“Mother of God, I can’t stand the pain and pressure I’m under here”
Let me tell you a little story from prison. Someone was arrested and spent 20 years in prison, a young man who had grown old in suffering. In the midst of an extraordinarily difficult investigation, he lost his patience and set out to find a way to end his life. But he remembered that in his youth, when he was free, his grandmother used to tell him: “If you are in trouble, pray to the Virgin Mary.”
He remembered this and said:
“I didn’t have the courage to pray to the Redeemer – because he had his faults – but I prayed to the Mother of God, who was an earthling like us!”
A prayer of despair: “Mother of God, I can no longer bear the pain and the pressure that is being put on me here! Help me!” He prayed in his cell. A few moments later, he saw a figure dressed in white, with a child in her arms, entering through the door of his cell: “You called me! I will help you. Be at peace!” And She went away. They never called him back for questioning after that. They moved him to another place, somewhere at the North Pole, and all his life after that – he lived many more years in prison – he had a very peaceful life in his soul, although the sufferings outside were quite heavy from time to time. The Blessed Mother helped him the next moment he prayed.
I know this story from the person who experienced it. He told it to me. And you don’t lie in prison! In prison, everyone is sincere. This poor man told me what happened to him and how his problem was solved.
That’s how Our Lady “Quick to hear” does it. But prayer must be made with all our desire, with all our being, with all our strength, with all our trust, even when we are in despair. And prayer is answered in the next moment. Sometimes we don’t need long prayers. But sometimes we need long prayers to calm ourselves, to gather ourselves, to concentrate on God. Other times, in moments like these, which are very difficult, He answers you on the spot.
(Pr. Sofian Boghiu – Father Sofian, 2nd edition, revised and added by Constanța Costea and Ioana Iancovescu, Byzantine Publishing House, Bucharest, 2012, p. 119)