Universal Living Rosary Association of Saint Philomena (ULRA)

INFINITE LOVE OF THE DIVINE EUCHARIST (continued)

THE PRIEST AND THE TABERNACLE

Ministers of Jesus Christ receive the homage of my very deep respect. You are chosen among all men to work the prodigies of Infinite Love. How can I not burst in thanksgiving at the sight of your ineffable grandeur? You are truly kings and priests. It is you who dispose of the heavenly crowns in our favor by the power which the adorable Victim, Who offers Himself each day in your hands, has given to you. You are truly our fathers and mothers since our life rests in your bosom. We find in your charity for us the most delicious milk. I prostrate and humble myself and I see my Savior in you. Yes, Lord, Thou alone can germinate Thy Priesthood in feeble and mortal men, and render their voice fruitful to reproduce Thee on our Altars. Hence, priests of the Most High, if we owe to you the presence of Jesus Christ among us, you owe to His Presence in you all that you are! Your powers come from the Tabernacle and are nothing else but the power, itself, of God Who resides therein. In your anxieties and your solicitudes, in your doubts and your weariness, to whom will you have recourse, if not to the Divine Host of the Tabernacle?

It is on Him and Him alone that the success of your work depends. It is there that you must plead your own cause as well as that of the people given over to your care. Only at the foot of the Tabernacle will you find the sacred fire, the celestial ardor, the strength, the light and all the graces which are necessary for you to fulfill, with dignity, the divine function of your redoubtable ministry.

O Jesus, my loving God, to what excess Thou hast loved us! Not content to have instituted the Divine Eucharist so that the Body and Blood of the Infinite Victim becomes the spiritual nourishment of our souls and the gauge of our glorious resurrection, Thou hast also wished that It perpetuate the memory and the merits of Thy Life and Thy Death. It is by the immolation of Thy Heart, after Thy Sacrifice on Calvary, which poured out Blood and Water on the Cross that Thou hast given birth to the adorable Sacrifice of the Mass. This Sacrifice is offered thousands of times a day and in a thousand different places. Present in army camps, in hospices for the unfortunate, in prisons of human justice, on land and at sea, in all the countries of the world is Thy Sacrifice. Everywhere, there are men who profit from it. The most holy, the most august, the only Sacrifice which is worthy of God. It is begun and consummated within a short space of time for the greater good of priests and of the faithful, to whom it belongs as their property.

Oh! If only we all profited by it! O Jesus, why don't our eyes become as fountains of tears? Why art Thou insulted even on Thy Altars as was Thy fate on Calvary? The Jews said of Thee: “Let Him come down from the Cross and we will believe in Him.” Thus, the irreligious, on entering Thy temples, seem to say to Thee by their proud and disdainful mien: “We will not adore You. If You are a powerful God, respond to our insults, take up Your own defense"

God of Goodness! Thou dost always keep silent and Thy only answer to the impious is the continuation of Thy blessings. So many and so great are the outrages, but these will not suspend Thy Sacrifice. Thou dost continually give Thyself for the nourishment of the faithful and allow Thyself to be enclosed in the Tabernacle, as if those assisting at Thy redoubtable Mysteries were pure souls and perfect adorers. O Victim of Propitiation! It is in Thee that the fires of eternal justice come to extinguish themselves. Thou dost stay the torrents of celestial anger. If the insolent sinner were crushed in the same instant of his offense, how could the Perpetual Sacrifice be continued and reproduce Calvary? Is it not necessary that the reign of Thy Mercy precede that of Thy Justice? Eternity will remain for the punishment of the unfortunate soul who has failed to profit by the tender advances of Thy Love.

SHELTERING THE DIVINE OUTCAST (continued)

“THE KINGDOM OF GOD IS WITHIN YOU.”
( St. Luke. XVII: 21 )

We must keep in mind that God dwells in a secret and hidden way in all souls. This indwelling of God is very different in different souls. In some, He dwells alone, in others not; in some, He dwells contented, in others displeased. Where personal desires and personal self-will least abound, there He is most content, for there He dwells as in His own house, ruling and directing it. The more secretly He dwells, the more He is alone, for nothing may enter into the “secret place” of the soul except that which is permitted to enter. In the soul where the Beloved dwells the most secretly, the purer the soul and, therefore, the more intimate His converse and the closer His embrace.

We must always remember that the Son of God, together with the Father and the Holy Ghost, is hidden in essence and in presence in the inmost being of our soul. As St. Augustine says, “l found Thee, not without, O Lord; I sought Thee without, in vain, for Thou art within.”

O Soul most beautiful, who art so longing to know the place where thy Beloved dwells, that thou mayest seek Him there and be united to Him, thou knowest now that thou art thyself the very tabernacle where He dwells! Rejoice, therefore, because all thy good and all thy hope is so near to thee as to be within thee! Love Him, then desire Him, then adore Him and go not out from thyself to seek Him, for that would be but distracting and wearisome, and thou wouldst not find Him! Strive, therefore, to be hidden with Him and, then, thou shall embrace Him and be conscious of His presence with loving affection! For as St. Paul states, “You are the temple of the Living God.”

God reads our hearts – that is all He cares about. He sees in a glance if there is room for Him in our hearts, and how much room we will give to Him. The presence of the Holy Ghost within us incites us to find more and more room for our Divine Guest, to seek by every means to profit from His wonderful Presence within us. Every day, we become more and more closely united to Him in friendship and love. What matters is not our mission in life, but the Divine Life within our hearts.