The Apostles creed

"Our Father" - God wants us to approach Him as "Daddy" (Aramaic: Abba). 
He wants to take care of us and protect us. God desires intimacy. 
Remember, He has infinite love and grace. 
God wants us to be secure in His family as adopted children and heirs.


"Who Art in Heaven" -- Look up to God. Obey Him and Love Him and Trust Him. 
He is all-powerful and can deal with all our problems, even the big ones. But He loves us so much that He doesn't stay up there.

"Hallowed be Thy Name" -- Holy, holy, holy. Approach God with awe and wonder. Save the word "awesome" for God. Live a life that honors Him.


"Thy Kingdom Come" - "Take this job and love it!"  Working on behalf of God's kingdom is the ultimate joy.  Bloom where you're planted. Do everything as unto the Lord. Find your gifts and use them.
Be open to God's leading each day.

"Thy Will Be Done" - God is the potter; we are the clay. God keeps us spinning on His potter's wheel, shaping and reshaping us as He bathes our lives in tears to make us more Christ-like so He can use us for His will. Surrender daily. Keep your clay moist through daily prayer.


"On Earth as it is in Heaven" -- Thy will be done - not my will be done!


"Give Us This Day Our Daily Bread" - Trust! God will provide for our needs. His eye is on the sparrow and I know He cares for me.


"Forgive Us Our Debts as We Forgive Our Debtors" -- Forgiveness = Surrender. Don't carry your own backpack - surrender it to Him. 
Revealing the feeling is the beginning of healing. 
Act as if you have forgiven and the feeling will follow. 
In our weakness, God sends His strength and peace..
"Lead Us Not Into Temptation" - Watch for unrecognized temptation. 
Pray, so you won't fall. We are tempted every day. 
It deepens our walk and strengthens our faith - but be careful of spiritual blindness. Open my eyes, Lord, to my blind spots - use honest friends and family
"Deliver Us From Evil" -- The evil One, satan. 
We are saved from death to life. 
Jesus is more powerful than Satan - God is greater!


"For Thine Is the Kingdom (obedience), and the Power (confidence) and the Glory (joy), Forever" -- This is our Father's world. 
Everything we have is His. He is the ruler!

Descubriendo el Siglo 21

Discovering 21century

Fr Tomás Del Valle-Reyes

P. O. BOX 1170

New York, NY 10018

(212) 244 4778

www.descubriendoelsiglo21.com/

Teach us how to Pray: Luke 11.1

The disciples asked Jesus to “Teach us how to pray,"
He just answered by teaching them the prayer we call the
Our Father or The Lord's Prayer.
The Lord's Prayer is a basic Christian prayer.
As a model of prayer, every Christian learns it by heart.
It appears everywhere in the church's life: in its liturgy and
sacraments, in public and private prayer.
It 's a prayer Christians treasure.
Though we memorize it as a set formula, the Lord's Prayer shouldn't be repeated mechanically or without thought. Its purpose is to awaken and stimulate our faith. 
Through this prayer Jesus invites us to approach God as Father. 
Indeed, the Lord's Prayer has been called a summary of the gospel.
Our Father, who art in heaven,hallowed be thy name.
When Moses approached God on Mount Sinai, he heard a voice saying, "Do not come near; put off your shoes from your feet, for the place on which you are standing is holy ground."
An infinite chasm separates us from the transcendent God.
In the Lord's Prayer, Jesus invites us to draw near to God who is beyond human understanding, who dwells in mystery, who is all holy. 
We can call God "our Father".
Calling God "Father" does not mean that God is masculine. 
God is beyond the categories of gender, of masculine or feminine. None of our descriptions of God is adequate. 
God, who is "in heaven", whose name is holy, cannot be fully known by us.
By calling God "Father" we are more rightly describing ourselves and our relationship with God.
Jesus teaches that we have a filial relationship with God; God sees us as if we were a daughter or a son. 
And we, on our part, can approach God in the familiar confident way a child approaches a loving parent.
What is more, we approach God through God's only Son, Jesus Christ, who unites us to himself.
Thy Kingdom come,thy will be done,on earth as it is in heaven.
God's kingdom. Jesus often said that God's power would appear and renew all creation.
God like a mighty king would rule over the earth according to a plan that unfolds from the beginning of the world. God's kingdom would be marked by peace and justice.
Good would be rewarded and evil punished.
The kingdom, according to Jesus, is not far off, but already present in our midst, though not yet revealed.
In the Lord's prayer we pray that God's kingdom come, that God's will, which is for our good, be done on earth as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread.
We are God's children. What can be more childlike than this petition in which we pray for our daily bread, a word that describes all those physical, human and spiritual gifts we need to live. 
With the confidence of children we say: "Give us this day what we need."
Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us.
This petition of the Lord's Prayer is a demanding one. 
Not only do we ask God's forgiveness for our daily offenses, but we link God's forgiveness of us with our forgiveness of others.  
Forgiving others is not always easy to do. 
We need God's help to do it. But it must be done or we ourselves cannot receive God's mercy.
And lead us not into temptation,but deliver us from evil.  
Amen.
 Life is not easy. It is a daily battle. Trials like sickness and failure can crush our spirits. 
False values and easy promises can entice us and even destroy our souls. 
And so we ask God to keep us from failing when we are tested, to help us to know the right thing to do, to deliver us from the evil which awaits us in life.
The Lord's Prayer sums up the teaching of Jesus. It is also a prayer that offers the grace of Jesus: his reverence for God, his childlike confidence in his Father, and his power to go bravely through life no matter what comes. When we pray his prayer, his spirit becomes our own.

Fr. Tomas Del Valle-Reyes

Discovering 21 Century /Descubriendo el siglo 21

P. O. BOX 1170

New York, NY 10018

212.244-4778

The Lord's Prayer

In Luke 11, 1 the disciples asked Jesus to “Teach them how to pray,"  
He just answered by teaching them the prayer we call the Our Father or The Lord's Prayer.
The Lord's Prayer is a basic Christian prayer. 
As a model of prayer, every Christian learns it by heart. 
It appears everywhere in the church's life: in its liturgy and sacraments, in public and private prayer. It 's a prayer Christians treasure.
Though we memorize it as a set formula, the Lord's Prayer shouldn't be repeated mechanically or without thought. 
Its purpose is to awaken and stimulate our faith. 
Through this prayer Jesus invites us to approach God as Father. Indeed, the Lord's Prayer has been called a summary of the gospel.
Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name.
When Moses approached God on Mount Sinai, he heard a voice saying, "Do not come near; put off your shoes from your feet, for the place on which you are standing is holy ground."  
An infinite chasm separates us from the transcendent God.
In the Lord's Prayer, Jesus invites us to draw near to God who is beyond human understanding, who dwells in mystery, who is all holy. We can call God "Our Father".
Calling God "Father" does not mean that God is masculine. 
God is beyond the categories of gender, of masculine or feminine.
None of our descriptions of God is adequate. 
God, who is "in heaven", whose name is holy, cannot be fully known by us.
By calling God "Father" we are more rightly describing ourselves and our relationship with God. Jesus teaches that we have a filial relationship with God; God sees us as if we were a daughter or a son. 
And we, on our part, can approach God in the familiar confident way a child approaches a loving parent. What is more, we approach God through God's only Son, Jesus Christ, who unites us to himself .
Thy Kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.God's kingdom. Jesus often said that God's power would appear and renew all creation. 
God like a mighty king would rule over the earth according to a plan that unfolds from the beginning of the world. 
God's kingdom would be marked by peace and justice. 
Good would be rewarded and evil punished. 
The kingdom, according to Jesus, is not far off, but already present in our midst, though not yet revealed.
In the Lord's prayer we pray that God's kingdom come, that God's will, which is for our good, be done on earth as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread.
We are God's children. What can be more childlike than this petition in which we pray for our daily bread, a word that describes all those physical, human and spiritual gifts we need to live. 
With the confidence of children we say: "Give us this day what we need."Forgive us our trespasses,
as we forgive those who trespass against us.
This petition of the Lord's Prayer is a demanding one. 
Not only do we ask God's forgiveness for our daily offenses, but we link God's forgiveness of us with our forgiveness of others. 
Forgiving others is not always easy to do.
We need God's help to do it. But it must be done or we ourselves cannot receive God's mercy.
And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. Amen.
Life is not easy. It is a daily battle. 
Trials like sickness and failure can crush our spirits. False values and easy promises can entice us and even destroy our souls.
And so we ask God to keep us from failing when we are tested, to help us to know the right thing to do, to deliver us from the evil which awaits us in life.
The Lord's Prayer sums up the teaching of Jesus. 
It is also a prayer that offers the grace of Jesus: his reverence for God, his childlike confidence in his Father, and his power to go bravely through life no matter what comes.
When we pray his prayer, his spirit becomes our own.
Rev. Father  Tomas del Valle-Reyes

Descubriendo el Siglo 21

Discovering 21century

Fr Tomás Del Valle-Reyes

P. O. BOX 1170

New York, NY 10018

(212) 244 4778

www.descubriendoelsiglo21.com/