Youcat commented through CCC – Question n. 518 – Part I.

YOUCAT Question n. 518 - Part I. If the Father is “in heaven”, where is that heaven?

(Youcat answer) Heaven is wherever God is. The word “heaven” does not designate a place but, rather, indicates God’s presence, which is not bound by space and time.

A deepening through CCC

(CCC 2794) This biblical expression does not mean a place (“space"), but a way of being; it does not mean that God is distant, but majestic. Our Father is not "elsewhere": he transcends everything we can conceive of his holiness. It is precisely because he is thrice holy that he is so close to the humble and contrite heart. "Our Father who art in heaven" is rightly understood to mean that God is in the hearts of the just, as in his holy temple. At the same time, it means that those who pray should desire the one they invoke to dwell in them (St. Augustine, De serm. Dom. in monte 2, 5, 18: PL 34, 1277). "Heaven" could also be those who bear the image of the heavenly world, and in whom God dwells and tarries (St. Cyril of Jerusalem, Catech. myst. 5:11: PG 33, 1117).

Reflecting and meditating 

(Youcat comment) We should not look for heaven above the clouds. Wherever we turn to God in his glory and to our neighbor in his need; wherever we experience the joys of love; whenever we convert and allow ourselves to be reconciled with God, heaven opens there. “Not that God is where heaven is, but rather heaven is where God is” (Gerhard Ebeling). 

(CCC Comment)

(CCC 2796) When the Church prays "our Father who art in heaven," she is professing that we are the People of God, already seated "with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus" and "hidden with Christ in God" (Eph 2:6; Col 3:3); yet at the same time, "here indeed we groan, and long to put on our heavenly dwelling" (2 Cor 5:2; cf. Phil 3:20; Heb 13:14). [Christians] are in the flesh, but do not live according to the flesh. They spend their lives on earth, but are citizens of heaven (Ad Diognetum 5: PG 2, 1173).

 
(This question If the Father is “in heaven”, where is that heaven? is continued)

Youcat commented through CCC – Question n. 517 – Part III.

YOUCAT Question n. 517- Part III. How are we changed by the Our Father?

(Youcat answer) The Our Father allows us to discover joyfully that we are children of one Father. Our common vocation is to praise our Father and to live together as though “of one heart and soul” (Acts 4:32).    

A deepening through CCC

(CCC 2790) Grammatically, "our" qualifies a reality common to more than one person. There is only one God, and he is recognized as Father by those who, through faith in his only Son, are reborn of him by water and the Spirit (Cf. 1 Jn 5:1; Jn 3:5). The Church is this new communion of God and men. United with the only Son, who has become "the firstborn among many brethren," she is in communion with one and the same Father in one and the same Holy Spirit (Rom 8:29; Cf. Eph 4:4-6). In praying "our" Father, each of the baptized is praying in this communion: "The company of those who believed were of one heart and soul" (Acts 4:32).    

Reflecting and meditating 

(Youcat comment) Because God the Father loves each of his children with the same exclusive love, as though we were the only object of his devotion, we too must get along together in a completely new way: peacefully, full of consideration and love, so that each one can be the awe-inspiring miracle that he actually is in God’s sight.   

(CCC Comment)

(CCC 2791) For this reason, in spite of the divisions among Christians, this prayer to "our" Father remains our common patrimony and an urgent summons for all the baptized. In communion by faith in Christ and by Baptism, they ought to join in Jesus' prayer for the unity of his disciples (Cf. UR 8; 22).

(The next question is: If the Father is “in heaven”, where is that heaven?)

Youcat commented through CCC – Question n. 517 – Part II.

YOUCAT Question n. 517- Part II. How are we changed by the Our Father?

(Youcat answer) The Our Father allows us to discover joyfully that we are children of one Father. Our common vocation is to praise our Father and to live together as though “of one heart and soul” (Acts 4:32).   

A deepening through CCC

(CCC 2789) When we pray to "our" Father, we personally address the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. By doing so we do not divide the Godhead, since the Father is its "source and origin," but rather confess that the Son is eternally begotten by him and the Holy Spirit proceeds from him. We are not confusing the persons, for we confess that our communion is with the Father and his Son, Jesus Christ, in their one Holy Spirit. The Holy Trinity is consubstantial and indivisible. When we pray to the Father, we adore and glorify him together with the Son and the Holy Spirit.

   Reflecting and meditating 

(Youcat comment) Because God the Father loves each of his children with the same exclusive love, as though we were the only object of his devotion, we too must get along together in a completely new way: peacefully, full of consideration and love, so that each one can be the awe-inspiring miracle that he actually is in God’s sight.     

(CCC Comment)

(CCC 2801) When we say "Our" Father, we are invoking the new covenant in Jesus Christ, communion with the Holy Trinity, and the divine love which spreads through the Church to encompass the world.   

(This question: How are we changed by the Our Father? is continued)

Youcat commented through CCC – Question n. 517 – Part I.

YOUCAT Question n. 517- Part I. How are we changed by the Our Father?

(Youcat answer) The Our Father allows us to discover joyfully that we are children of one Father. Our common vocation is to praise our Father and to live together as though “of one heart and soul” (Acts 4:32).   

A deepening through CCC

(CCC 2787) When we say "our" Father, we recognize first that all his promises of love announced by the prophets are fulfilled in the new and eternal covenant in his Christ: we have become "his" people and he is henceforth "our" God. This new relationship is the purely gratuitous gift of belonging to each other: we are to respond to "grace and truth" given us in Jesus Christ with love and faithfulness (Jn 1:17; Cf. Hos 2:21-22; 6:1-6).   

Reflecting and meditating 

(Youcat comment) Because God the Father loves each of his children with the same exclusive love, as though we were the only object of his devotion, we too must get along together in a completely new way: peacefully, full of consideration and love, so that each one can be the awe-inspiring miracle that he actually is in God’s sight. 

(CCC Comment)

(CCC 2788) Since the Lord's Prayer is that of his people in the "endtime," this "our" also expresses the certitude of our hope in God's ultimate promise: in the new Jerusalem he will say to the victor, "I will be his God and he shall be my son" (Rev 21:7).      

(This question: How are we changed by the Our Father? is continued)

Youcat commented through CCC – Question n. 516.

YOUCAT Question n. 516 - How can people say “Father” to God if they have been tormented or abandoned by their earthly father / their earthly parents?

(Youcat answer) Human fathers and mothers often distort the image of a kind, fatherly God. Our Father in heaven, however, is not the same as our experiences of human parents. We must purify our image of God from all our own ideas so as to be able to encounter him with unconditional trust.

A deepening through CCC

(CCC 2779 a) Before we make our own this first exclamation of the Lord's Prayer, we must humbly cleanse our hearts of certain false images drawn "from this world." Humility makes us recognize that "no one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son and anyone to whom the Son chooses to reveal him," that is, "to little children" (Mt 11:25-27). The purification of our hearts has to do with paternal or maternal images, stemming from our personal and cultural history, and influencing our relationship with God.

Reflecting and meditating 

(Youcat comment) Even individuals who have been raped by their own father can learn to pray the Our Father. Often it is their task in life to allow themselves to experience a love that was cruelly refused them by others but that nevertheless exists in a marvelous way, beyond all human imagining.

(CCC Comment)

(CCC 2779 b) God our Father transcends the categories of the created world. To impose our own ideas in this area "upon him" would be to fabricate idols to adore or pull down. To pray to the Father is to enter into his mystery as he is and as the Son has revealed him to us. The expression God the Father had never been revealed to anyone. When Moses himself asked God who he was, he heard another name. The Father's name has been revealed to us in the Son, for the name "Son" implies the new name "Father" (Tertullian De orat. 3: PL 1, 1155).

(The next question is: How are we changed by the Our Father?)