O God, Who dost deign mercifully to bestow upon us infinite treasures of love in the Heart of Thy Son, which was wounded for our sins; grant, we beseech Thee, that we who pay Him the devout homage of our piety, may in like manner show unto Thee our due of worthy satisfaction.
Through the same Christ our Lord.
Amen
O Godhead hid, devoutly I adore Thee,
Who truly art within the forms before me; To Thee my heart I bow with bended knee, As failing quite in contemplating Thee.
Jesu, eternal Shepherd! hear our cry; Increase the faith of all whose souls on Thee rely.
Sight, touch, and taste in Thee are each deceived; The ear alone most safely is believed; I believe all the Son of God has spoken, Than truth’s own word there is no truer token.
God only on the cross lay hid from view; But here lies hid at once the manhood too; And I, in both professing my belief, Make the same prayer as the repentant thief.
Thy wounds, as Thomas saw, I do not see; Yet Thee confess my Lord and God to be; Make me believe Thee evermore and more; In Thee my hope, in Thee my love to store.
O Thou memorial of our Lord’s own dying! O living bread, to mortals life suppying! Make Thou my soul henceforth on Thee to live, Ever a taste of heavenly sweetness give.
O loving Pelican! O Jesus Lord! Unclean I am, but cleanse me in Thy Blood! Of which a single drop, for sinners spilt, Can purge the entire world from all its guilt.
Jesus, whom, for the present, veil’d I see, What I so thirst for, oh! vouchsafe to me; That I may see Thy countenance unfolding, And may be blest Thy glory in beholding.
O good cross, made beautiful by the body of the Lord, long have I desired thee, ardently have I loved thee, unceasingly have I sought thee, and now thou art ready for my eager soul. Receive me from among men and restore me to my Master, so that He, who redeemed me through thee, shalt receive me through thee.
Amen.
O Holy Family of Nazareth, community of love of Jesus, Mary and Joseph, model and ideal of every Christian family, to you we entrust our families. Open the heart of every family to the faith, to welcoming the Word of God, to Christian witness, so that it becomes a source of new and holy vocations. Touch the hearts of parents, so that with prompt charity, wise care, and loving devotion they be for their sons and daughters sure guides towards spiritual and eternal values. Stir up the hearts of young people a right conscience and a free will, so that growing in “wisdom, age and grace,” they might welcome generously the gift of a Divine vocation. Holy Family of Nazareth, grant that all of us, contemplating and imitating the assiduous prayer, generous obedience, dignified poverty and virginal purity lived out in your midst, might set about fulfilling the will of God and accompanying with far-sighted sensitivity those among us who are called to follow more closely the Lord Jesus, who “has given Himself for us” (cf. Gal 2:20).
Amen!
O immaculate virgin, Mother of God, full of grace, the One whom you brought forth, Emmanuel, is the fruit of your womb. In your Motherhood you have nurtured all human beings. You surpass all praise and all glory. I salute you, Mother of God, joy of the Angels, because you surpass in fullness what the Prophets have said about you. The Lord is with you: you gave life to the Saviour of the world.
My failure to be true even to my own accepted standards:
O Lord, forgive!
“My self-deception in the face of temptation: O Lord, forgive!
My choosing of the worse when I knew the better: O Lord forgive!
My failure to apply to myself the standards of conduct that I demand of others; O Lord forgive!
My blindness to the suffering of others and my slowness to be taught by my own: O Lord, forgive!
My complacence toward wrongs that do not touch my won case and my over sensitiveness to those that do:
O Lord, forgive!
My slowness to see the good in my fellows and to see the evil in myself:
O Lord forgive!
My hardness of heart toward my neighbor’s faults and my readiness to make allowance for my own:
O Lord for give!
My unwillingness to believe that You have called me to a small work and my brother to a great one:
O Lord, forgive!
O Mary bright dawn of the new world, Mother of the living, to you do we entrust the cause of life: Look down, O Mother, upon the vast numbers of babies not allowed to be born, of the poor whose lives are made difficult, of men and women who are victims of brutal violence, of the elderly and the sick killed by indifference or out of misguided mercy. Grant that all who believe in your Son may proclaim the Gospel of life with honesty and love to the people of our time. Obtain for them the grace to accept that Gospel as a gift ever new, the joy of celebrating it with gratitude throughout their lives and the courage to bear witness to it resolutely, in order to build, together with all people of good will, the civilization of truth and love, to the praise and glory of God, the Creator and lover of life.
O Most Blessed Virgin Mary, Mother of Christ and Mother of the Church, With joy and wonder we seek to make our own your Magnificat, joining you in your hymn of thankfulness and love.
With you we give thanks to God “whose mercy is from generation to generation,” for the exalted vocation and the many forms of mission entrusted to the lay faithful. God has called each of them by name to live his own communion of love and holiness and to be one in the great family of God’s children. He has sent them forth to shine with the light of Christ and to communicate the fire of the Spirit in every part of society through their life inspired by the Gospel. O Virgin of the Magnificat, fill their hearts with a gratitude and enthusiasm for this vocation and mission. With humility and magnanimity you were the “handmaid of the Lord;” give us your unreserved willingness for service to God and the salvation of the world. Open our hearts to the great anticipation of the Kingdom of God and of the proclamation of the Gospel to the whole of creation. Your mother’s heart is ever mindful of the many dangers and evils which threaten to overpower men and women in our time. At the same time your heart also takes notice of the many initiatives undertaken for good, the great yearning for values, and the progress achieved in bringing forth the abundant fruits of salvation.
O Virgin full of courage, may your spiritual strength and trust in God inspire us, so that we might know how to overcome all the obstacles that we encounter in accomplishing our mission. Teach us to treat the affairs of the world with a real sense of Christian responsibility and a joyful hope of the coming of God’s Kingdom, and of a “new heavens and a new earth.” You who were gathered in prayer with the Apostles in the Cenacle, awaiting the coming of the spirit at Pentecost, implore his renewed outpouring on all the faithful, men and women alike, so that they might more fully respond to their vocation and mission, as branches engrafted to the true vine, called to bear much fruit for the life of the world.
O Virgin Mother guide and sustain us so that we might always live as true sons and daughters of the Church of your son. Enable us to do our part in helping to establish on earth the civilization of truth and love, as God wills it, for his glory.
Amen.
O most loving Jesus, deign to let me pour forth my gratitude before Thee, for the grace Thou hast bestowed upon me in giving me to Thy holy Mother through the devotion of Holy Bondage, that she may be my advocate in the presence of Thy majesty and my support in my extreme misery. Alas, O Lord! I am so wretched that without this dear Mother I should be certainly lost. Yes, Mary is necessary for me at Thy side and everywhere that she may appease Thy just wrath, because I have so often offended Thee; that she may save me from the eternal punishment of Thy justice, which I deserve; that she may contemplate Thee, speak to Thee, pray to Thee, approach Thee and please Thee; that she may help me to save my soul and the souls of others; in short, Mary is necessary for me that I may always do Thy holy will and seek Thy greater glory in all things. Ah, would that I could proclaim throughout the whole world the mercy that Thou hast shown to me! Would that everyone might know I should be already damned, were it not for Mary! Would that I might offer worthy thanksgiving for so great a blessing!
Mary is in me. Oh, what a treasure! Oh, what a consolation! And shall I not be entirely hers? Oh, what ingratitude! My dear Saviour, send me death rather than such a calamity, for I would rather die than live without belonging entirely to Mary. With St. John the Evangelist at the foot of the Cross, I have taken her a thousand times for my own and as many times have given myself to her; but if I have not yet done it as Thou, dear Jesus, dost wish, I now renew this offering as Thou dost desire me to renew it. And if Thou seest in my soul or my body anything that does not belong to this august princess, I pray Thee to take it and cast it far from me, for whatever in me does not belong to Mary is unworthy of Thee.
O Holy Spirit, grant me all these graces. Plant in my soul the Tree of true Life, which is Mary; cultivate it and tend it so that it may grow and blossom and bring forth the fruit of life in abundance. O Holy Spirit, give me great devotion to Mary, Thy faithful spouse; give me great confidence in her maternal heart and an abiding refuge in her mercy, so that by her Thou mayest truly form in me Jesus Christ, great and mighty, unto the fullness of His perfect age.
Amen.
O Mother of Perpetual Help
To thee we come imploring help.
Behold us here, from far and near,
To ask of thee our help to be;
Behold us here, from far and near,
To ask of thee our help to be.
Perpetual help we beg of thee;
Our souls from sin and sorrow free;
Direct our wandering feet aright,
And be thyself our own true light;
Direct our wandering feet aright,
And be thyself out own true light.
And when this life is o’er for me,
This last request I ask of thee:
Obtain for me in heaven this grace,
To see my God there face to face;
Obtain for me in heaven this grace,
To see my God there face to face.
