Our Father, who art in heaven,

hallowed be thy name;

thy kingdom come;

thy will be done;

on earth as it is in heaven.

Give us this day our daily bread.

And forgive us our trespasses,

as we forgive those who trespass against us.

And lead us not into temptation;

but deliver us from evil.

For thine is the kingdom,

the power and the glory,

for ever and ever.

Amen

“Lord, teach us to pray,” the disciples have just said to Jesus (Luke 11.1). And in this painting by James Tissot (The Lord’s Prayer, c1890), Jesus is in full flight, imparting words precious now to Christians of all traditions, many of whom know them by heart.  “When you pray, say this,” Jesus had begun. And so we do. The Lord’s Prayer has a place in every Anglican act of worship, and it offers a pattern for other prayer - acknowledging God’s holiness, praying for the coming of the Kingdom, for daily needs to be met, for forgiveness and protection.

It also stresses our togetherness – it’s ‘Our Father’, not ‘My Father’! None of us has exclusive access! In fact, the words ‘our’, ‘we’ and ‘us’ occur no less than nine times. In Tissot’s painting, Jesus seems to be teaching his friends to hold out their hands as they pray - a bodily sign, maybe, of becoming more open not just to God but to each other, for every single human being is parented lovingly by the one to whom the prayer is addressed. No surprise then that it’s been translated into just about every language under the sun. God’s inclusion has no limits and experiencing the Lord’s Prayer in other languages can be humbling, levelling. It’s especially moving at the moment to listen to it in Ukrainian. You might also like to hear Duruflé’s gentle setting in French.