B16 on Prayer as service

This is something the Pope said last Wednesday when he was talking to visitors at his summer home in Castel Gondolfo (August 13 2008) (emphasis mine)

I know well that the first service I can render the Church and humanity is, in fact, prayer, because by praying I confidently place in the Lord's hands the ministry that he himself has entrusted to me, together with the destiny of the whole ecclesial and civil community.

Those who pray never lose hope, even when they find themselves in difficult and even humanly desperate situations. Sacred Scripture teaches us this and it is attested in the history of the Church. How many examples, in fact, we can recall of situations in which it was precisely prayer that sustained the journey of saints of the Christian people!

He says it much better than I can. It is this 'service rendered to the Church' that I want this blog to be about.