ACC ~ Matthew 6 v6

THE BEDROOM OF OUR HEARTS

HILARY: We are asked to pray with the bedroom door closed, as it were, and we are taught to pour out our prayer in every place. The saints’ prayers were undertaken in the presence of wild animals, in prisons, in flames, from the depths of the sea and the belly of the beast. Hence we are admonished not to enter the recesses of our homes but the bedroom of our hearts. With the office of our minds closed, we pray to God not with many words but with our conscience, for every act is superior to the words of speakers. ON MATTHEW 5.1. [1]

[1] SC 254:150.

ENTERING THE INNER CHAMBER

AUGUSTINE: Enter into your inner chamber. Do not let the door stand open to the boisterous, through whom the things that are outside profanely rush in and assail the inner self. SERMON ON THE MOUNT 2.3.11. [1]

[1] PL 34:1274; NPNF 1 6:37**; ACW 5:101. The door to external temporal and physical attractions must be shut so that full attentiveness can be given to God, by cleansing the inmost heart.

CLEANSING THE HEART

AUGUSTINE: Outside the inner chamber are all things in time and space, which knock on the door. Through our bodily senses they clamor to interrupt our prayer, so that prayer is invaded with a crowd of vain phantoms. This is why you must shut the door. The senses of the body are resisted, that the spirit of prayer may be directed to the Father. This occurs in the inmost heart, where prayer is offered to the Father in secret. There “your Father who sees in secret will reward you.” This is a fitting conclusion to good counsel, not merely calling us to pray but also showing us how, not merely calling us to give alms but also showing the right spirit for doing so. The instruction is to cleanse the heart. Nothing cleanses the heart but the undivided and single-minded striving after eternal life from the pure love of wisdom alone. SERMON ON THE MOUNT 2.3.11. [1]

[1] PL 34:1274; NPNF 1 6:37**; ACW 5:101.

SHUTTING OUT ALL EXTERNAL CARES

ANONYMOUS: These things are better understood in a spiritual sense, as spoken about the soul. “Room” is the heart, or the inner, that is, spiritual intellect. It has been written, “That which you say in your hearts, also grieve for in private.” [1] The doorway is the exterior, bodily sense through which all things, good and bad, enter upon the soul. So also in the Canticle, Wisdom speaks in the person of the church: “Lo, my beloved knocks at the door, ‘Open to me, my sister, my dearest.’” [2] Christ too knocks at the door of the Christian, entering the heart either through the divine Scriptures or good thoughts. The one who receives them opens oneself to Christ. The one who sends them away shuts the door. For this reason Jesus orders that the soul enter the inward understanding when it prays, so that it thinks of nothing except for what it prays and to whom it prays. Thus it closes the doorway of its bodily sense, so that it may shut outside all external thoughts and cares. INCOMPLETE WORK ON MATTHEW, HOMILY 13. [3]

[1] Ps 4:4 .

[2] Song 5:2.

[3] PG 56:709-10.

EXAMPLES OF PRAYING IN SECRET

CHROMATIUS: We find in the books of Kings that very holy woman Hannah fulfilling the precepts of this Gospel teaching. For while praying without uttering a sound, in her heart and in the sight of God, she poured out her desire in her prayers. She was immediately found worthy to be heard by the Lord. [1] In the same way the Lord granted to Daniel, who always prayed in secret with three servants, to understand the interpretations of his dream and the secrets of revelation. [2] Cornelius too, not yet instructed in the precepts of the gospel, prayed secretly and faithfully in his room and was found worthy to hear the voice of the angel speaking. [3] What should we say of Jonah, who, not only in his room but trapped in the stomach of the whale, deserved so greatly to be heard through his prayers that from the depths of the sea and from the belly of so great a beast he escaped unharmed and alive? [4] TRACTATE ON MATTHEW 27.1.4-5. [5]

[1] 1 Sam 1:13-17.

[2] Dan 1:17.

[3] Acts 10:1-4.

[4] Jon 2:1-11.

[5] CCL 9a:325-26.