Praying with Scripture | Lectio Divina

By Dr. Brant Pitre

According to the Catechism of the Catholic Church, Sacred Scripture is“...food for the soul, and a pure and lasting font of spiritual life” (CCC 131).[1] For this reason, the Church teaches that Christians should not just read the Bible, but learn to practice “...lectio divina, where the Word of God is so read and meditated that it becomes prayer...” (CCC 1177). But what exactly is lectio divina? And how does one go about it? [2]

Lectio Divina is a Latin expression that means “divine reading.” For centuries, it has been used to describe the practice of praying with Scripture. Though there are many different methods of lectio divina, perhaps the simplest was formulated in the Middle Ages in a beautiful treatise entitled The Ladder of Paradise. In this writing, a Carthusian monk named Guigo outlined four basic steps for praying with Scripture:

One day when I was busy working with my hands I began to think about our spiritual work, and all at once four stages in spiritual exercise came to my mind: reading, meditation, prayer, and contemplation. These make a ladder for monks by which they are lifted up from earth to heaven. [3]

Though Guigo originally wrote his treatise for monks, his simple approach can be practiced by anyone who wants to learn to pray with Scripture. Let’s take a few moments to outline these four basic steps.

Step 1 | Reading:  The first step is “reading” (Latin lectio). This means picking up the Bible, opening it, and carefully and attentively reading the inspired word of God. To do this, we need to slow down, and not rush or skim what we are reading. We also have to develop the habit of regular Scripture reading, so that we might become like the person who says that “the law of the LORD is his joy” and who reads it “day and night” (Psalm 1:2). Without this first step, we cannot begin to climb the spiritual ladder.

Step 2 | Meditation:  The second step is “meditation” (Latin meditatio). Meditation means not just reading the Bible in a passive way, but thinking about the words of Scripture and pondering their meaning. When we meditate, we use our minds to seek out the truth of God’s word. According to the Church, meditation is not optional, but necessary for us to grow spiritually: “Christians owe it to themselves to develop the desire to meditate regularly, lest they come to resemble the three first kinds of soil in the parable of the sower” (CCC 2707). [4]

Step 3 | Prayer:  The third step is “prayer” (Latin oratio). Although lectio divina as a whole can be described as a form of prayer, this third step refers in particular to speaking with God from the heart about what we have read in the Bible. As the Catechism teaches: “... prayer should accompany the reading of Sacred Scripture, so that a dialogue takes place between God and man. For ‘we speak to him when we pray; we listen to him when we read the divine oracles.’” (CCC 2653). [5]

Step 4 | Contemplation:  The fourth and final step is “contemplation” (Latin contemplatio). This step is the most difficult to define, because it is a kind of prayer that goes beyond words and thoughts. In the first three steps of lectio divina, we act by reading the Bible, meditating on its words, and talking with God about what we have read. In the fourth step, however, we don’t have to “do” anything except be still, listen, and quietly rest in God’s presence. As the Catechism says: “Contemplative prayer… is a gaze of faith fixed on Jesus, an attentiveness to the Word of God, a silent love” (CCC 2724). Or, as the book of Psalms says, “Be still, and know that I am God” (Psalm 46:11).

One of the beautiful things about these four steps of lectio divina is that they are so easy to remember and so natural to practice. Though at first it may take a bit of effort to remember to do each of them, with time and practice, we can easily develop the spiritual habit of (1) reading the Scripture, (2) taking time to ponder its words, (3) talking with God about what we’ve read, and (4) being still and silent in his presence. When we do this, we will begin to taste the truth of Jesus’ words: “One does not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes forth from the mouth of God” (Matthew 4:4).

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1  Vatican Council II, Dei Verbum 24

2  See Brant Pitre, Introduction to the Spiritual Life: Walking the Path of Prayer with Jesus (New York, N.Y.: Image, 2021), 210-21 for more details.

3  Guigo II, The Ladder of Paradise 2. See Guigo II, The Ladder of Monks and Twelve Meditations (trans. Edmund College, O.S.A. and James Walsh, S.J.; Collegeville, Minn.: Liturgical Press, 1979).

4  Cf. Mk 4:4-7, 15-19.

5  DV 25; cf. Phil 3:8; St. Ambrose, De officiis ministrorum 1, 20, 88: PL 16, 50.