Consecration to the Blood of Jesus Christ
Jesus said to His Disciples:
“You have heard that it was said,
You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.
But I say to you, love your enemies
and pray for those who persecute you,
that you may be children of your heavenly Father,
for he makes his sun rise on the bad and the good,
and causes rain to fall on the just and the unjust.
For if you love those who love you, what recompense will you have?
Do not the tax collectors do the same?
And if you greet your brothers only,
what is unusual about that?
Do not the pagans do the same?
So be perfect, just as your heavenly Father is perfect.” — Gospel MT 5:43-48
God seeks our highest good and teaches us to seek the greatest good of others, even those who hate and abuse us. Our love for others, even those who are ungrateful and selfish towards us, must be marked by the same kindness and mercy which God has shown to us. It is easier to show kindness and mercy when we can expect to benefit from doing so. How much harder when we can expect nothing in return. Our prayer for those who do us ill both breaks the power of revenge and releases the power of love to do good in the face of evil.
How can we possibly love those who cause us harm or ill-will? With God all things are possible. He gives power and grace to those who believe and accept the gift of the Holy Spirit. His love conquers all, even our hurts, fears, prejudices and griefs. Only the cross of Jesus Christ can free us from the tyranny of malice, hatred, revenge, and resentment and gives us the courage to return evil with good. Such love and grace has power to heal and to save from destruction. Do you know the power of Christ’s redeeming love and mercy?
God gives us every good gift in Jesus Christ so that we may not lack anything we need to do his will and to live as his sons and daughters (2 Peter 1:3). He knows our weakness and sinfulness better than we do. And he assures us of his love, mercy, and grace to follow in his ways. Do you want to grow in your love for God and for your neighbor? Ask the Holy Spirit to change and transform you in the image of the Father that you may walk in the joy and freedom of the Gospel.
“Lord Jesus, your love brings freedom and pardon. Fill me with your Holy Spirit and set my heart ablaze with your love that nothing may make me lose my temper, ruffle my peace, take away my joy, nor make me bitter towards anyone.”
Virgin Mary, Mother of God and our Mother,
to your Immaculate Heart we consecrate ourselves,
in an act of total to the Lord.
By You we will be led to Christ.
By Him and with Him we will be led to the Father.
We will walk in the light of faith, and we will do everything
so that the world may believe that Jesus Christ is the One sent by the Father.
With Him we wish to carry His Love and Salvation to the ends of the earth.
Under the protection of your Immaculate Heart,
we will be one People with Christ.
We will be witnesses of His Resurrection.
By Him we will be led to the Father,
for the glory of the Most Holy Trinity,
Whom we adore, praise and bless forever. Amen.
REMEMBER: AT HOLY MASS, THE BREAD AND WINE BECOME
THE BODY AND BLOOD OF JESUS CHRIST.
Jesus said to them,
“Truly, truly, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood,
you have no life in yourselves.”
“He who eats My flesh and drinks My blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day.”
“For My flesh is true food, and My blood is true drink.”
“He who eats My flesh and drinks My blood abides in Me, and I in him.”
“As the living Father sent Me, and I live because of the Father, so he who eats Me,
he also will live because of Me.”
“This is the bread which came down out of heaven; not as the fathers ate and died;
he who eats this bread will live forever.”
John 6:53-58
I, ______________, a faithless sinner,
renew and ratify today in thy hands the vows of my Baptism;
I renounce forever Satan, his pomps and works;
and I give myself entirely to Jesus Christ,
the Incarnate Wisdom, to carry my cross after Him all the days of my life,
and to be more faithful to Him than I have ever been before.
In the presence of all the heavenly court I choose thee this day for my Mother
and Mistress. I deliver and consecrate to thee, as thy slave, my body and soul,
my goods, both interior and exterior, and even the value of all my good actions,
past, present and future, leaving to thee the entire and full right of disposing of me,
and all that belongs to me, without exception, according to thy good pleasure,
for the greater glory of God in time and in eternity. Amen.
(With Ecclesiastical Approval)
“Such is the generation of those who seek Him, who seek the face of the God of Jacob” (Psalm 24:6 – RSV)
There are a number of different devotions we might focus on as we enter this most Holy Week of the Church calendar, but it might be good for us to reverently reconsider the very image our Savior chose to leave us, that of His own Beautiful Face yet Sorrowful Face.
It is good for us to recall the sacrifice of great Love that our Lord made for us. It has been said that too much familiarity with this Holy Season can tend to diminish our appreciation of the measure of Christ’s love reflected in own His Holy Countenance. It is good for us to recall that it was at the beginning of His passion that our Lord experienced one of the more painful events He would endure; it ,was not simply the betrayal of one of His own disciples, but that fact that Judas Iscariot chose to betray our Lord by placing a kiss on His cheek.
The Church has a long history of devotion to the Holy Face going all the way back to Veronica’s singular act of courage and compassion, when she wiped the bloodied face of Jesus, forever preserving for us the painful image of His sacrifice and love. What similar act of compassion and even courage might we offer to our Eucharistic Lord, an act that can help to console our Lord in our own time, when we still witness so much blasphemy and so many offenses against His Church, His Mystical Body, and by consequence, His Holy Face.
In his Encyclical Ecclesia de Eucharistia, (The Eucharist) Saint John Paul II drew the eyes of the Church to the Face of Christ in the sacrament of the Eucharist.
“To contemplate Christ involves being able to recognize him wherever he manifests himself, in His many forms of presence, but above all in the living sacrament of his Body and Blood. The Church draws her life from Christ in the Eucharist; by Him she is fed and by Him she is enlightened. The Eucharist is both a mystery of faith and a “mystery of light.” Whenever the Church celebrates the Eucharist, the faithful can in some way relive the experience of the two disciples on the road to Emmaus: “their eyes were opened and they recognized him” (Lk 24:31). . . . I cannot let this Holy Thursday (2003) pass without halting before the “Eucharistic face” of Christ and pointing out with new force to the Church the centrality of the Eucharist.
Perhaps we could make our own act of courage and compassion this week and find an hour to visit our Church and just spend some time contemplating the Face of Christ in the Eucharist. This is also a wonderful time to begin, if you have not already, to develop a continual devotion to the Holy Face of Jesus Christ. For information please visit: www.holyface.com
Mark Danis
Host of Carmelite Conversations
Mondays 7 pm eastern / 6 pm central
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Francesca Franchina MS Ed. talks with Fr. Tom Alkire, OC of Los Angeles, CA about Ash Wednesday,Lent 2013, The Blessed Mother: Seat of Wisdom and what believers of Jesus Christ are called to do about the resignation of Pope Benedict XVI and other world situations. Discussion focuses on how we need to continue to grow spiritually, living and sharing their LOVE with discernment and prudence; increasing prayers of reparation and reconciliation as disciples of Jesus under the Mantle of our Blessed Mother who is equipping us with WISDOM and spiritual weapons as the Fatima Peace Plan From Heaven and the message of Medjugorje continue to unfold and become known in this the Year of Faith and The New Evangelization. Fr. Tom Alkire OC, is a seasoned Carmelite priest affiliated with the Marian Movement of Priests, The Association of The Precious Blood/Tallahassee, FL, is Associate Pastor of St. Raphael’s Parish in Los Angeles, CA and has been a Home Missionary in Northern and Southern California for many years.
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Francesca Franchina MS Ed. talks with Fr. Tom Alkire, OC of Los Angeles, CA about The Blessed Mother, the Queen of Peace, the alleged 2012 Christmas Medugorje Message from Jesus and The Blessed Mother and what we the believers of Jesus Christ are called to do about the world situation. Father Tom traveled to Medjugorje four times and lived with the family of Mirjana Soldo, one of the visionaries and will share his experience and Scriptural references to the signs and symbols of Fatima and Medugorje. Jesus and Our Lady are equippings us with spiritual weapons and the Fatima Peace Plan From Heaven continues to unravel and become known in this the Year of Faith and The New Evangelization. Fr. Tom Alkire OC, is a seasoned Carmelite priest affiliated with the Marian Movement of Priests, The Association of The Precious Blood/Tallahassee, FL, is Associate Pastor of St. Raphael’s Parish in Los Angeles, CA and has been a Home Missionary in Northern and Southern California for many years.
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“Making Disciples” is a weekly evangelization and apologetics program that seeks to inform, inspire and equip its listeners to more effectively share, explain and defend the Gospel of Jesus Christ and the teachings of the Catholic Church.
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Who Is Jesus Christ? Unlocking the Mystery in the Gospel of Matthew
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