it’s a 3hugs&blessings thursday…

Prayer isn’t there to make us feel better when we’re anxious.

And it’s not there as an obligation.

It is a communion of love, between a lover and the beloved.

St. Faustina is a reliable witness on this point: she spoke to Our Lord about this many times, and He always expressed His infinite love for humanity.

“While I was saying the chaplet [of Divine Mercy], I heard a voice which said, Oh, what great graces I will grant to souls who say this chaplet; the very depths of My tender mercy are stirred for the sake of those who say the chaplet.”  (No. 848)

In prayer we need not only to pray the words but Christ needs us to also listen!

I am so grateful when I hear Him.

And today I want to thank Him…

for being my companion, my friend. 

These 3hugs&blessings are my personal thanks for a friend who often speaks; but most especially, always listens to me –  as I meet Him there, in prayer, each morning.

 

First

Second

Lord, I offer you all of me, all that I am and all that I am not. I offer you every good decision and every regrettable mistake, every great accomplishment and every unapplied talent, every success and every miserable failure.  I offer you all joy and all heartache, every kindness and every bitterness to be forgotten, every twinkle in my eye and every tear flowing down my cheek, every great love and each lost or irrecoverable act of charity.  I offer you every quiet reflective moment and all of the unneeded chaos around me, all things holy and good in me and all things in need of greater purification.  I give you every joyful memory and every bitter foul pain, each future moment and every missed opportunity to love, every kind act and each regrettable harsh word, all meekness and humility within me and every misplaced prideful thought, every virtue and every weak vice, every laugh and all misery mixed with weeping.  I give you every healthy  breath and every weakness of mind and body, every attempt at chastity and every unworthy lustful thought, every restful repose and every anxious sleepless night.  O Lord, you can have all of me, the beauty that you’ve deposited deep within me and the emptiness of my sinful faults.  I love you and am yours completely.    AMEN.  Pedro de la Cruz

Third

Prayer of Surrender

(Suscipe)

Take, Lord, and receive all my liberty, my memory, my understanding, and my entire will, all I have and call my own.

You have given all to me.  To you, Lord, I return it.

Everything is yours; do with it what you will.  Give me only your love and your grace, that is enough for me.

-St. Ignatius of Loyola

Lord, you never forget to meet me every morning.

So today, I just want to offer you

3hugs&blessings – for what is said…and what is heard.