Bellarmine On Certain Obstinate Sinners Praying The “Our Father”

St. Robert Bellarmine, On Certain Habitual Sinners Who Pray The “Our Father”:

“But if someone does not want the grace of conversion, nor asks for it from his heart, but prays with his lips alone from habit – or what is more grave, prays in order to be seen by men – he not only gains nothing from his prayer, but it even becomes a sin, since he lies in almost all of his petitions.  For how can he say ‘Our Father’, who does not want to be a son?  And how can he say ‘hallowed be thy name’, by whom the name of God is regularly blasphemed?  And how can he say ‘thy kingdom come’, who fears nothing more than the coming of the Lord?  And how can he say ‘thy will be done’, who always does his own will and not the will of God?”

- De Bonis Operibus In Particulari, Book 1, Chap. 6 (Fifth Petition)