Thursday, September 20, 2012

Prayer of St Ignatius of Loyola

During morning assembly for my high school days at St Joseph's Institution, a student at the podium would lead the school in morning prayer. There is a stock of prayers in the student handbook, of which one would be chosen to be recited for the morning prayer. One of the prayer that was used occasionally is this prayer that is attributed to a person named St Ignatius. It goes as follows:

Lord, I freely yield all my freedom to you.
Take my memory, my intellect and my entire will.
You have given me anything I am or have;
I give it all back to you to stand under your will alone.
Your love and your grace are enough for me;
I shall ask for nothing more.


I abstained from saying this prayer with the assembly because I felt that I would not truly mean what I say. I felt that it would be too difficult for me to accept the prospect of my memory, intellect, and entire being taken from me, and I did not want to say such a prayer casually without truly meaning what I say.

I do place a significant value on the trait of intellect in my life. However, I do realize that having an attachment to such traits can be a vulnerability for me in my faith in God. Indeed, whenever I do badly for my school grades, I find myself greatly angst beyond reasonable proportions against God such that I am profoundly affected in my faith. It is an unhealthy response.

The prayer said by St Ignatius is one that expresses a genuine faith in God, and I suppose if I should be rational about it, I should not be worried about saying such a prayer because indeed, God's love and grace should be enough for a person.

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