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Join Msgr. John Esseff, as he offers this novena in honor of St. Pio

The entire novena can be found on the The St. Pio of Pietrelcina (Padre Pio) Discerning Hearts Page

Day 7

From the writings of St. Pio:

May the Grace and peace of the Holy Spirit always be at the center of your heart.  Place your heart in the open side of the Savior, and unite it with the King of your heart who is within it as on a royal throne, in order that He might receive homage and obedience from all other hearts.  Keep your hearts door open, so that everyone can approach Him and gain an audience at all times.  May the King of all saints also be the King of your heart!

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Join Msgr. John Esseff, as he offers this novena in honor of St. Pio

The entire novena can be found on the The St. Pio of Pietrelcina (Padre Pio) Discerning Hearts Page

Day 6

From the writings of St. Pio:

In the most Holy Sacrament of the Eucharist, in this sacrament of Love, we have true life, a blessed life, and true sacrament of Love; we have true life, a blessed life, and true happiness.  Because in it we receive not only those graces that perfect us but the very Author of those graces.

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Join Msgr. John Esseff, as he offers this novena in honor of St. Pio

The entire novena can be found on the The St. Pio of Pietrelcina (Padre Pio) Discerning Hearts Page

Day 5

From the writings of St. Pio:

St Therese of the Child Jesus used to say, “I don’t want to choose either to die or to live, but let Jesus do as He likes with me.”  I see clearly that this is the image of all souls who are stripped of self and filled with God… What St. Therese has said ought to be said by every soul inflamed with love of God.

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Join Msgr. John Esseff, as he offers this novena in honor of St. Pio

Day 4

From the writings of St. Pio:

I often think that there is only one thing in this base world which can soothe the most acute pain which pierces the heart when we see ourselves far from God, the source and consolation of distressed souls.  That one thing is solitude, for here the soul enjoys sweet rest in the One who is its true peace.  I want the heavenly Father to grant you the grace of stability in all your resolutions, not least of all your resolution to grow in holiness and to be silent and reduce to silence everything around you, so that you may hear the divine voice of the Beloved and establish with Him a tranquil and everlasting dialogue.

Recollect yourself continually, and may your whole life be hidden in Jesus and with Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane, that is to say, in the silence of meditation and prayer.

Try to be always more docile to grace and more and more generous with Jesus, making absolutely everything around you and within you to be silent.  Don’t worry; rest trustfully in the divine Mercy.

Silently adore the delicacy of the workings of divine grace.

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Join Msgr. John Esseff, as he offers this novena in honor of St. Pio

Day 3

From the writings of St. Pio:

I am greatly comforted and very content in Jesus’ company, and who could describe the help it is to me to have Him continually by my side?  This company makes me much more careful not to do anything which would displease God.  It seems to me as if Jesus is constantly watching me.  If it sometimes happens that I lose the presence of God, I soon hear Our Lord calling me back to my duty.  I cannot describe the voice He uses to call me back, but I know that it is very penetrating, and the soul who hears it finds it almost impossible to refuse what He asks.

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Join Msgr. John Esseff, as he offers this novena in honor of St. Pio

Day 2

From the writings of St. Pio:

I implore you to be faithful and humble and always to keep the great Mother of God before your mental gaze, she who humbled herself more profoundly the more she was exalted.  Never, ever be exalted at your virtues but repeat that everything comes from God, and give Him the honor and glory. (more…)

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Join Msgr. John Esseff, as he offers this novena in honor of St. Pio

Day 1

From the writings of St. Pio:

Jesus Keeps nothing for Himself of what is done for love of Him, and He will repay us very lavishly,  Don’t let us make our happiness depend on enjoying wonderful health, or else we should be just like those foolish worldly people to whom it is not given to know the secrets of heaven…. Continue to love Jesus, and make an effort to love Him more and more, without wanting to know anything else He alone will steer us to the haven of salvation.

St. Padre Pio Communion Prayer:

Stay with me, Lord, for it is necessary to have you present so that I do not forget You. You know how easily I abandon You

Stay with me, Lord, for You are my life and without You I am without fervor.

Stay with me, Lord, for You are my light and without You I am in darkness.

Stay with me, Lord, so that I hear Your voice and follow You.

Stay with me, Lord, for I desire to love You very much and alway be in Your company.

Stay with me, Lord, if You wish me to be faithful to You.

Stay with me, Lord, as poor as my soul is I want it to be a place of consolation for You, a nest of Love.

Stay with me, Jesus, for it is getting late and the day is coming to a close and life passes, death, judgment and eternity approach. It is necessary to renew my strenth, so that I will not stop along the way and for that, I need You. It is getting late and death approaches, I fear the darkness, the temptations, the dryness, the cross, the sorrows. O how I need You, my Jesus, in this night of exile!

Stay with me tonight, Jesus, in life with all its dangers, I need You.

Let me recognize You as Your disciples did at the breaking of the bread, so that the Eucharistic Communion be the Light which disperses the darkness, the force which sustains me, the unique joy of my heart.

Stay with me, Lord, because at the hour of my death, I want to remain united to You, if not by Communion, at least by grace and love.

Stay with me, Lord, for it is You alone I look for, Your Love, Your Grace, Your Will, Your Heart, Your Spirit, because I love You and ask no other reward but to love You more and more.

With a firm love, I will love You with all my heart while on earth and continue to love You perfectly during all eternity. Amen.

The novena is offered by Msgr. John Esseff with Kris McGregor

The Seven Sorrows  of the Blessed Virgin Mary

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The Virgin Mary, who believed in the word of the Lord, did not lose her faith in God when she saw her Son rejected, abused and crucified. Rather she remained beside Jesus, suffering and praying, until the end. And she saw the radiant dawn of His Resurrection. Let us learn from her to witness to our faith with a life of humble service, ready to personally pay the price of staying faithful to the Gospel of love and truth, certain that nothing that we do will be lost.

— Pope Benedict XVI, Angelus – September 13, 2009

Collect:

Father,
as Your Son was raised on the cross,
His mother Mary stood by Him, sharing His sufferings.
May Your Church be united with Christ
in His suffering and death
and so come to share in His rising to new life,
where He lives and reigns with You and the Holy Spirit,
one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

The Devotion from the revelation to St. Bridget of Sweden:

For more prayers for Our Lady of Sorrows

Jesus in your heart! Eternity in your mind! The will of God in all your actions! But above all, love, God’s love, entire love!
– St. Catherine of Genoa

St. Catherine of Genoa’s life is one that testified to the power that regular confessions and frequent Communion can have in helping us see the direction (or drift) of our life with God.  Isn’t it interesting that people who have a realistic sense of their own sinfulness and of the greatness of God are often the ones who are most ready to meet the needs of their neighbors. Catherine’s life testifies to that as well.  She’s best known for her “Treatise on Purgatory” .  She gave tirelessly to the needs of the poor and sick.  Beautiful, married young to…well, should we be charitable and say…”an unpleasant fellow ” (Ok, he was a jerk) at 16.  During the course of ten years within the marriage, Catherine began to slowly slide into worldliness, not necessarily a sinful life, but not the one of holiness she had desired before her marriage.  And then it happened, Catherine experienced a powerful encounter with the Holy Spirit in a dramatic life-changing mystical moment at the age of 26.  Again you can read more about in  “Treatise on Purgatory“.  Her life of prayer and service to the poor and needy would effect her husband as well; his conversion is a strong testament to the fruits of her relationship with God.  She reminds me a little of Mother Teresa, in that her deep, deep prayer led her to serve Him in those around her.

“Since I began to love, love has never forsaken me. It has ever grown to its own fullness within my innermost heart.” – St. Catherine of Genoa.   And it’s true…God is love, expand and make more room for Him and He will fill the space.

From Approved Apparitions:

“Catherine lived in holy obedience to God as He guided her to do His Will as He spoke to her interior,

“My daughter, observe these three rules, namely: never say I will or I will not. Never say mine, but always ours. Never excuse yourself, but always accuse yourself. When you repeat the `Our Father’ take always for your maxim, Fiat voluntas tua, that is, may his will be done in everything that may happen to you, whether good or ill; from the `Hail Mary’ take the word Jesus, and may it be implanted in your heart, and it will be a sweet guide and shield to you in all the necessities of life. And from the rest of Scripture take always for your support this word, Love, with which you will go on your way, direct, pure, light, watchful, quick, enlightened, without erring, yet without a guide or help from any creature; for love needs no support, being sufficient to do all things without fear; neither does love ever become weary, for even martyrdom is sweet to it. And, finally, this love will consume all the inclinations of the soul, and the desires of the body, for the things of this life.”

 Though Catherine lived a life of austere penance she did so for she understood how deadly is sin to the soul as a child of God can quickly turn to become a child of the Devil, if they choose to willfully disobey God through their actions. As Catherine explained, “If it were possible for me to suffer as much as all the martyrs have suffered, and even hell itself, for the love of God, and in order to make satisfaction to him, it would be after all only a sort of injury to God, in comparison with the love and goodness with which he has created, and redeemed, and, in a special manner, called me. For man, unassisted by God’s grace, is even worse than the devil, because the devil is a spirit without a body, while man, without the grace of God, is a devil incarnate. Man has a free will, which, according to the ordination of God, is in nowise bound, so that he can do all the evil that he wills; to the devil, this is impossible, since he can act only by the divine permission; and when man surrenders to him his evil will, the devil employs it, as the instrument of his temptation.”

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Prayers and Chaplet for St. Charbel

Saint Charbel was born on May 8, 1828 from a modest Maronite family in Bekaa Kafra, a village in North Lebanon. He entered the order of Lebanese monks in 1851 and was ordained a priest in 1859. Later he withdrew to the hermitage of Saints Peter and Paul to spend 23 years in prayer, fasting, manual labor, and penance, until on Christmas Eve of the year 1898 he piously gave back his soul to God. Aged 70 years. After his death, many graces and bodily cures have been obtained through his intercession. He was canonized by His Holiness Paul VI in 1977.

For more on visit his Discerning Hearts St. Charbel page

Chaplet

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THE CHAPLET
The chaplet is made up of five sets of beads, three red, one white and one blue. Five black beads, divide the sets. A medal of the saint connects the beads, with a single white bead following the medal and preceding the five sets.

The red beads are for the vows of poverty, chastity and obedience, the virtues by which religious share in the Passion of Christ.

The white beads represent the Holy Eucharist, and the blue beads love and devotion to Our Blessed Mother.

ORDER OF RECITATION
On the first white bead after the medal say the “Father of Truth” prayer. On each black bead recite an “Our Father”.

On the first three red beads say the “Hail Mary” in honor of Saint Charbel’s fidelity to the vow of poverty.

On the second set of red beads say the “Hail Mary” in honor of Saint Charbel’s fidelity to the vow of chastity.

On the third set of red beads say the “Hail Mary” in honor of Saint Charbel’s fidelity to the vow of obedience.

On the three white beads say the “Hail Mary” in honor of Saint Charbel’s love for the Eucharist.

On the three blue beads say the “Hail Mary” in honor of Saint Charbel’s devotion to Our Blessed Mother. Conclude with the prayer to obtain graces on the medal.

Father of Truth Prayer
Father of Truth, behold Your Son, a sacrifice pleasing to You. Accept this offering of Him who died for me; behold His blood shed on Golgotha for my salvation. It pleads for me. For His sake, accept my offering. Many are my sins, but greater is Your mercy. When placed on a scale, Your mercy prevails over the weight of the mountains known only to You. Consider the sin and consider the atonement; the atonement is greater and exceeds the sin. Your beloved Son sustained the nails and the lance because of my sins so in His sufferings You are satisfied and I live.

Prayer to Obtain Graces
Lord, infinitely holy and glorified in Your saints, You have inspired Charbel, the saint monk, to lead the perfect life of a hermit. We thank You for granting him the blessing and the strength to detach himself from the world so that the heroism of the monastic virtues of poverty, chastity, and obedience might triumph in his hermitage. We beseech You to grant us the grace of loving and serving You, following his example. Almighty God, who have manifested the power of Saint Charbel’s intercession through his countless miracles and favors, grant us this grace (here mention your intention) which we request from You through his intercession. Amen.

the music found in the Chaplet is from Sister Marie Keyrouz’s CD

Other Prayers

1.

Lord, infinitely Holy and Glorified in Your Saints,
You have inspired Charbel, the saint monk,
to lead the perfect life of a hermit.
We thank You for granting him the blessing
and the strength to detach himself from the world
so that the heroism of the monastic virtues of poverty,
obedience, and chastity,
could triumph in his hermitage.
We beseech You to grant us the grace of loving and serving You,
following his example.
Almighty God, Who has manifested
the power of St. Charbel’s intercession
through his countless miracles and favours,
grant us…

(State your intention(s) here…)

through his intercession.

Amen.

Our Father…
Hail Mary…
Glory Be…

2.

O God of Silence, in stillness Your adorable and mysterious Trinity lives, loves and acts. In the silence of time, Your great Mysteries have been accomplished. Blessed is the one who quiets everything within himself and listens to the impelling voice which leads to You. Charbel heard this voice and closed himself in solitude. He separated himself from a self-seeking world and spoke with You. You taught him to deny himself and to die, like the grain of wheat. You asked him to bind himself to You in a life of poverty, chastity and obedience. Freed from himself, he discovered You, 0 Lord, embraced the way of the Cross and filled his spirit with the memory of Your Son’s passion and death. The holy Mysteries became his life, the Eucharist his real food and the Mother of God his consolation. Day and night he sought You in the Scriptures and in the lives of the saints. Through unending prayer his whole life became a living hymn of praise to You and ended in a sacrifice of love that continues to proclaim Your glory. We beseech You, through his intercession, to inspire us to a life of prayer and sacrifice. Help us to live lives of quiet dedication to the service of Your Church, forever.

Amen

I LOVE it…the birthday of the mother of all “moms”!  Happy Birthday to the dearest Mother of  all.  The Church celebrates 3 birthdays on the calendar…Jesus, John the Baptist, and the great Mother of God, Mary Most Holy.  We celebrate the day the Immaculate Conception was brought through birth into the world.   

From The Catholic News Agency –
“The Catholic Church will soon celebrate the birth of the Blessed Virgin Mary on its traditional fixed date of September 8, nine months after the December 8 celebration of her Immaculate Conception as the child of Saints Joachim and Anna.

The circumstances of the Virgin Mary’s infancy and early life are not directly recorded in the Bible, but other documents and traditions describing the circumstances of her birth are cited by some of the earliest Christian writers from the first centuries of the Church.

These accounts, although not considered authoritative in the same manner as the Bible, outline some of the Church’s traditional beliefs about the birth of Mary.

The “Protoevangelium of James,” which was probably put into its final written form in the early second century, describes Mary’s father Joachim as a wealthy member of one of the Twelve Tribes of Israel. Joachim was deeply grieved, along with his wife Anna, by their childlessness. “He called to mind Abraham,” the early Christian writing says, “that in the last day God gave him a son Isaac.”

Joachim and Anna began to devote themselves extensively and rigorously to prayer and fasting, initially wondering whether their inability to conceive a child might signify God’s displeasure with them.

As it turned out, however, the couple were to be blessed even more abundantly than Abraham and Sarah, as an angel revealed to Anna when he appeared to her and prophesied that all generations would honor their future child: “The Lord has heard your prayer, and you shall conceive, and shall bring forth; and your seed shall be spoken of in all the world.”

After Mary’s birth, according to the Protoevangelium of James, Anna “made a sanctuary” in the infant girl’s room, and “allowed nothing common or unclean” on account of the special holiness of the child. The same writing records that when she was one year old, her father “made a great feast, and invited the priests, and the scribes, and the elders, and all the people of Israel.”

“And Joachim brought the child to the priests,” the account continues, “and they blessed her, saying: ‘O God of our fathers, bless this child, and give her an everlasting name to be named in all generations’ . . . And he brought her to the chief priests; and they blessed her, saying: ‘O God most high, look upon this child, and bless her with the utmost blessing, which shall be for ever.’”

The protoevangelium goes on to describe how Mary’s parents, along with the temple priests, subsequently decided that she would be offered to God as a consecrated Virgin for the rest of her life, and enter a chaste marriage with the carpenter Joseph.

Saint Augustine described the birth of the Blessed Virgin Mary as an event of cosmic and historic significance, and an appropriate prelude to the birth of Jesus Christ. “She is the flower of the field from whom bloomed the precious lily of the valley,” he said.

The fourth-century bishop, whose theology profoundly shaped the Western Church’s understanding of sin and human nature, affirmed that “through her birth, the nature inherited from our first parents is changed.” – CNA

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The importance of his life and contribution to the Church cannot be overstated. St. Augustine, one of the greatest of the Church Fathers, has not only influenced the Church, but the thought of the world as we know it.  The story of his conversion as chronicled in his “Confessions”, would be enough, but then add the body of his theological work and you have nothing less than a glimpse of what is truly the power of  “grace and mercy”.

Mike Aquilina is one of the best at bringing this great saint’s life into perspective.

For a more detail accounting of St. Augustine’s  life, you can visit  Lives of the Saints

 

 

Spiritual Writings:

- Confessions 
- Letters
- City of God
- Christian Doctrine
- On the Holy Trinity
- The Enchiridion
- On the Catechising of the Uninstructed
- On Faith and the Creed
- Concerning Faith of Things Not Seen
- On the Profit of Believing
- On the Creed: A Sermon to Catechumens
- On Continence
- On the Good of Marriage
- On Holy Virginity
- On the Good of Widowhood
- On Lying
- To Consentius: Against Lying
- On the Work of Monks
- On Patience
- On Care to be Had For the Dead
- On the Morals of the Catholic Church
- On the Morals of the Manichaeans
- On Two Souls, Against the Manichaeans
- Acts or Disputation Against Fortunatus the Manichaean
- Against the Epistle of Manichaeus Called Fundamental
- Reply to Faustus the Manichaean
- Concerning the Nature of Good, Against the Manichaeans
- On Baptism, Against the Donatists
- Answer to Letters of Petilian, Bishop of Cirta
- Merits and Remission of Sin, and Infant Baptism
- On the Spirit and the Letter
- On Nature and Grace
- On Man’s Perfection in Righteousness
- On the Proceedings of Pelagius
- On the Grace of Christ, and on Original Sin
- On Marriage and Concupiscence
- On the Soul and its Origin
- Against Two Letters of the Pelagians
- On Grace and Free Will
- On Rebuke and Grace
- The Predestination of the Saints/Gift of Perseverance
- Our Lord’s Sermon on the Mount
- The Harmony of the Gospels
- Sermons on Selected Lessons of the New Testament
- Tractates on the Gospel of John
- Homilies on the First Epistle of John
- Soliloquies
- The Enarrations, or Expositions, on the Psalms

For me, out of all the St. Augustine’s work,  this is the piece that deeply touches my heart and is one of my all-time favorite prayers:

Late Have I Loved You
A Prayer of Saint Augustine

Late have I loved you, O Beauty, so ancient and so new, late have I loved you!
And behold, you were within me and I was outside, and there I sought for you, and in my deformity I rushed headlong into the well-formed things that you have made.

You were with me, and I was not with you. Those outer beauties held me far from you, yet if they had not been in you, they would not have existed at all.

You called, and cried out to me and broke open my deafness; you shone forth upon me and you scattered my blindness.

You breathed fragrance, and I drew in my breath and I now pant for you.

I tasted, and I hunger and thirst; you touched me, and I burned for your peace.

This prayer is from his book, “Confessions.”

                                                  

St. Monica (331-387) a “shining light of Christ” example of perserverance in prayer!  We have her as an outstanding model of never giving up…what a gift to us!  Today we can turn to her and see what sticking to it can do, but did you ever think, “Who was her example?”  She didn’t know how the story of her son, St. Augustine would turn out.  She didn’t know that he would be transformed by grace into one of the greatest Doctors of the Church  who ever lived. Monica must have become frustrated, and at times filled with anxiety and maybe even  a degree of despair, but she persevered through it all!  She surely suffered emotionally for her lost son, but she never gave up her hope in God and faith in His promises…the energy of her love for her son fueled her prayer and grace transformed his seeking heart.  It took 30 years, but it happened.

A few months after his conversion, Augustine, Monica and Adeodatus (her other son), set out to return to Africa, but Monica died at Ostia, the ancient port city of Rome, and she was buried there. Some pictures show her so old, but when you think of it, she was only 56 when she died. Augustine was so deeply moved by his mother’s death that he was inspired to write his Confessions, “So be fulfilled what my mother desired of me–more richly in the prayers of so many gained for her through these confessions of mine than by my prayers alone” (Book IX.13.37)

An account of Monica’s early life, her childhood, marriage, her final days and her death, is given in Confessions Book IX, 8-12. He expresses his gratitude for her life:

“I will not speak of her gifts, but of thy gift in her; for she neither made herself nor trained herself. Thou didst create her, and neither her father nor her mother knew what kind of being was to come forth from them. And it was the rod of thy Christ, the discipline of thy only Son, that trained her in thy fear, in the house of one of thy faithful ones who was a sound member of thy Church” (IX.8.7).

Centuries later, Monica’s body was brought to Rome, and eventually her relics were interred in a chapel left of the high altar of the Church of St. Augustine in Rome (see below).

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Day 8

From a letter to St. Agnes of Prague

it is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven. Therefore, you have cast aside Your garments, that is, earthly riches, so that You might not be overcome by the one fighting against You, [and] that You might enter the kingdom of heaven through the straight path and narrow gate.

What a great laudable exchange:

to leave the things of time for those of eternity,

to choose the things of heaven for the goods of earth,

to receive the hundred-fold in place of one,

and to possess a blessed and eternal life.

Dear St. Clare,

As a young girl you imitated your mother’s love for the poor of your native Assisi.

Inspired by the preaching of St. Francis, who sang enthusiastically of His Lord Jesus and Lady Poverty, you gave your life to Jesus at nineteen years of age, allowing St. Francis to cut off your beautiful hair and invest you with the Franciscan habit.

All through your life you offered your great suffering for your Sisters, the Poor Clares, and the conversion of souls. You greatly aided St. Francis with his new order, carrying on his spirit in the Franciscans after his death.

Most of all you had a deep love of Jesus in the Most Blessed Sacrament, which fueled your vocation to love and care for the poor.

Please pray for me (mention your request) that I will seek to keep Jesus as my first love, as you did. Help me to grow in love of the Blessed Sacrament, to care for the poor, and to offer my whole life to God.

Heavenly Father, thank You for the gift of St. Clare. Through her intercession, please hear and answer my prayer, in the name of Jesus Your Son.

Amen.

For the complete novena visit the St. Clare Novena Discerning Hearts Page

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Day 7

From the testament of St. Clare

In the Lord Jesus Christ, I admonish and exhort all my sisters, both those present and those to come, to strive always to imitate the way of holy simplicity, humility, and poverty and [to preserve] the integrity of [our] holy manner of life, as we were taught by our blessed Father Francis from the beginning of our conversion to Christ. Thus may they always remain in the fragrance of a good name (cf. 2 Cor 2:15), both among those who are afar off and those who are near. [This will take place] not by our own merits but solely by the mercy and grace of our Benefactor, the Father of mercies (cf. 2 Cor 1:3).

Dear St. Clare,

As a young girl you imitated your mother’s love for the poor of your native Assisi.

Inspired by the preaching of St. Francis, who sang enthusiastically of His Lord Jesus and Lady Poverty, you gave your life to Jesus at nineteen years of age, allowing St. Francis to cut off your beautiful hair and invest you with the Franciscan habit.

All through your life you offered your great suffering for your Sisters, the Poor Clares, and the conversion of souls. You greatly aided St. Francis with his new order, carrying on his spirit in the Franciscans after his death.

Most of all you had a deep love of Jesus in the Most Blessed Sacrament, which fueled your vocation to love and care for the poor.

Please pray for me (mention your request) that I will seek to keep Jesus as my first love, as you did. Help me to grow in love of the Blessed Sacrament, to care for the poor, and to offer my whole life to God.

Heavenly Father, thank You for the gift of St. Clare. Through her intercession, please hear and answer my prayer, in the name of Jesus Your Son.

Amen.

For the complete novena visit the St. Clare Novena Discerning Hearts Page