Lesson two at Benedict XVI’s School of Prayer

“'Digital man just like the caveman, looks for religious ways to overcome his limitations and to ensure his precarious earthly adventure”, said Pope Benedict XVI Wednesday. In his second lesson in the cycle dedicated to prayer, the Holy Father decided to speak to the tens of thousands of pilgrims in St Peter’s Square about the human being’s religious sense.

“In our catechesis on Christian prayer, we have seen how prayer is part of the universal human experience. Our own age, marked by secularism, rationalism and an apparent eclipse of God, is showing signs of a renewed religious sense and a recognition of the inadequacy of a purely horizontal, material vision of life”.

“Life without a transcendent horizon -''said Pope Benedict in comments in Italian- would be without meaning and happiness', for which we all yearn”. ''Man by his very nature is religious – he continued–he is homo religiosus just as he is homo sapiens and homo faber”.

“Man is made in the image of God; a desire for God is present in every heart and man in some way knows that he is capable of speaking to God in prayer. Saint Thomas Aquinas tells us that prayer is the expression of our desire for God, a desire which is itself God’s gift. Prayer is first and foremost a matter of the heart, where we experience God’s call and our dependence on his help to transcend our limitations and sinfulness”.

He continued in Italian “The prediction of those who, since the Enlightenment, heralded the demise of religions and praised an absolute reason, detached from faith, has failed. " However, admitted the Pope, "praying is difficult. In fact, prayer, is the place par excellence for gratuitous tension toward the Unseen, the Unexpected and the Ineffable. Therefore, 'the experience of prayer is a challenge to all, a 'grace' to be invoked, a gift from Him to which we are called”.

“The posture of kneeling at prayer expresses this acknowledgment of our need and our openness to God’s gift of himself in a mysterious encounter of friendship. Let us resolve to pray more frequently, to listen in the silence of our hearts to God’s voice, and to grow in union with the God who has revealed himself in Jesus Christ, with the One who is infinite Love”.

* * * * *

“I offer a warm greeting to the Missionary Benedictine Sisters of Tutzing visiting Rome for a programme of spiritual renewal. Upon all the English-speaking pilgrims and visitors present at today’s Audience, especially those from England, Australia, India, Indonesia, Japan, Canada and the United States, I invoke an abundance of joy and peace in the Risen Christ!". Listen to Emer McCarthy's report::