This goal of this session is to bring God to the awareness of the listeners. This awareness begins with God's love for us and his attitude towards us. The presentation transitions to how we might respond to him using prayer, touching on ways we pray today and how we might improve on prayer to build a stronger relationship with God. Encouragement to spend time in prayer every day is supported by what God can do for us when we reach out to him and how our efforts can help us filter the messages of this world.

As the focus of this seminar began with pre-confirmation students, this session introduces a Novena to the Holy Spirit on behalf of the current confirmation candidates as a first step in building a habit of prayer. The Novena is optional as circumstances vary. Any other Novena and/or devotion and prayer intention could be substituted.

First presented: St Paul Catholic Church, Damascus, MD; 2009-2010.

Presentation

God loves you! [pause] Do you know that?
God LOVES YOU! He DELIGHTS in you! [pause] Do you KNOW this? Do you UNDERSTAND this?

When you walk into the church on Sunday, his heart flutters with excitement that you are there to be with him! When you arrive for your Religious Education class, He reaches out to welcome you! He cries out to you, "I am so excited to see you. Be with me and let me be with you. Let me share myself with you."

How can we understand the kind of love that God has for us? How can we respont to it?

Prayer is part of who we are! It is how we allow God to become closer to us. When we love someone (or like them very much), we want to spend as much time with them as we can. Sometimes, not even doing anything, just hanging out. This is how God loves us. He wants to hang out with us, every minute of every day. Our offering of prayer is a response to his love for us. We may not feel the love, but we choose to act on that love. But it is sometimes difficult to take the action of prayer.

The world has programmed us to be active and entertained. And so we go to mass or go to prayer expecting and waiting for that entertainment value. Entertainment can be a part of prayer and sometimes is appropriate to build people up, but it is not the intent or the purpose. The intent of prayer is to bring us closer to God and to make God more present in our daily lives and in our world. 

You may ask, "Why doesn't God act? Why does He let things go the way they sometimes do?" Well, ask yourself this, "Do I pray? When do I pray. How do I pray? What do I pray for?" God created us, but gave us FREE WILL. That means, He will not act unless we ask him to. But even more importantly, we need to also be willing to be his hands and feet and eyes and ears. We must give God permission to act and to use us to accomplish his will.

Through prayer, we open ourselves up to his love and his will. We don't have to be good at it or even be that into it. We just have to do it. We don't even have to hear what God says or know what his will is. All we have to do is be available to him. Sometimes God choosed to affirm us or build us up by helping us recognize his presence, hear his voice or know his will and that is a great gift. But even that is not necessary to accomplish his will.

We pray when we go to mass, more or less depending on our attitude. We pray at meal times, sometimes first thing in the morning or before bed. Sometimes we pray for special reasons. We have a special reason to pray now. Last year's confirmation II candidates will be confirmed on October 11th. They really need our prayers. As they make final preparations for confirmation, our prayers will help them grow in anticipation of and desire for the sacrament and the grace of a new union with Jesus through the Holy Spirit. They need our prayers so that on the day of their confirmation, their hearts, minds, bodies and souls are open to receiving all the gifts that God wants to give them and for the grace to recognize, use and build on the gifts they are given. This is such an important time for our confirmation candidates. Soon you will be preparing and will benefit from your peers praying for you. Do this now for them.

The prayer is a "devotional." We use devotions to express a particular request to a particular member of Gods family. A novena is a nine-day series of prayers. This Novena will be to the Holy Spirit, since confirmation is receiving the Holy Spirit, the same Holy Spirit that we received at Baptism, but with the capacity for greater presence, activity and influence in our lives. The prayers begin on October 2nd and finish on October 10th. Carve out just 5 minutes in each day, first thing in the morning, right after school, after homework, after dinner, before bed, whenever it works best for you. Find a special place in your house or in your room to set aside for the prayer time. Sit, kneel, stand, however you are comfortable. Make the novena on your own or with your entire family! The more that pray, the more graces our candidates will receive through our prayers. So storm heaven, be prayer warriers! GO TEAM!