Meditation for Holy Week
Meditation for Holy Week
Welcome Jesus,
Lord Jesus, I thank you for giving me the opportunity to enter with you another Holy Week in the history of my life, and for living it in Community spiritually united with my brothers and sisters. How many times over my years have I let these days pass without due importance and ignored You and coldly sought You? How much have I resisted and put off plunging into the depths of Your unfathomable mysteries, for countless excuses? How slow have I been in taking possession of the inner and outer change you want from me through the Merciful Look? You know all that well. However, full of clemency and mercy, you never tire of calling me and waiting patiently for me. Many times I continue to ignore You, to forget You, to relativize Your voice that speaks to me through the norms and statutes of the Community, to ignore You in my brother, to ignore You in the priest who passes by me and I do not have attention…! I am a poor sinner, and yet you give me the opportunity to deepen myself and respond a little better to Your love in one more Holy Week.
The circumstances in which I find myself… you are well aware of them. But I don’t want this to be just another week in my life. I don’t want my love for You, for my brother and for myself to reach the end of it without being transformed. Look at my heart’s desire and help me to live it as the best week of my life. The holiest of all weeks, because I only have today to love you. Give me the grace to live these days like I never lived before. More united with You. Closer to Maria Santísima. More available and willing to renounce my sin because I know that this is the only way I can truly celebrate your Resurrection. I want to let myself be profoundly transformed by Your love and for your Mercy!
“My life is a single instant, a passing hour My life is a single day that escapes and escapes me You know, oh my God! To love you on earth I only have today!… (…)
What do I care, Lord, if the future is dark? I can’t ask you for anything, oh no, for tomorrow!…
Keep my heart pure, cover me with your shadow Just for today. If I think about tomorrow, I fear my inconstancy. I feel sadness and disgust rising in me. But I accept, my God, the test, the suffering Just for today.
I want to see you soon on the eternal shores O Divine Pilot! Whose hand leads me. On the rough waves guide my boat in peace Just for today.
Oh! Let me, Lord, hide in your Face, Where I will no longer hear the vain noise of the world Give me your love, keep me in your grace Just for today. Next to your divine Heart, I forget everything that passes I no longer fear the terrors of the night Oh! Give me, Jesus, a place in that Heart Just for today. (…)
Holy Guardian Angel, cover me with your wings Illuminate with your light the path I follow Come direct my steps… help me, I call for you Just for today.”
(Excerpts from the poem My song today by Santa Terezinha.
Holy Mary Our lady of Guadalupe, all the patron saints and co-patron saints of Olhar Misericordioso , pray for our Holy Week and for all the priests and families for whom we pray during these days. AMEM!
Holy Monday
Jesus arrives in Betania to make his last visit to his friends of his entire life Give the best to Jesus “Jesus said to Saint Faustina: ́My love and My mercy know no limits ́ (Diary of Saint Faustina 718). And why do we set limits when we love God? We are often so stingy wanting to offer God not the best we have, the best time, but what we have left, the crumbs of our life. (…) Giving the best of ourselves is a decision of love, for love. (…) All the best to God, because God’s love and mercy know no limits for us!” (Father Alexandre, Lenten retreat, 02/18/2021).
Lord, your hour is near and behold, you want to be with those you love so much in Bethany. Today, too, you visit my depths and want me to welcome you with all my heart. But I ask myself for a moment: what shall I anoint You with? I don’t have the pure and costly nard with which Mary prepared You for the grave. But You yourself are the vessel that has the perfume of the Merciful Father’s love. So where will I find the container to anoint you? In Yourself, Lord! Give me the grace to love You and not save anything in my life for You. Anything! I don’t want to give you my crumbs, but my best, always, because you are greater than everything I have and to you I owe everything. Everything I have comes from you!
Therefore, I pray with Saint Faustina: “O Wound of Mercy, Heart of Jesus, hide me in Your depths, like a small drop of Your own Blood, and do not let me come out of it for all eternity. Collect me in Your depths and teach me Yourself to love You. Eternal love, mold my soul so that I may be able to respond to your love. O Living Love, make me capable of loving You eternally; I want to respond eternally to Your love. O Christ, a single look from You is dearer to me than a thousand worlds, than the whole of heaven. You can, Lord, make my soul know how to understand, in all its fullness, who you are. I know and believe that You can do everything. If You deigned to give Yourself so generously to me, I know that You can be even more generous. Bring me to intimacy with You so much as far as human nature can be taken…” (Diary of Saint Faustina, no 1631)
Holy tuesday
Ask Jesus for forgiveness “Many human beings, instead of gratitude and love, repay the Sacred Heart with offenses and injuries, and certainly we have been or are in that group. ́ Forgiveness, Lord! ́ Jesus, in the century. XVII, said to Santa Margarida Maria de Alacoque, our co-patron: ́Here is the heart that loved men so much, to the point of exhausting itself and consuming itself to witness its love and, in return, it receives nothing but ingratitude from the majority. , coldness and contempt. How are we, up to the present moment, corresponding to Divine benevolence? How will we match you for the future? Poor of us if it weren’t for the infinite Mercy of the Lord!” (Father Alexandre, Meditatio 06/18/2021).
On this day when we relive the last moments you had with the apostles at the last supper, I want to recline my head in your heart, just like John reclined. How much pain must have already been penetrating there, and how hard it must have been for you to announce Judas’s betrayal! Your look, however, was the same: Merciful and full of love. Simão Pedro, wanting to correspond to this love, promises to give his life for You. Me too, Lord, have already made so many vows of love and promises to You that You listened with great attention, and that I forgot and abandoned on the first occasion. You knew the reality of Pedro and, in him, that of all of us. Have mercy on me, Lord! I want to be more faithful to what I promised you in the Merciful Look. You know very well that my faith and love are still weak and that much of what I want to accomplish is not easily achieved, and I end up getting discouraged along the way. But I don’t want to make You suffer anymore with my infidelity. Increase my faith, increase my hope, increase my love! You called me to be centered in Your Sacred Heart and to be a missionary of Mercy. On this Holy Tuesday, I bring the beats of my heart closer to those of Your Most Holy One, so that they may be rhythmic based on Your love, which knows everything from my interior! Heal me Lord! “Have mercy on me, O Lord, according to your goodness. And according to the immensity of your mercy, blot out my iniquity. Wash me wholly from my fault, and cleanse me from my sin. iniquity, my sin is always before me. Against you only have I sinned, and that which is evil I have done before you. Thus your sentence appears just, and your judgment righteous. Behold, I was born in guilt, my mother conceived me in sin. Yet you love sincerity of heart. So put wisdom in my inmost being. Sprinkle me with a branch of hyssop, and I shall be clean. Wash me and I will make you whiter than snow. Make me hear a word of joy and gladness, so that the bones you have crushed may rejoice. Turn away your eyes from my sins, and blot out all my guilt. O my God , create in me a pure heart, and renew me the spirit of steadfastness. From your face do not reject me, nor deprive me of your holy Spirit. Then I will teach the wicked your ways, and sinners will come to you. God, O God, my savior, deliver me from the pain of this shed blood, and your mercy my tongue will extol. Lord, open my lips, so that my mouth announces your praises. You are not appeased with ritual sacrifices; and if I offered you a sacrifice, you would not accept it. My sacrifice, O Lord, is a contrite spirit, a repentant and humbled heart, O God, which you will not despise. Lord, by your goodness, treat Zion with kindness, rebuild the walls of Jerusalem. Then you will accept the prescribed sacrifices, offerings and burnt offerings; and upon your altar victims will be offered to you.” salm 50
Holy Mary… Our Lady of Guadalupe, all saints and patron saints and co-patron saints of Merciful Look, pray for our Holy Week and for all the priests and families for whom we pray during these days AMEM
Holy Wednesday
Day of darkness Surrender Yourself Completely to Jesus “Cursed is being on top of the wall! ́Since you are lukewarm, neither cold nor hot, I will vomit you up ́ (Ap 3,16). We will be capable of true aberrations if we are like that. We can calmly betray Christ and our brothers by living decisions in half! Be fully COM, not half COM. Half decisions are the fruit of a lack of faith, not the conviction that God cares for us (cf. Ps 36:18).” (Father Alexandre, Meditatio 01/12/2017).
Your time draws nearer and nearer, Jesus. You ardently desired to celebrate this supper with Your apostles. However, many times I don’t even want to be with you and my brothers, isolating myself and exhausting myself in my own selfishness. How ardently should I want to receive You in the sacraments, and seek You in my prayer life and in my encounters with my brothers and sisters! You have given me everything I need to be happy, you have given yourself in the Sacrament of the Eucharist, yet I am ungrateful and often do not take full possession of the desires that You have for me. me. You call me to live the Merciful Look charism and you give me all the tools to be holy through it. And I, how do I respond to all this? You know it well, O Jesus. I am aware that your Eucharistic heart, full of love and pain, loves us deeply at the Last Supper. Everything converges to this moment in your life. You were ready for total surrender! Lord, today I humbly want to tell You that it is in Your heart on fire with love and wounded by pain that I have the treasure of my life. “I give and consecrate to You, O Sacred Heart of Jesus Christ, my person and my life, my actions, pains and sufferings, so that I no longer want to use any part of my being but to honor, love and glorify You. This is my irrevocable will: to be all Yours and do everything for Your love, renouncing with all my heart everything that could displease You. I therefore take You, O Sacred Heart, for the sole benefit of my love, protector of my life, security of my salvation, remedy for my fragility and my unconsciousness, repairer of all the imperfections of my life and my safe haven on time of death. Be thou, O heart of goodness, my justice before God, Thy Father, that he may turn away his just wrath from me. O heart of love! I put all my trust in You, because I fear everything from my malice and my weakness, but I hope everything from Your goodness! Extinguish in me everything that might displease You or oppose Your will. May Your pure love be so deeply imprinted in my heart that I can never forget You nor be separated from You. I beseech you for all your finesses, that my name be written in your heart, because I want to make all my happiness and all my glory consist in living and dying as your slave. Amen.” (Consecration to the Sacred Heart of Jesus written by Saint Margaret Mary Alacoque) Holy Mary… Our Lady of Guadalupe, all the saints and patron saints and co-patron saints of Olhar Misericordioso, pray for our Holy Week and for all the priests and families for whom we pray during these days AMEM!
Holy Thursday
Institution of the Eucharist and priestly order stay with Jesus “Thank you, Lord, Jesus, for Your presence in the Eucharist! Thank you, Lord, for being with us always! We ask You, Lord, increase our love for You! Daughters and sons, may we never forget the immense Love of God for us! And in an eternal design, He called us to the Merciful Look so that in this Community, and through it, we may take His Merciful Love to all nations, races and languages! And what more important food, to fulfill this mission, than to eat the same Bread of Angels, nourish ourselves with the very Body and Blood of Merciful Jesus?” (Father Alexandre, Meditatio 11/06/2020).
Jesus, on that night when you offered your Body and Blood to the Father under the species of Bread and Wine, I want to remember my first Communion, that day when you came for the first time to find shelter in my soul. What a great gift you left us, Lord! I thank you for all the priests I have known, without whom I would not have received any of the sacraments I received. How much do I owe them! Receive my thanks and my praise for the lives of each one, even those whose names I don’t remember or whose presence was very brief. Powerful and eternal, however, it is the effect and mark that each Communion left on my soul, thanks to each priest who passed through me. Only You know in depth the most sincere desire of my heart to receive You in the Eucharist. But how many times have I been cold and distracted when receiving Communion, letting all the graces you want to give me pass by! How many times have I truly consoled You in this sacrament of love? How many times have I just wanted to ask you for graces and I really didn’t want you to act profoundly in my soul? I want to learn to communicate better, Lord. Help me with Your grace! “Remain, Lord, with me, because Your presence is necessary so that I do not forget You; you know how easily I abandon you. Remain, Lord, with me, for I am weak and need Your strength not to fall so many times; because You are my light and without You I am in darkness; for you are my life and without you we are I pray in fervor; to make known Your will to me; so that I may hear Your voice and follow You; for I want to love You very much and always be in Your company. Stay with me, Lord, if you want me to be faithful to you. Remain with me, Lord, because, however poor my soul may be, it wants to be for You a place of consolation and a nest of love. Remain, Jesus, with me, for it is late and the day is waning… That is, life passes, death, judgment, eternity draws near and it is necessary to renew my strength so as not to delay on the path, and to that’s why I need you. It is late and death approaches. I fear darkness, temptations, aridity, the cross, sufferings, and how much I need You, my Jesus, in this night of exile. Remain, Jesus, with me, because on this night of life, of dangers, I need You. Make that, like Your disciples, I recognize You in the breaking of bread, that is, that Eucharistic Communion be the light that dispels darkness, the strength that sustains me and the only joy of my heart. Remain, Lord, with me, because at the hour of death I want to remain united to You, if not through communion, at least through grace and love. Remain, Jesus, with me, not You I ask for divine consolations because I don’t deserve them, but the gift of Your presence, so I ask. Remain, Lord, with me, it is only You that I seek, Your love, Your grace, Your will, Your heart, Your Spirit, because I love You and I ask for no other reward than to love You more. With firm, practical love, to love You with all my heart on earth to continue to love You perfectly for all eternity AMEM (Prayer written by S Pe Pio that he always prayed after communion)
Holy Friday
Passion and Death of Jesus suffer with Jesus “For us Christians, there is no Christ without a cross, nor a cross without Christ. Trying to understand the mission of Jesus without the light of the cross illuminating me is impossible. Indeed we were born from the cross! (…) many look at the cross and think of it as the cause of death. We Christians must look to the cross and see in it the cause of life, of eternal life! That’s why your cross, associated with Christ’s, is so important! Don’t run away from the cross of Christ! Do not abandon your cross, carry it out of love!” (Father Alexandre, Meditatio 09/14/2019).
Your Passion. Your last words. Your last look. Your last breath. The nails. The sores. The pain. Love. Your death. The spear. The heart. The blood. The water. Mercy. Life… How much do you have to tell me this day, Lord. Every move You made, every drop of blood, all Your sweat and tears…everything speaks to us on this day. Everything speaks to us and, however, much we still cannot understand, much we still cannot accept. Each wound exudes love. Speak to us in love, and Thy body bears my sins. But so many times we don’t understand the language of love. How many times have we rejected Your love. How many times do we choose a path other than that of love. Before Your cross, I can only exclaim: have mercy on me, Lord! How can I go on judging others if You Yourself, being mistreated by those men, exuded pure love and mercy and prayed for them! What harm have they done to me that should approach what you suffered for me? None, none will ever come close to what you experienced on this day. Give me the grace to penetrate into Your love, into the depths of the immensity of pain that You felt at each season. Convert my petty and inconstant heart. Give me the grace to look at the little crosses of my day-to-day life with new eyes. Transform my gaze before the Cross. I want that which takes me away from holiness to die in me. I want to learn to suffer with you, Lord. I want to carry my cross for love! “O Mary, you who walked the path of the cross together with your Son, feeling your mother’s heart torn apart by pain, but always remembering your fiat and intimately confident that He for whom nothing is impossible would know how to give fulfillment of your promises, implore for us and for future generations the grace of abandonment to the love of God. Make it so that in the presence of suffering, contempt, ordeal, even if prolonged and hard, we never doubt your love. To Jesus, your Son, honor and glory forever. Amen” (Saint John Paul II, Via Sacra no Coliseo. Holy Friday in 2000)
Holy Saturday
Jesus descends into hell and triumphs over death wait on Jesus “Remember: the darkest nights produce the brightest stars. It’s never too late to take our story and write a new ending, full of hope, full of Mercy! And the supernatural hope is that which reminds us that death is not the end, but eternal life with God. (…) Life leaves pain that is difficult to heal. But God’s merciful love leaves memories that no one can erase.” (Father Alexandre, Meditatio 11/29/2017).
Lord Jesus, today I want to entrust to You again all those I have prayed for throughout my life and the situations for which I have already claimed Your power. How many times have you heard me speak to you about those I love and whom I carry in my heart. Receive them all again today in Your hands, when we relive the day when You broke the gates and chains of death, destroying the prisons of hell. Teach me to always hope in You, Lord, and to desire Your grace and Your grace more than anything else. salvation to me and the whole world. Only You know what is best for me and mine, and I want to learn to trust You more, because I know that a missionary of Mercy never gets discouraged or gives up. Holy Mary, you who waited on the Lord and faithfully believed in His promise, come to my aid and help me to be pure and upright in intention, always seeking the glory of God as my ultimate end, even in my prayers. Sacred Heart of Jesus, I trust and hope in You!
In the holy sepulchre, Mary Magdalene Looking for her Jesus, bowed down in tears; The angels wanted to ease your pain, But nothing could pacify their feathers. Was it not for you, luminous Archangels, That burning soul came to look for; She wanted to see the Lord of Angels, Take him in your arms, take him far away. From the tomb she had been the last to leave, and the first to come with daylight; Your God also came, veiling your light, For, in matters of love, she did not win. And Jesus, when showing his Divine Countenance, One name, just one, comes out of his Heart, Telling him: Mary! And it was at that moment that she was filled with peace and consolation. (…) I desire a heart burning with tenderness, That a support give me without complaining, Loving everything in me, even my impotence And night and day like this, without ever leaving me. I never met any creature Who could love me, but without being able to die: A God must take my nature, Become my brother in order to suffer. You listened to me, the only friend I love, Becoming mortal to conquer me; You shed your blood, supreme mystery!… And yet you live for me on the Altar. If I cannot see the brightness of Your Face, Hear Your voice in all meekness, May I, O God, live by Your Grace, I can rest in Your Sacred Heart. Heart of Jesus, treasure of tenderness, My happiness and only hope, You knew how to charm my youth, stay with me when the last night to arrive! Lord, to You, to You alone I gave my life, And all my desires you know them well; It is in Your ever-infinite goodness That I want to lose myself, Heart of (…)” (Excerpt from the poem Meu Céu na Terra, by Santa Teresinha)
Resurrection Sunday
Jesus rises Thank Jesus “Each time we pray from the heart, Heaven opens up to us! Each time we obey, Heaven opens up to us! Each time we commit ourselves to God, Heaven opens up to us! Every time we truly love, Heaven opens up to us! Indeed Heaven is always open to me. I who close the window of my eyes of faith when I don’t want to see him. It’s amazing how there are people who prefer not to advance Heaven on Earth. And we can already live here in a waiting room for Heaven! For those who serve God, Heaven is never closed. You can at any moment knock on the door of Heaven and be answered, because Jesus promised “Behold, I have set before you an open door, which no one can close” (Revelation 3,8). This door of God’s presence is wide open for anyone who wants to enter.” (Father Alexandre, Meditatio 01/27/2018)
Today is the feast of feasts, the solemnity of solemnities. Your light, O Christ, shines brighter than the sun on all beings. Great is Your power and Your majesty! Hallelujah! I open wide the doors of my heart and I want to let Your light enter my soul with all its strength, Lord! What a great joy it is to believe in You and live in Your presence. Your glory and Your splendor will never cease! Thank you for the gift of my faith, my hope and my love! They come to me from you, and it is thanks to your action in me that today I can celebrate your Resurrection with joy. Another Holy Week has passed in my life, so that today and from that moment on I can take even more possession of the true life you have to give me. I give you thanks and praises, Lord! Today once again I tell you with all my heart: I want to be a saint! I want to be a reflection of your goodness and mercy for the world that so needs your light and your presence! I renounce all fear and all distrust of You! I take possession of your grace! I know that I will fall and need Your Mercy many, many times, but I want to continue with my eyes fixed on You, because I know that, even if I fall, You will always support me and lift me up.
“To you, O God, we praise, to you, Lord, we sing. To you, Eternal Father, worships the whole earth. The angels sing to you, the heavens and their powers: Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord, God of the universe! Heavens and earth proclaim your immense glory. The glorious choir of the Apostles celebrates you, Praise you from the Prophets the noble crowd and the luminous army of your holy Martyrs. To you throughout the earth proclaims the Holy Church, O omnipotent Father, of immense majesty, and worship together your only Son, the living and true God, and your Holy Spirit. O Christ, King of glory, of the eternal Father and Son, you were born of a Virgin in order to save us. By suffering death, you triumphed over death, opening the eternal kingdom to those who have faith in heaven. you sat on the right of God, of the Father in glory. We believe that you will come again as judge. Therefore, we ask you: save your servants, whom you, Lord, redeemed with precious blood. Make us numbered, Lord, we beseech you, among your saints in your eternal glory.” (Hymn Te Deum – To You, O God, We Praise)
