Monthly Archives: August 2017

“Give them something to eat.”

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“Give them something to eat.”

On the mountain of Your Holiness,

You commanded,

“You give them something to eat.”

What have I that would feed,

And satisfy so many?

You give to me,

In steady supply.

You are my All.

In You, I believe,

It is You, I adore,

And from You,

I draw my hope,

And loving trust.

You have fulfilled Your promise,

Feeding me with the finest wheat,

The Eucharistic Wheat,

Made Bread, most holy,

Your body and Your Blood.

“Give them something to eat.”

What have I that would feed,

And satisfy so many?

I will give them my Treasure,

My Only Good.

As life flowing from this temple

Flow from me,

To water,

And sup with the humanity all about me.

© 2017 Joann Nelander

“At the heart of all temptations”

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From Jesus of Nazareth by ‘Joseph Ratzinger/Pope Benedict XVI:

“At the heart of all temptations… is the act of pushing God aside because we perceive Him as secondary, if not actually superfluous and annoying, in comparison with all the apeparently far more urgent matters that fill our lives, constructing a world by our own lights without reference to God, building on our own foundation, refusing to acknowledge the reality of anything beyond the political and material, while setting God aside as an illusion that is the temptation the threatens us in many varied forms. Moral posturing is part and parcel of temptation. It does not invite us directly to do evil; no, that would be far to blatant. It pretends to show us a better way, where we finally abandon our illusions and threw ourselves into the work of actually making the world a better place. It claims moreover to speak for true realism; what’s real is what’s right there in front of us, power and bread. By comparison, the things of God fade into unreality, into a secondary world that no one really needs.

God is the issue. Is He real, reality Itself or isn’t He? Is He good or do we have to invent the good ourselves? The God question is the fundamental question, and it sets us down right at the crossroads of human existence. What must the Savior of the world do, or not do that is the question the temptations of Jesus are about.”
Alfred Delp, a German theologian, executed by the Nazi’s said:

“Bread is important. Freedom is more important, but what is most important of all is unbroken fidelity and faithful adoration.”
Benedict XVI continues:

“When this ordering of goods is no longer respected, but turned on its head, the result is not justice or concern for human suffering the result is rather ruin and destruction even of material good themselves. When God is regarded as a secondary matter that can be set aside temporarily, or permanently, on account of more important things, it is precisely these supposedly more important things, that come to nothing. It is not just the negative outcome of a Marxist experiment that proves this, the aid given by the West to developing countries has been purely technically and materially based. It has not only left God out of the picture but has driven men away from God. and this aid proudly claiming to know better is itself what first turned the Third World into what we now mean today by that term.It has thrust aside indigenous religious , ethical and social structures and filled the resulting vacuum with its technocratic mindset. The idea was that we can turn stones into bread; instead our aide has only given stones in place of bread. The issue is the primacy of God.”

KNOWN BUT BY GRACE

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Only, and far flung God,
Bursting upon the scene of Time
To start the clock
By uncreated might,
And usher forth
Your manifold good will,
In the splendor of creation,
Look on me,
In my becoming.
In this, the only now I know,
This precious fleeting instant,
Reveal Yourself evermore.

You entered Time
That Man might enter Heaven.
You, Who are Eternal Being,
Let me contemplate Thee
Wrapped in swaddling clothes,
Nursing at the Virgin’s breast,
Growing as men grow,
Yet knowing the Father Creator
As only Son.

I see Thee arrayed,
Transfigured in the Light,
Even as You are stretched
Between Heaven and Earth
On Your Holy Cross,
Becoming Sin,
And dying in my stead.
Lifted above the earth in Your divinity,
Higher than the mountains,
Yet pervading depth and breathe,
To shake and shape
The cursed land and Man anew,
In elegant Revelation of Mystery,
Rising from the dead,
To live in universal blessedness,
Across all time and space,
Known but by grace.

Copyright 2013 Joann Nelander

Promises for Spreading the Devotion

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https://youtu.be/_g3R6GWrTiY

Distractions in Prayer

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REMEDY AGAINST DISTRACTIONS

When you are distracted in prayer, commend it to the Heart of Jesus, to be perfected by Him, as our Lord Himself taught St. Gertrude. One day, when she was much distracted in prayer, He appeared to her, and held forth to her His Heart with his own sacred hands, saying: Behold, I set My Heart before the eyes of thy soul, that thou mayest commend to it all thine actions, confidently trusting that all that thou canst not of thyself supply to them will be therein supplied, so that they may appear perfect and spotless in My sight.

Remember always to say the Gloria Patri with great devotion. The hermit Honorius relates that a certain monk who had been accustomed to say his office negligently appeared to another after his death, and being asked what sufferings he had to undergo in punishment of his carelessness, he said that all had been satisfied for and effaced by the reverent devotion with which he had always said the Gloria Patri.

AN EFFICACIOUS METHOD OF OFFERING OUR ACTIONS TO GOD

While St. Gertrude was offering a certain action to God, saying:

O Lord, I offer Thee this work through Thine Only Son, in the power of the Holy Spirit, to the praise of Thine eternal Majesty; it was revealed to her that whatever action was thus offered would acquire a worth and acceptableness to God beyond all human comprehension. For as all things appear to be green when seen through a green glass, so whatever is offered to God through His Only-begotten Son cannot be otherwise than most precious and pleasing in His sight.

That you may understand how useful it is to offer all your works to God, listen to what our Lord said on one occasion to St. Gertrude: All thy works are most perfectly pleasing to Me. And as she could not believe this, He added: If you held in your hand some object which you had the means and the skill to render perfectly pleasing to everyone, and if you tenderly loved that object, would you neglect to adorn it? Even thus, because you are accustomed to offer all your works to Me, I hold them in My hand; and as I have both the power and the skill, My love rejoiceth to cleanse and perfect them all, that they may be most perfectly pleasing in My sight.

Prayer for Sleep

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TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN AND OTHER SAINTS

To thy maternal faithfulness and to thy special care, O most blessed Virgin Mary, I commend myself this night, beseeching thee to protect me from all the snares of the enemy. O my beloved Angel guardian, and thou, holy Saints, my patrons, defend me and keep me in safety through this night. Praise my God for me without ceasing while I sleep ,and deign to bestow on me thy blessing in answer to my humble prayer. Amen.

 

INTENTION BEFORE SLEEP

Taught to St. Gertrude by our Lord.

O LORD JESUS, I accept this sleep in the love with which Thou didst sanctify it when Thou didst deign to sleep in Thy most sacred Humanity, to the glory of God the Father, and for the salvation of all the whole human race; beseeching Thee that, in union with Thy Divine Love, it may tend to the increase in grace and glory of all Thine elect, in Heaven, on earth, and in Purgatory. Amen.

Before you lie down to sleep, trace on your forehead these four letters, I. N. R. I., saying:

MAY Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews, preserve me from sudden and unprepared
death. Amen.

Our Lord revealed to St. Edmund that those who use this prayer shall be preserved from sudden death in the night.

On one occasion when St. Gertrude could not sleep, she learned this prayer from Christ Himself.

By Thine Own eternal and unruffled repose in the bosom of God the Father, by Thy most
peaceful rest in the womb of the Blessed Virgin, by the most ecstatic rapture with which Thou didst ever take thy delight in the hearts of those who love Thee, I beseech Thee, O most loving Lord, deign to grant me needful sleep, not for my pleasure or advantage, but that the weary members of my body may be refreshed to labour for Thine eternal praise and glory. Amen.