by Rev. Deacon Lawrence A. St. Onge

Today’s 1^st reading is a continuation from yesterday. Yesterday we were heard that Hannah, one of the two wives of Elkanah, was barren – without children – and that Elkanah’s other wife, who had children, made it a point to constantly remind Hannah of the fact that God had left her barren.

In today’s reading Hannah is in the temple praying, lamenting her barrenness and passionately petitioning God to favor her with a male child. She vows, that if God looks upon her misery and has pity on her, and so grants her petition, she will give the child to the Lord for as long as he lives. Consider for a moment, if you will, what it is that Hannah promises the Lord if he accedes to her request and grants her a male child. She promises that if God gives her what she desires most in life, she will turn around and give it back to the Lord -- a sacrificial offering to God, if you will. Now, that is something worth reflecting upon.

But it is in her pleading with God that Hannah presents us with a picture of heartfelt prayer. She has a conversation with the Lord and pours out her troubles to him. It is her deep sorrow and misery, which prompt her prayer, and God hears her supplications – the same God who raises up the needy and the poor that we heard about in the Responsorial Psalm. God can bear our pain, or suffering, even our anger and frustration if we allow him.

Prayer, then, is simply and always turning to God, with passion if necessary, and pouring out our hearts to Him, in faith, hope and trust, knowing that the presence of the Lord will replace our loneliness and isolation, and we will be lifted up. It is that knowledge that gives us hope. That is what happened to Hannah. That is why further on in the reading it says, that after she left the shrine, "she went to her quarters and ate and drank with her husband, and no longer appeared downcast." Because of her new found hope in God through her heartfelt prayer, Hannah could now echo the words of today’s psalm: "I have swallowed up my enemies; I rejoice in my victory. My heart exults in the Lord, my Savior."