Member Log InDictionary.com defines "habit" as "an acquired behavior pattern regularly followed until it has become almost involuntary." It gives an example: "the habit of looking both ways before crossing the street." Suffice it to say, though I grew up in the country where the nearest neighbor was several hundred feet up the road, I needed frequent reminders from my parents about the caution required in looking both ways before crossing the road. Cars and trucks whizzed by our house upwards of 50 miles per hour. There were no "pedestrian" warning signs. My habit of looking didn't develop after one or two tries. In retrospect, it does seem that the habit developed rather easily in time, however.
Developing the habit of daily prayer was a bit more of a challenge. There were multiple starts and stops over the years, the enthusiasm after having prayed daily for a week sinking into disappointment when, it seemed, life pulled me away from daily prayer for the next week or longer. It wasn't until I was about 30 years old, after a significant life-changing event, that the habit of daily prayer (daily Mass attendance, actually) developed.
I was a new physician, fresh out of training, in a new community, having joined a group practice as a family doctor. My heart's desire was to serve families through my profession. Though I had completed a three-year residency training at a Catholic hospital, I finished the training program convinced - despite what I knew to be the truth of Catholic teaching about life and fertility management - that, in order to be a good family physician I needed to provide contraceptive medicine to my patients of childbearing age. After all, I reasoned, why would a Catholic hospital permit me to learn this aspect of medical practice if it weren't (for reasons that I rationalized completely) "okay"?
Shortly after settling into our new community, a young parochial vicar from the other Catholic parish in town (there were two Catholic churches in our community) called me and invited me to meet with him. I was buoyed that a priest wanted to get to know me. We were contemporaries, both 29 years of age; he was starting his second year of priesthood. We met at the rectory of "the other Catholic church" - his rectory - on a Saturday afternoon.
His office was small, and his desk even smaller. He sat behind his desk; I sat in a chair directly in front of him. He was (is) a friendly chap, and we made small introductory talk, when he spoke his desire that I "become the Catholic doctor of the community." I acknowleged that I was Catholic and a doctor. Did that not suffice, I wondered?
He introduced his pastoral work with local Natural Family Planning (NFP) teachers and their mutual effort to promote the Church's teachings about the sanctity of human life and the natural regulation of fertility. I explained to him that I had learned virtually nothing about Natural Family Planning in medical school and, what I did learn, was taught to me through NFP classes that my wife and I attended in the third year of our marriage.
A sidebar here, my wife and I received poor instruction in our Catholic marriage prep course in 1980. When the subject of children and fertility was discussed, the group we were with was told by the instructors about NFP in a perfunctory manner with the added comment that, "while this is what the Church teaches, no one expects you to do this." It is not rocket science to understand how that language fell on our young ears. As we were married 2 months before I started medical school, we had more than a few reasons not to bear children out of the gate. And our shared faith wasn't strong enough to trust that God had us in the palm of His hand. At the start of our 3rd year of marriage, we had moved to a different diocese where I finished medical school and residency training, where we were prompted almost immediately by a Sunday parish bulletin notice about a Natural Family Planning course being offered. We mutually asked, "Shouldn't we be doing this?"
The good priest across the desk from me clearly wasn't moved by my assertion of my Catholicity and my limited knowledge of NFP. He asked a few probing questions, gently but firmly moving me to a point where I had to face the inner conflict that existed. He wanted me to step out in faith and be a faithful Catholic physician. Without speaking aloud my inner conflict, I did speak my fear in becoming a "Catholic" physician. I mean, as a new doctor in a new community, with obstetrical medicine one of the cornerstones of my practice, I wondered who in their right mind and of reproductive age would want to see a physician stranger who didn't prescribe the pill, for crying out loud? He assured me of God's fidelity and mercy.
At one point after I had stammered my way through my concern, clearly unmoved by my reticence, Father lowered his glasses to the end of his nose, as if to say, "Enough, already." He peered directly into my eyes - as I am certain Jesus peered into Peter's eyes on the eve of His crucifixion after Peter had thrice denied knowing Him. We locked eyes. With as much love in his heart as I'm sure he could muster, he then said to me, "Dr. Skoch, I cannot speak for my brother priests, but if you don't stop doing what you're doing, I cannot give you Holy Communion."
I can hear the love his voice even today.
You can imagine my shock. I thanked him for his time and excused myself from the his office and the rectory. I was angry - incensed, actually, that he would complicate my life in this way.
It took a year of processing, stop-and-start prayer, begging God to take this cup away from me, acknowledging repeatedly my lack of faith and my weakness, working through the anger and resentment in my heart to which I ardently wanted to cling because it would be easier that admitting the truth, attempts at multiple half-hearted confessions, and a whole truckload (more, actually) of God's tender mercy for me to arrive at the decision to stop prescribing contraceptives. It was the fall of 1988, a few weeks before the birth of our third child and second son.
I made a general confession - to a different priest, I might add (isn't this the Catholic thing to do?) - concluding my litany of sins with open expression of doubt about just how I was going to be able to navigate this matter professionally.
From behind the screen, came the almost humorous comment, "Well, a piece of advice. You could start going to daily Mass."
"Is this guy serious?" I thought. I quickly discovered that he was. Dead serious.
We were blessed in that community of two Catholic parishes to have four (4) daily Masses (not counting the Catholic grade school, which also had Mass every weekday). It turned out that, while there were days I needed to be a bit creative with my schedule, attending daily Mass was not nearly as challenging as I anticipated. There were some days that my professional schedule allowed me to attend the grade school Mass where my children were in attendance. I had no idea of the importance of this in many ways not at all related to the bolstering of my own faith journey.
The "habit" of daily Mass attendance was firmly established after about a year. Now, some 35 years later, I experience a hole in my day when I am unable to get to Mass. Oh, yes, there was a long time where, if I missed a day, I was shattered. Perfectionism is one of my crosses. Now, it's just a hole - a longing - and I know Jesus is still there. I converse with Him in other ways.
While not everyone may be called to daily Mass as part of their daily prayer life (it is most certainly not a necessity!) the beginning of making daily prayer a habit is to hear God's call to task. How has God called you to spend time with Him daily?
Recently, I came across a GREAT piece from Fellowship of Catholic University Students (FOCUS) very appropriately titled: How to Develop a Prayer Life (hs-sites.com) Click the link and read about how simple it can be to bring daily prayer into your life. In working toward the formation of a habit of daily prayer, your life will be changed in ways you cannot now imagine.
Guaranteed.
