Saint Callistus

First Reading: Exodus 17:8-13

Second Reading: 2 Timothy 3:14-4:2

Gospel: Luke 18:1-8

Today’s Gospel exhorts us to pray with persistence. This command is everywhere in the Bible. We see it in Abraham’s steady petition on behalf of the people of Sodom. We see it in today’s account of the persistent widow. We hear it in Jesus’s extraordinary teaching: “Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you.”

One reason that we don’t receive what we want through prayer is that we give up too easily. What could be behind this rule of prayer? Augustine said that God sometimes delays in giving us what we want because he wants our hearts to expand. The more ardently we desire something, the more ready we are when it comes, the more we treasure it. The very act of asking persistently is accomplishing something spiritually important. So when the Lord seems slow to answer your prayer, never give up.