Prayer and Fidelity!

Sunday, July 27, 2025

Seventeenth Sunday in Ordinary Time

Gen 18:20-32; Col 2:12-14; Lk 11:1-13

The seventeenth Sunday invites us to reflect on fidelity in prayer. It is our fidelity to God that explains the earnestness of our prayer. 

But when we think of prayer, several questions pop up: ‘Why should we pray? What should we pray about? Should we pray at all? If God is thoughtful, will He not care for me even if I don’t pray to Him? Does God demand our prayer for self-serving reasons?’ 

While these questions are inevitable for some, the readings of the day invite us to contemplate a different dimension within prayer. Fidelity, or faithfulness, is increasingly talked of as an integral dimension of prayer. 

The word ‘fidelity’ was strictly used to describe the marital bond. However, we increasingly understand the importance of fidelity even within friendship. To put it differently, wherever we talk of relationship, we talk of fidelity too. Since we consider prayer as a relationship with God, fidelity becomes the foundational virtue that should govern our relationship with God. 

Interestingly, the theme of fidelity runs through all three readings, signifying that our relationship with God should be enriched with the relational virtue. 

1. In the first reading, Abraham intercedes with God for saving the sinful cities from His wrath. One must have the nerve to negotiate and bargain with God. Bible scholars employ a unique term to describe Abraham’s negotiation with God. They call it ‘Holy Haggling’ to describe Abraham’s daring and masterful negotiation with God. By resorting to the expression ‘Far be it from you to do such a thing’ (v. 25), Abraham dares to even remind God of His duty to save and not destroy. While Abraham’s courage is exceptional, his approach is both diplomatic and humble at the same time. 

We may often wonder how Abraham could bargain with God. In my view, Abraham could haggle with God from his integrity. Such courage in Abraham would be unseen if not for his integrity. In our own life too, if not for our integrity, prayer amounts to nothing more than begging. With God, we need not beg thanks to the fact that we are His rightful children. But the question is if we still maintain our integrity as God’s beloved children. In Abraham’s example, his integrity was his fidelity to God. 

2. In the second reading, Paul highlights how we are morally and legally culpable, but our sins were nailed to the cross, and we were all saved. Jesus proved his fidelity and loyal love by dying for his friends on the cross. The example of Jesus’ crucifixion shows that a faithful friend like Jesus does not observe our suffering from afar as if he were totally negligent and indifferent to our misery but enters into it and proves his loyalty even when humanity was quite undeserving. Indeed, Jesus’ sacrifice was faithful love in action, extended toward the unworthy. 

In Paul’s explanation, we realize God’s friendship with humans, by which he abolished our sins. By his death, Jesus bore the cost of our wrongs. The radical forgiveness that Jesus exemplified took responsibility for our sins and did not overlook them. By nailing to the cross the record of our debt, Jesus took our place without abandoning us to face the judgement alone. If Jesus manifested the covenantal fidelity of God in his sacrifice, how are we faithful to the Author of our lives? Where do we go wrong? What must we do to set things right? 

3. In the Gospel, Jesus gives us the example of two ‘shameless friends.’ The one who asks is shameless to beg and shameless to persist despite receiving a no. The one who says no is shameless not to honor his friend’s urgent request and shameless to give it grumbling. While giving the example of human friendship to suggest persistence in prayer, Jesus calls God Father, the first time giving a personal and relational dimension to prayer, which was totally absent from the Jewish form of prayer. 

Though we see the two friends behaving in a shameless manner toward each other, Jesus explains prayer through two friends, each of whom had the freedom to say ‘no’ and the freedom to persist, respectively. Jesus wants us to use the example of the two friends to govern our prayer. Sometimes, we are disappointed with God. At times, we wonder why our prayers are not answered. Jesus asks us not to despair. We understand that in genuine friendships we have the liberty to say no, and because of some minor individual differences, we do not give up our friendship altogether. Now, by giving us the example of such friends, Jesus asks us, ‘Why don’t we do the same with God? Should we not feel free to haggle with God as Abraham did and move God through our prayer? Do we not have the liberty to argue with God as His beloved children? For Jesus, the relational term ‘Father’ implies so much freedom that we have been privileged with as rightful children of God. How are we going to honor the fidelity of God by which He is faithful to us and expects the same in return?

To conclude, we pray to God for our own sake and not for the sake of God. As we read, ‘Our praises add nothing to His greatness but profit us for our salvation. 

We need God more than He needs us. 

Let us pray that we may honor our relationship with God through our fidelity, the faithful love. 

Fr. Dhinakaran Savariyar