A few months after I started my first assignment, I got a call on the non-emergency line from a family that had some big stuff going on that they wanted to process as a family. They were excited, nervous, and pretty much every other emotion on the spectrum, and they called me because they thought it would be nice to have one of their parish priests around to pray with them as everybody talked through important vocational stuff. I told them I’d be there, and when we got off the phone, I stared out the window for a few moments and thought about how much I love being a priest, precisely because of moments like that one. Getting called into moments when people see their need for God’s grace is what it’s all about.

That moment, and others like it, serve as reminders that there is always something going on in people’s lives that others wouldn’t normally know about. Too often we push through those moments alone rather than invite God and our brothers and sisters into them, so I encourage all of us, as a parish family, to do two things: be intentional about praying with one another, and please invite your priests and deacons to pray with you and your loved ones when big things are happening. All three of the parables in the Gospel this   weekend have to do with God’s merciful love  and the boundless joy He has when a lost sheep returns to Him. One of the greatest things we can do to reach out to the lost sheep is to ask people how we can pray for them in their struggles, and then to do so. In a world in which people are often uncomfortable with open displays of the Faith, you might be surprised how open   people are to be prayed for when there is     something  difficult  happening in their lives.
 
Our parishes thrive when they are obvious places of grace and mercy. If the hundreds of people who come to Mass at our parish on any given weekend were to go out into the world  and pray with as many people as possible, it would be nigh unto impossible for us not to become a transformative place. The Father      rejoices when His lost children return to Him, and how blessed we are to have the chance to   be a part of that reunion. May God grant us the grace of boldness in prayer, and may we always be grateful for the opportunities to pray into    the most meaningful, difficult, and beautiful moments of peoples’ lives.