Collect taken from the mass of the day, Monday of the First Week of Ordinary Time
Collect: Attend to the pleas of your people with heavenly care, O Lord, we pray, that they may see what must be done and gain strength to do what they have seen. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son…
“Attend to the pleas of your people with heavenly care, O Lord, we pray”
-Short and to the point, the Church begs of God to hear us and care for us. Yet, the request the Church is about to make of us is not for our own comfort, but for the grace to be more fully what we already are: baptized Christians walking in the way of the Lord.
“that they may see what must be done and gain strength to do what they have seen”
– It is fitting that this is the first collect of Ordinary Time. “Ordinary” does not mean “plain” but instead means “regular” or “methodical.” We have this time as a way to remind us of the regular and constant demands of the Christian life. Part of this is the faith to recognize the requests God makes of us precisely through the ordinary events of our lives.
Questions & Advice: Have you ever asked God about your vocation, about what you should do with your life or do you only think about what you want? Are you waiting for a booming voice from the sky in order to tell you your vocation? Is your primary concern with your own comfort and pleasure or are your more invested in doing what is right and in doing what will help other people?
God speaks to use through what we experience in daily life. If you see problems and difficulties in the world or in the lives of others, do you ever pause to consider if you can help with that problem? The fact is that most of us will find our vocation through this kind of reflection and not through some miraculous voice or vision. Not only that, but this is also the way to lead our daily lives and answer the smaller, more ordinary requests that God makes of us.
Spend some time in prayer with this collect. Pray it out loud if it helps. Ask God to give you the grace to recognize his voice in the daily needs you encounter. Then, firmly resolve to take more notice of the needs of others and the demands of justice around you. Then, seek the grace to do it.
Finally, Do It!
