A Oração de Jesus

The Jesus Prayer is a short prayer, repeated over and over.

The application "The Jesus Prayer" contains texts, with complete instructions, as well as timers and a virtual prayer string, for the practice of Jesus Prayer.

The Jesus Prayer, also known as the Heart Prayer is a short prayer, repeated over and over again as part of a personal ascetic practice. It is, for Eastern Orthodox and Eastern Catholics, one of the most profound and mystical prayers, its use being an integral part of the hermitic tradition of prayer known as Hesicasmo (from the Greek: ἡσυχάζω, hesychazo, "to keep silent").

Prayer is particularly appreciated by the Spiritual Fathers of this tradition as a method to open the heart (kardias). The Heart Prayer is considered the Incessant Prayer that the apostle Paul advocates in the New Testament. St. Theophan the Recluse considers the Jesus Prayer to be stronger than all other prayers because of the power of the Holy Name.

For us who give so much importance to the mind, learning to pray from the heart and from it is of special importance. The desert monks show us the way. Although they do not expose any theory about prayer, their narratives and their concrete advice present the stones with which the later orthodox spiritual authors built a magnificent spirituality.

The spiritual authors of Mount Sinai, Mount Athos and the Startsi of nineteenth-century Russia all rely on the tradition of the desert. We find the best formulation of the prayer of the heart in the words of the Russian mystic Theophan the Recluse:

"To pray is to descend with the mind to the heart and there to stand before the face of the Lord, omnipresent, omnivorous within us".

Anyone can practice the Jesus Prayer. You can repeat it at any time. To begin saying Prayer as part of our daily prayer rule, we must follow Jesus' direction. He says, "Come with me to a deserted place, and rest for a while" (Mark 6:31); "Try to live in silence" (I Thessalonians 4:11.); then pray in secret, alone and in silence.