Our Father ("Lord's Prayer")

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. Amen.

Explanation of the Our Father

The greatest of all prayers is the Our Father. It is the one prayer that is entirely of divine origin. It was taught by our Lord to His disciples, and has been used by the Church since the very beginning of her history. The fift, sixth and seventh chapters of the Gospel of St. Matthew contain the "Sermon on the Mount," and the sixth is largely an instruction on prayer. Our Blessed Lord gave to His hearers a model prayer addressed to His Heavenly Father, expressing adoration, recognition of God's attributes, and petitions for the graces, temporal favors, forgiveness and protection needed by humankind - and expressing all of these in a few sentences and in simple words.

The wording of the prayer, as given by St. Matthew, is slightly different from that now used by us. It reads as follows: "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. Amen.

In the Gospels of St. Mark and St. John the prayer is not recorded at all. In that of St. Luke it is found in a shorter form: "When you pray, say: Father, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come. Give us each day our daily bread and forgive us our sins for we ourselves forgive everyone in debt to us, and do not subject us to the final test." (Luke 11:2-4)

The prayer, then, as used by the Church from the earlier times and as found in the most ancient liturgies, is a composite product, being formed by combining the versions given by these two Evangelists.