______________________ - is the act of continually pursuing something in spite of obstacles. Prayer often requires persistence.

God invites us into a relationship of trust and caring. We sustain that relationship through _______________________________.

For seventeen years, _______________________ prayed for her son’s conversion to the Christian faith. Her persistence was rewarded. Augustine, later to be known as Saint Augustine, was baptized in 387.

During World War II, the Nazis under the leadership of Adolf Hitler, killed more than 12 million people, including 6 million Jews. In Vatican City in Italy, ______________________ worked to save the Jewish people, concealing many Jews in the Vatican and at Castel Gandolfo, the papal summer home. He told bishops, priests, and nuns to help the Jewish people whenever they could, and asked that convents and monasteries be opened to Jews.

It is truly right and just… to acclaim our God invisible, the almighty Father.
-Based on the _________ Proclamation (Exsultet), Roman Missal

When the king met Esther, he was struck by her kindness and her great beauty. He made her the __________.

At this time, a man named Haman was the highest official in the royal court. Haman was greedy for fame and power. All the king’s servants had to bow down in his presence. _______________ refused. As a Jew, he would not honor a man in the way he would honor the Lord. Haman was angry about this. He vowed to destroy all the Jews in Persia. He wrote a royal order stating, “All Jews, young and old, including women and children, should be killed in one day.”

…”My Lord, you alone are our KING. Help me, who am alone and have no help but you, for I am taking my life in my hand… Put in my mouth persuasive words in the presence of the lion, and turn his heart to hatred for our enemy,... Save us by your power,...”
-_____________ C:14-15, 24-25

“If I have found favor with you, O king,... I ask that my life be spared, and I beg that you spare the lives of my people. For we have been sold, I and my people, to be destroyed, killed, and annihilated.”
-_________ 7:3-4

Esther had great faith in the goodness and power of God. In her time of need, she prayed a prayer of ______________________ to the Lord. She humbly and earnestly asked God for help. She asked God to give her the courage to face the king and the wisdom to convince the king to spare her people.

Esther prayed with _____________________. Her prayer arose from her faith that God could really answer her. She trusted that God would meet the needs of his people. Esther’s petition, or solemn prayer of request, was granted.

Job lost his fortune, witnessed the deaths of his children, and suffered from sores all over his body. As each terrible thing happened, Job refused to believe that God had ________________ him.

To the amazement of Job’s friends, God actually answered Job. God spoke in a mighty voice, explaining that he was the almighty Creator and asking for Job’s ___________.
God’s words satisfied Job, and the suffering man places his trust in his Creator. Job praised God, saying, “I was born with nothing, and I shall die with nothing. The Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord”

[Jesus] said, “There was a judge in a certain town who neither feared God nor respected any human being. And a widow in that town used to come to him and say, ‘Render a just decision for me against my adversary.’ For a long time the judge was unwilling, but eventually he thought, ‘while it is true that I neither fear God nor respect any human being, because this widow keeps bothering me I shall deliver a just decision for her,...’” The Lord said, “Pay attention to what the dishonest judge says. Will not God then secure the rights of his chosen ones who call out to him day and night? Will he be slow to answer them? I tell you, he will see to it that justice is done for them speedily.”
-__________ 18: 1-8