The Liturgy of the Hours

Psalm 63: 2-6

"O God, you are my God-- for you I long!

For you my body yearns; for you my soul thirsts,

Like a land parched, lifeless, and without water.

So I look to you in the sanctuary to see your power and glory.

For your love is better than life; my lips offer you worship!

I will bless you as long as I live; I will lift up my hands, calling on your name.

My soul shall savor the rich banquet of praise, with joyous lips my mouth shall honor you."

This Psalm, which the Church just used this past Sunday during Lauds, or Morning Prayer, from the Liturgy of the Hours, really opens up a great understanding of praying through words and actions.

In this Psalm, the psalmist says "For you my body yearns; for you my soul thirsts." This is amazing. Both body and soul long for that union with God. With that in mind, we can see why so many people really desire to have sex. Sex is a beautiful thing, and in the context of marriage, it is appropirately used. One of the results of this is the joining of two persons. This desire to union with another is part of who we are as humans (Gen 2:23). We were created male and female (Gen. 1:27), and this was realized under the creation of woman from man (Gen. 2:21-22). The Pope goes to great lengths to explain this in his beginning audiences to the TOB.

But, back to the Psalm. So we can clearly see that man's desire for union is desired for both the physical and spiritual parts of our being. Not that they can really be separated anyway. And that's why this is so beautiful. These lines from Psalm 63 go to show that the whole of the human person desires union. It's not just a physical or a spiritual thing. It's a personal thing (cf. Deus Caritas Est, 5). This desire for union is natural to our being created in God's image and likeness.

God exists as a communion of love (cf. 1 John 4:16). The Father gives to the Son, the Son receives the love, and the Holy Spirit is the love that perfectly exists between the Father and the Son. This communion of persons of the Trinity is the root of why man desires to be in communion with another. This is part of what the Psalm is talking about. In this, we can see man's plea to enter into the eschaton!

"My soul shall savor the rich banquet of praise, with joyous lips my mouth shall honor you."