The Beauty of a Litany

In reading Mother Theresa’s “Prayer for the Poor,” I was seeing the beauty of Litany for the first time in my rather longer life. When I was young the only thing that I remember from liturgies that had litanies was the response, or “ora pro nobis”. I remember the phrase and the rhythm that could come with the saying of the litanies in Latin and then later in English. Now in the reading of her prayer, I see a beauty, a beauty of looking at God or in this case Jesus in many different lights. Scripture is my main way of thinking of Jesus and in that I am only concentrating in one aspect of his existence at a time whereas in the prayer I go from the “Word made Flesh” to the “bread of Life” in the next line. What a way to slowly mediate on him. She then moves into descriptors and then action to be taken. The Word to be- spoken, the truth-to be told, the way- to be walked, the light to be lit. For the first time I am seeing that there is meaning in litany. Jesus is the sick- to be healed; Jesus is the leper- to wash his hands. Jesus is the Crippled- to walk with him.
This is a great way to look at Jesus in different ways. We get to comfortable with the singular vision that we have of Jesus over time, this helps us to expand that vision. Jesus is both the victim and the helper. This prayer, this litany is a call to us for the various ministries of Jesus.
This can also lead us into making up our own litany at some time.