Top Five habits to Motivate Prayer

Prayer is our conversation with God. There is no wrong way to pray...but here are the TOP FIVE THINGS you can do RIGHT NOW to help your prayer life!

Holiness is hard! Just ask Saint Augustine who famously prayed: God give me chastity...but not now!

We all long for holiness and we all long for a more profound prayer life. These are the TOP FIVE habits to develop NOW to motivate prayer.

No. 5: Morning Offering:

The Morning Offering is an easy prayer and the surest way to start your day by offering it to the Lord.

Saint Jose Escriva wrote in his book, The Way: Conquer yourself each day from the very first moment, getting up on the dot, at a fixed time, without yielding a single minute to laziness. If, with God’s help, you conquer yourself, you will be well ahead for the rest of the day. (The Way, 191) … The heroic minute. It is the time fixed for getting up. Without hesitation: a supernatural reflection and… up! The heroic minute: here you have a mortification that strengthens your will and does no harm to your body. (The Way, 206)

So, we can see how helpful it is that upon waking, we turn immediately to prayer. Now. I know many of you, myself included, can’t help turning to our little devices to check the news, check our social media...resist! Instead, turn to the Lord in the morning offering.

No. 4: Night Prayer:

In the sacred tradition of the Church, night prayer is a part of the Liturgy of the Hours. Those prayers said specifically religious and priests and have their origin in the 150 psalms of the Old Testament.

Jews, including Jesus, prayed the psalms at regular hours. The psalms speak the language of the soul, either by praising God or imploring his assistance.

Night prayer has a special place in the liturgy as it reflects our human frailty, our need for God, and finally our desire for a happy death. A final reconciliation after an examination of conscience. Nothing prepares the Christian for confession and an encounter with the Lord quite like Night prayer.

No. 3 Spiritual Reading:

If you love to read and like to learn about the lives of the saints...or simply want to find a way to prepare for Sunday Mass... try spiritual reading. This can be anything that elevates our minds to God and His truths. So, the gospel readings for Mass or a good book on the life of your favorite saint are easy ways to get into spiritual reading.

Just try 10 minutes a day, just TEN! And you will find your prayer life enter a deeper level.

No. 2 Mental Prayer:

No. 3 and 2 really can go hand in hand. Mental prayer is the habit of reading scripture and reflecting on it. Use your imagination to enter into the Word of God. Picturing yourself among the people you encounter in scripture. This is a POWERFUL way to engage our senses in the Word.

Start with just 10 minutes of Mental Prayer every day. Just 10 minutes! Start with the day’s Mass readings. Don’t just read: Meditate on the words. Pray the words. Read slowly. Pause. Apply the words to your own life. Enter into conversation with God regarding the Word. Repeat this until you have a sense that it is a good time to pause for the day. Slowly buildup 5 minutes at a time until you can do at least 30 minutes of mental prayer. I promise you: time with God in His Word is never wasted.

No. 1 Mass:

The source and summit of our faith. In the Mass we have all the elements of our faith: in the Liturgy of the Word, we are fed from the “table of his Word” (USCCB). We encounter God in community and in scripture.

In the liturgy of the Eucharist, we encounter God in his Real Presence, and our soul is fed with Him. The priest collects our hopes and prayers and offers them to the Lord. Then the Lord responds by offering Himself to us as heavenly food. The only food worthy of our souls.

When you can, add an extra Mass besides the Sunday obligation to your week. You will find that nothing draws you closer or motivates prayer quite like the Mass.