Visits to the Most Holy Sacrament and to the Blessed Virgin MaryVisit 9

To the Blessed Sacrament,
My Lord Jesus Christ, page 123.

St. John says that he saw our Lord girt up with a golden girdle, which supported his breasts: /I saw the Son of Man girt about the paps with a golden girdle.” Thus also is Jesus in the Sacrament of the Altar, with his breasts all filled with milk; that is to say, with the graces which, in his mercy, he desires to bestow upon us. And as a mother, whose breasts are overcharged with milk, goes about seeking for children who may draw it off, and relieve her of its weight,¹ so also does he call out to us, You shall be carried at the breasts.’

The Venerable Father Alvarez saw Jesus in the Blessed

1 Deer. ad glor. V. Sacrament with his hands filled with graces, and seeking to whom he might dispense them. Of St. Catharine of Sienna it is related, that when she approached the Most Holy Sacrament, she did so precisely with the same loving avidity with which a child lies to its mother’s breast.

O most beloved and only-begotten Son of the Eternal Father, I know that Thou art the object most worthy of being loved. I desire to love Thee as much as Thou deservest to be loved, or at least as much as a soul can ever desire to love Thee. I fully understand that I, who am a traitor, and so great a rebel to Thy love, deserve not to love Thee, neither do I deserve to approach Thee so near as I now am in this church. But I feel that Thou, for all this, seekest my love; I hear Thee say, My son, give me thy heart. Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart.” I understand that it is for this end that Thou hast spared my life, and not sent me to hell, that I might be converted and turn all my affections to Thee. Since, then, Thou art pleased that even I should love Thee, oh, yes, my God, I will do so. Behold me: to Thee I yield myself up; I give myself to Thee; I love Thee. O God! all goodness, all love, I choose Thee for the only king and lord of my poor heart. Thou desirest it, and my will is to give it to Thee: it is cold, it is loathsome; but if Thou acceptest it, Thou wilt change it. Change me, my Lord, change me; I no longer have courage to live as I have hitherto done, ungrateful, and with so little love towards Thy infinite goodness, which loves me so much, and deserves an infinite love. Enable me to supply from this day forward for all the love which I have hitherto failed to bear Thee.

Ejaculatory Prayer. My God, my God, I will love Thee, I will love Thee, I will love Thee!

Spiritual Communion, page 124.
Visit to the Blessed Virgin Mary.

In all things like to her Son Jesus is his Mother Mary; and as she is the Mother of mercy, she is thrice happy when she helps and consoles the miserable. So great is the desire of this Mother to bestow graces on all, that Bernardine de Bustis says, that “she desires more to do us good, and to impart to us graces, than we can desire to receive them.” *

Ejaculatory prayer. Hail, our hope!
[From the Naples Edition.]
Prayer of St. John Damascene.

Hail! Mary, the hope of Christians. Hear the petition of a sinner, who wishes to love thee with the greatest tenderness, and to honor thee as thou deservest, and who reposes in thee, next to God, his hope of salvation. Being indebted to thee for the preservation of my life, I entreat thee to restore me to the grace of thy divine Son. Thou art the surest pledge of my salvation; deliver me, then, by thy prayers, from the heavy load of my sins. Disperse the darkness of my understanding; banish every inordinate affection from my heart; repress the temptations of my spiritual enemies, and so order my life that, under thy protection, I may arrive at eternal repose in heaven.

Ejaculatory prayer. O my Mother, obtain for me the grace that I may always remember thee.

The usual prayer, page 125.