Prayer of Venerable John Paul II to Our Lady of Guadelupe during his First Foreign trip outside of Rome as Pope

Photo ©  Speramus-We Hope 

Altogether 27 popes have officially honored Our Lady of Guadalupe 

St. John Paul II visited her Sanctuary four
times: on his first apostolic trip  outside Rome as Pope in 1979. Then again in 1990, 1999, 2002.

      

During his third pastoral visit to the shrine in 1999  in his homily at the Basilica of Our Lady of Guadalupe, he declared the date of December 12th the Feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe as a Liturgical Holy Day for the whole continent of America.

During this same visit he entrusted the cause of life to her loving protection

Placing under her motherly care the innocent lives of children, especially those who are in danger of not being born.

Prayer of St. John Paul II
To Our Lady of Guadalupe
Mexico, January 1979

O Immaculate Virgin, Mother of the true God and Mother of the Church! who from this place reveal your clemency and your pity to all those who ask for your protection, hear the prayer that we address to you with filial trust, and present it to your Son Jesus, our sole Redeemer.

Mother of Mercy, Teacher of hidden and silent sacrifice, to you, who come to meet us sinners, we dedicate on this day all our being and all our love. We also dedicate to you our life, our work, our joys, our infirmities and our sorrows. Grant peace, justice and prosperity to our peoples; for we entrust to your care all that we have and all that we are, our Lady and Mother. We wish to be entirely yours and to walk with you along the way of complete faithfulness to Jesus Christ in His Church; hold us with your loving hand.

Virgin of Guadalupe, Mother of the Americas, we pray to you for all the Bishops, that they may lead the faithful along paths of intense Christian life, of love and humble service of God and souls. Contemplate this immense harvest, and intercede with the Lord that He may instill a hunger for holiness in the whole people of God, and grant abundant vocations of priests and religious, strong in the faith and zealous dispensers of God’s mysteries. 

Grant to our homes the grace of loving and respecting life in its beginnings, with the same love with which you conceived in your womb the life of the Son of God. Blessed Virgin Mary, protect our families, so that they may always be united, and bless the upbringing of our children.

Our hope, look upon us with compassion, teach us to go continually to Jesus and, if we fall, help us to rise again, to return to Him, by means of the confession of our faults and sins in the Sacrament of Penance, which gives peace to the soul.                                                                

We beg you to grant us a great love for all the holy Sacraments, which are, as it were, the signs that your Son left us on earth.

Thus,  Most Holy Mother, with the peace of God in our conscience, with our hearts free from evil and hatred, we will be able to bring to all true joy and true peace, which come to us from your son, our Lord Jesus Christ, who with God the Father and the Holy Spirit, lives and reigns for ever and ever.  Amen.

The Popes and Our Lady of Guadelupe  http://www.sancta.org/olg-popes.html

Is it not an overwhelming thought that an Angel admonished the Fatima Children for playing when the need for prayer and sacrifice was so great?

      Photo © Real Presence Association uploaded by Speramus-We Hope w permisssion

1916 The Apparitions of the Angel at Fatima 

The first apparition of the Angel took place on the side of a hill called Lopa do Cabeço in the spring of 1916.  Although the children had previously seen a nebulous figure of light, this was the first time they could definitely perceive the Angel and hear him speak. The Angel then knelt, bowing low with his head touching the ground.  The three children, impelled by a supernatural impulse, did the same, and then repeated after him: "My God, I believe, I adore, I trust, and I love Thee.  I beg pardon for those who do not believe, do not adore, do not trust, and do not love Thee."  Having repeated this prayer three times, the Angel rose and said: "Pray thus.  The Hearts of Jesus and Mary are attentive to your supplications."

Lucia later told Canon Galamba

About this visit of the Angel

"The supernatural atmosphere which enveloped us was so intense that, for a long time, we were scarcely aware of our own existence, remaining in the same position and repeating the same prayers. "So intimate and intense was the feeling of the presence of God, that we did not even attempt to speak to one another. The next day we could still feel the holy atmosphere. It began to disappear only very slowly.  We said nothing about this apparition... it seemed to impose silence on us.  It was of such an intimate nature that it was not easy to speak of it at all."

The next apparition of the Angel took place in the heat of midsummer, while the children were playing by a well not far from Lucia's home. 

Suddenly they saw the Angel descending towards them and heard him ask: "what are you doing?  Pray!  Pray a great deal!  The Hearts of Jesus and Mary have merciful designs upon you.  Offer prayers and sacrifices continually to the Most High."  "How are we to make sacrifices?" Lucia asked.  The Angel replied: "Make everything you do a sacrifice, and offer it as an act of reparation for the sins by which He is offended, and as a petition for the conversion of poor sinners.  Bring peace to our country in this way.  I am its Angel Guardian, the Angel of Portugal.  Especially accept and bear with submission the sufferings sent you by Our Lord."

VALUE OF SACRIFICE

"These words," commented Lucia, "made a deep impression on our minds, like a light making us understand Who God is, how He loves us and desires to be loved, as well as the value of sacrifice, how pleasing it is to Him, and how, on account of it, He grants the grace of conversion to poor sinners."

For this reason, from that moment we began to offer such mortifications as daily befell us... and to remain for hours with our forehead touching the ground, repeating the prayer the Angel had taught us." The experience of this apparition  overwhelmed the children, and for days they remained silent and in a spirit of deep reflection.  Jacinta said: "I can't speak, nor play, nor sing; I have no strength for anything."  "Nor do I," replied Francisco, "But what does it matter?  The Angel is more important than anything!  Let us think about him."

Is it not an overwhelming thought to consider that the Angel admonished these little children, who were only nine, eight, and six years old for spending their time playing when the need for continual prayer and sacrifice was so great? 

Is that need any less today than it was then?  How many parents coddle and pamper their children, never teaching these little souls entrusted to them by God the importance of prayer and sacrifice.

We greatly underestimate the capacity of children for prayer and sacrifice!  When children are taught by example they are generous in their response to the good.  Very often the children's unreserved "offering of self" far surpasses the half-hearted offering of adults, who are overly imbued with self-love and attachment to material wealth, prestige, security, and comfortable living.

Remember well how our Lord set a little child before the apostles who were arguing over who would be most important in the Kingdom, solemnly assuring them, that unless they were converted and made like little children, they could not enter his kingdom. Children, when very young, do not desire authority, do not regard outward distinctions, are free from malice, are teachable, and willingly dependent on their parents. Granted  It is true that they soon begin to show other unfavorable dispositions due to concupiscence from original sin but these are marks of childhood, and render them proper emblems of true Christians. Surely we need to be daily renewed in the spirit, that we may become simple and humble, as little children, so that we may enter Gods Kingdom.

We will consider in the next post the last apparition of the Angel where the children received more light on the their mission of prayer and sacrifice for the conversion of poor sinners given to them by God.  Here their mission was linked by the mediation of the Angel directly to Eucharistic Reparation. Suggesting that the cause of the loss of so many souls is directly in proportion to the scorn and contempt our Lord receives by his own people in this Sacrament of His Love.

Bl. Jacinta and Francesco Marto and Sister Lucia  little shepherds of Fatima, and confidants of Our Lady and the Angels pray for us that we may become worthy of the promises of Christ.

Above Photo copyrighted by the Real Presence Association you are invited to visit their web page for a complete listing of Vatican approved Eucharistic Miracles.  Posted via email from Speramus's posterous

Take and drink the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ, horribly outraged by ungrateful men. Repair their crimes and console your God

Photo © Real Presence Association   via Speramus-We Hope w permission

Fatima and the 3rd visit of the Angel in the Fall of 1917

The angel appeared to the children and prostrated himself on the ground before a chalice and host and said, "Most Holy Trinity, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, I adore Thee profoundly. I offer Thee the most precious Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of Jesus Christ, present in all the Tabernacles of the world, in reparation for the outrages, sacrileges and indifference's whereby He is offended. And through the infinite merits of His most Sacred Heart and the Immaculate Heart of Mary, I beg of Thee the conversion of poor sinners.”

An Angel, a pure Spirit, who Lives Constantly in the Intimate Presence of God, Prostrates Before the Eucharist in Adoration and Teaches the Children How to Make Reparation in Prayer!

The angel in giving the children Holy Communion taught them to offer their Communions in reparation for those who abuse this Most Blessed Sacrament in various ways: Rising the Angel took the chalice and the Host. He gave the sacred Host to Lucia. He gave the precious blood of Jesus in the chalice to Jacinta and Francisco, saying; "Take and drink the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ, horribly outraged by ungrateful men. Repair their crimes and console your God."

Another example of Heaven

Speaking in Signs and Symbols. 

Jesus answered and said, you know not what you ask. Are you able to drink of the cup that I shall drink of, and to be baptized with the baptism that I am baptized with? They say to him, we are able. Mathew 20:20-22. 

God always works with our free will. 

Photo © Speramus-We Hope

At Fatima, Our Lady also asked the three shepherds a similar question to the one that Jesus asked the apostles. 

Would they accept they also accept their mission from God?  In her first apparition in May our Lady asked the three children: "Are you willing to offer yourselves to God to bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the sins by which He is offended and of supplication for the conversion of sinners?" "Yes, we are," was their reply. And the Blessed Mother answered: "Then you are going to have much to suffer, but the grace of God will be your comfort

Jacinta & Francesco Receive

First Holy Communion

From the Chalice.
 

They did not receive the sacred Host. This act by the angel signified that
they would soon join Jesus in drinking the cup of suffering from the Father and both died during the Spanish flu pandemic. Francesco first in 1919 and Jacinta in 1920. By giving Lucia the Host the Bread of Life" FOR THE

Photo © Speramus-We Hope

JOURNEY signifying the manna that  physically sustained the Israelites in their 40 year journey toward the Promised Land. The Bread of Life sustains us spiritually both now and eternally. It sustains us for the journey of this life and prepares us for our journey's end our destination and goal. The bread of life is like that bread given to Elijah who was weighed down by his burden of being a lonely faithful prophet. No one listened to him. He was tired and had enough. As the reading says, "He sat under a broom tree waiting for death.” God sent an Angel to feed him two times. “Get up and eat, for the journey is too much for you.” This bread and water gave Elijah enough strength to go forty days in the desert alone. This bread a foreshadowing the strength we receive to journey through this life from the Blessed Sacrament. The Eucharistic Bread that gave Lucia strength to live the Mission of Elijah a lonely profit who no one listened too for the next 88 years.

The Eucharist is alive!

Jesus is there!

He is hidden there and he wants to give graces to our souls. "When I come to a human heart in Holy Communion, My hands are full of all kinds of graces but souls do not even pay attention to me; they leave me to myself and busy themselves with other things. They treat me as a dead object." Our Lord to St. Faustina (Diary of St. Faustina, 1385)

"We believe that as the bread and wine consecrated by the Lord at the Last Supper were changed into His body and His blood, which were to be offered for us on the cross, likewise the bread and wine consecrated by the priest are changed into the body and blood of Christ, enthroned gloriously in heaven." -1968 Credo of the People of God

"The Hidden Jesus"

Under the consecrated species of bread and wine, Christ himself, living and glorious, is present in a true, real, and substantial manner.” Catechism of the Catholic Church– #1415

The children at Fatima called the Blessed Sacrament the “Hidden Jesus” Francesco knowing he was to die soon instead of going to school spent those hours in the parish church before his “Hidden Jesus”. His heart longed to be with him and console him for the outrages and in differences committed against the Blessed Sacrament reciting the prayers the Angel taught in 1916.

Let us learn from these simple children how to evaluate what is important in life and how we spend the gift of time that God has given to us. Your eternal happiness will depend on what you do with the time God has given you in this life.

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Particles of the Blessed Sacrament the Life-Giving Gold Dust

The Eucharistic Miracle of Gruaro Italy- 1294 Part 1

The Eucharistic Miracle of Gruaro Italy-Part 2

Take drink the Body & Blood of Jesus Christ Horribly outraged by ungrateful men!

Above Photo is copyrighted by the Real Presence Association you are invited to visit their web page for a complete listing of Vatican approved Eucharistic Miracles.