Today's readings: Genesis 18, 20-32; Colossians 2, 12-24; Luke 11, 1-13.

In spite of all we seek to transmit and perpetuate in our churches and communities, there is only one thing that matters: whether people know how to pray.

People today find difficulty with praying, particularly if we continue to speak of prayer in strictly devotional terms or if prayer is reduced to an exercise narrowly concerned and conditioned by the needs of the ego.

The disciples' request "Lord, teach us to pray" continues to be mostly crucial for the spiritual life. It is through prayer that we learn to see with the eyes of the soul. "Another beautiful thing about prayer", writes John O'Donohue in his book Eternal Echoes, "is the way it changes space. Physical space is full of distance. It is distance that separates people and things".

But prayer creates spiritual space. In our globalised world which seemed to have eliminated distance, yet which has multiplied differences that separate, it is spiritual space we need to create. This seems to be what Abraham was negotiating for with God and what we, as believers in God, are called to perpetuate.

In the life of believers, there is always the challenge of unanswered prayer, of asking and not receiving. But it is only in the struggle of prayer that we learn the place of suffering and tragedy in the mystery of our redemption. It is only in the struggle of prayer that we will learn to truthfully turn to God and pray as Jesus taught us: "Thy will be done". I remember reading somewhere that 'courage is fear that has said its prayers'.

Avoiding getting angry with God may be counter-productive because it kills all sentiment in prayer and seeks to bury the grief and the pain. That makes the heart grow colder. We can begin to learn that the silence that seems to be just a non-answer is actually God's way of answering.

There are experiences of prolonged suffering or silences in life that might deter us from pursuing a faith commitment. One thing we need to be aware of is that believing is not switching to 'survival mode'. It is not about being at the mercy of circumstances, but about pressing on into the heart of God.

This is precisely what Abraham did when he stood before the Lord. This is also what Jesus is teaching us to do in the gospel. Abraham's voyage in Genesis, from his call to moments which can easily be defined as dark nights, moves across an increasingly alien landscape. It is very similar to the alien landscape of modernity or post-modernity in which we all dwell and which as believers often leaves us homeless.

But what today's readings teach us is that God is engaged interactively with us humans in a mutuality that impinges upon both parties. In today's remarkable text from Genesis, God is engaged with a plan concerning the destruction of Sodom. But Abraham confronts God about that decision. He stood before the Lord and pleaded for Sodom and Gomorrah when, strictly speaking, there was nothing to plead about, given the outcry against them was great and their sin was grievous.

Yet as Scripture seems to suggest, there is always the possibility of dialogue even where we are safer with the dictates of the law. This is common practice throughout the Scriptures with Abraham, Moses, Jeremiah and so many others. This requires among us a huge unlearning of conventional ways of being authoritarian or of voicing certitudes in the public arena.

In an anxiety-driven society, the Church is called to be a venue for dialogue even if we are all the time tempted to cut short, to imagine that we can speak with the voice and authority of God but in a monologue. Our commitment as believers in God is to explore deeply the opportunities for dialogue in whatever concerns the salvation of people.