Thursday, November 30, 2006

Mental Prayer for the First Friday of December, Ingratitude to the Sacred Heart

Mental Prayer Meditation Helps

Presence of God

Grace I Ask: To experience or to realize how ungrateful I have been for the love of Christ.

The Idea: Have you ever been hurt by one you love very much? When someone we love coldly and cruelly ignores or, even worse, intentionally slights our expression of affection, we feel crushed. Yet we often coldly and cruelly ignore Christ; we often deliberately slight Him. He has showered on us every possible sign of His love, even unto death. And yet we so frequently ignore Him, or even, with eyes wide open, maliciously wound His Most Sacred Heart. Christ is a real living person who loves us intensely. He is not just an impersonal vague reality represented on a holy card. Until we come to think of Him in terms as real as our parents or friends, the notion of ingratitude to Him will never be fully realized.

My Personal Application: Do I try to realize that each time I commit the slightest sin, I actually wound His Sacred Heart? Do I make any effort to make Him a part of my life? Or am I so swallowed up in material things that I hardly have time ever to give Him a thought? And most of all, do I realize that, as all persons who love, He desires to be part of our lives? He died to give me life ; can I be so ungrateful as completely to ignore Him?...intentionally to wound His Sacred Heart?

I Speak to God: Dear Lord, please help me to realize that by sinning and by being indifferent to your love I actually have wounded you. Help me to see how ungrateful I've been in the past.

Thought for Today: Heart of Jesus, bruised for our offenses, have mercy on us.
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Adapted from Mental Prayer, Challenge to the Lay Apostle
by The Queen's Work,(© 1958)

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