Why could we not drive it out?

11 AUGUST (Mt 17,14-20)

Faith is the life of prayer. It can be compared to the germ of life that is in every seed. If this germ is destroyed, no lives will ever bloom from the seed. The same applies to every prayer. Elevated to God without faith, it produces no fulfillment. No gift of grace is granted to a prayer without faith.

Is anyone among you suffering? He should pray. Is anyone in good spirits? He should sing praise. Is anyone among you sick? He should summon the presbyters of the church, and they should pray over him and anoint (him) with oil in the name of the Lord, and the prayer of faith will save the sick person, and the Lord will raise him up. If he has committed any sins, he will be forgiven. Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The fervent prayer of a righteous person is very powerful. Elijah was a human being like us; yet he prayed earnestly that it might not rain, and for three years and six months it did not rain upon the land. Then he prayed again, and the sky gave rain and the earth produced its fruit. (James 5,13-18).

The faith we pray with must be in Christ, in his truth, mediation, redemption, grace, salvation, and justification. It must be faith in his power, invocation and request to God for Him, in Him, and with Him. Jesus is the mediator of all fulfillment by the Father. This faith must be the germ of life of Christian prayer. Without Christ there is no listening, because Christ is the one who must raise our prayer to the Father. The Father recognizes only the voice of Lord Jesus.

Whoever believes that Jesus is the Christ is begotten by God, and everyone who loves Him who begot also loves him who has been generated by him. In this we know that we love the children of God when we love God and keep His commandments. That indeed is the love of God, that we keep his commandments: and his commandments are not burdensome. Whoever has been born of God overcomes the world, and this is the victory that he has overcome the world: our faith. And who is it that overcomes the world but he who believes that Jesus is the Son of God? He is the one who came by water and blood, Jesus Christ: not by water only, but by water and blood. And it is the Spirit who bears witness, because the Spirit is truth. Since there are three that bear witness: the Spirit, the water and blood, and these three agree. If we accept the testimony of men, the witness of God is greater: and this is the witness of God which he has given about his own Son. Whoever believes in the Son of God has this witness in himself. Who does not believe God makes a liar of him, because he does not believe the testimony God has given about his own son. And this is the testimony: God has given us eternal life and this life is in His Son. Whoever has the Son has life: who does not have the Son of God does not have life. (Jn 5,1-11).

The Apostles received from Christ Jesus the power to cast out demons. They think they can do it without any prayer, without invocation to God, without any request to give vitality to the power received from them. It is the failure. The unclean spirit is deaf to their command. It does not obey. He remains in the man.

When they came to the crowd a man approached, knelt down before him, and said, “Lord, have pity on my son, for he is a lunatic and suffers severely; often he falls into fire, and often into water. I brought him to your disciples, but they could not cure him.” Jesus said in reply, “O faithless and perverse generation, how long will I be with you? How long will I endure you? Bring him here to me.” Jesus rebuked him and the demon came out of him, and from that hour the boy was cured. Then the disciples approached Jesus in private and said, “Why could we not drive it out?” He said to them, “Because of your little faith. Amen, I say to you, if you have faith the size of a mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you.”

The disciples have exercised a power without faith, without prayer, without invoking the name of Jesus Christ. Never will the devil submit to a single man, even the holiest, most perfect, most pure, most righteous, and most immaculate. Satan obeys God alone. He only submits to Christ Jesus and to all who drive him out in his Most Holy name with a prayer to the heavenly Father rich with a very great faith.

Virgin Mary, Mother of the Redemption, Angels, and Saints give us a strong and robust faith.