St. Alphonsus Liguori: Daily Meditations for Week of Pentecost

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Whit Monday

Morning Meditation

THE LOVE OF JESUS IN THE MOST BLESSED SACRAMENT

Jesus, not wishing to separate Himself from us even in death, instituted the Most Blessed Sacrament in order to remain with us therein until the end of the world. Behold I am with you all days even to the consummation of the world-(Matt. xxviii. 20).

I.

Our most loving Redeemer, knowing that He must leave this earth and return to His Father as soon as He should have accomplished the work of our Redemption by His death, and seeing that His hour was near at hand– Jesus knowing that his hour was come that he should pass out of this world to his father (Jo. xiii. l)– would not leave us orphans in this valley of tears. What, then, did He do? He instituted the Most Holy Sacrament of the Eucharist, in which He left us His whole Self. “No tongue,” says St. Peter of Alcantara, “can express the greatness of the love of Jesus for our souls; and hence this Spouse, before He departed this life, in order that His absence might not be the occasion of our forgetting Him, left us as a memorial this Most Holy Sacrament, in which He might Himself remain with us, not being willing that any other pledge but Himself should remain to remind us of Him.” Jesus, therefore, not wishing to separate Himself from us by His death, instituted this Sacrament of love, in order to remain with us until the end of the world: Behold I am with you all days, even to the consummation of the world (Matt. xxviii. 20). Let us behold Him, therefore, as Faith teaches us, residing upon numberless altars, shut up in so many prisons of love, that He may be found by all who seek Him. “But, O Lord,” says St. Bernard, “this does not become Thy majesty.” Jesus Christ answers: It is sufficient that it accords with My love.

O my beloved Jesus, O God Who lovest us with such great love, what more canst Thou do to make us, ungrateful sinners, love Thee? Oh, if men loved Thee, all the churches would be continually filled with devout people, prostrate on their faces, adoring and thanking Thee, burning with Thy love at beholding Thee with the eyes of Faith hidden in a tabernacle! But no, men, forgetful of Thee and of Thy love, wait indeed upon a mortal man from whom they expect some perishable good, and leave Thee, my Lord, abandoned and alone. Oh, that I were able to make Thee amends for so much ingratitude by my own devotion!


II.

Those persons are tenderly affected who go to Jerusalem, and visit the place where the Word Incarnate was born, the hall where He was scourged, the Mount on which He died, and the Sepulchre in which He was buried; but how much greater ought our tenderness to be in visiting an altar on which Jesus is present in the Most Holy Sacrament? The Blessed John of Avila was accustomed to say, that there was no sanctuary so excellent and holy as a church in which Jesus was sacramentally present.

I am grieved, O my Jesus, that I have hitherto been like unto such, careless and forgetful of Thee. But for the future I will not be one of their number. I will devote myself to Thee and visit Thee as often as I am able. Inflame my heart with Thy holy love, that for the future I may live only to love and to please Thee. Thou deservest to be loved by the hearts of all. If at one time I despised Thee, I now desire to love Thee. My Jesus, Thou art my Love and my only Good my God and my All. Most Holy Virgin Mary, obtain for me a great love of Jesus in the Holy Sacrament.

Spiritual Reading

VISITING JESUS IN THE BLESSED SACRAMENT

Our holy Faith teaches us, and we are bound to believe that in the consecrated Host Jesus Christ is really present under the species of bread. But we must also understand that He is thus present on our altars as on a throne of love and mercy, to dispense graces and to show us the love He bears us, in wishing thus to dwell night and day hidden in our midst.

It is well known that the Holy Church instituted the Festival of Corpus Christi with a solemn Octave, and that she celebrates it with many processions, and frequent Exposition of the Most Holy Sacrament, that men may thereby be moved to gratefully acknowledge and honour this loving presence and dwelling of Jesus Christ in the Sacrament of the Altar, by their devotions, thanksgivings, and the tender affections of their souls. O God, how many insults and outrages has not this admirable Redeemer had, and has He not daily to endure in this Sacrament on the part of those very men for whose love He remains upon our altars! Of this He indeed complained to His dear servant, St. Margaret Mary Alacoque, as the author of the Book of Devotion to the Heart of Jesus relates. One day, as she was in prayer before the Most Holy Sacrament, Jesus showed her His Heart on a throne of flames, crowned with thorns, and surmounted by a cross, and thus addressed her: “Behold this Heart which has loved men so much, and which has spared Itself in nothing, and has even gone so far as to consume Itself, thereby to show them Its love; but in return the greater part of men only show Me ingratitude by the irreverence, tepidity, sacrilege, and contempt, of which they make Me the object in this Sacrament of love; and that which I feel most acutely is, that hearts consecrated to Me treat Me thus.” Jesus then expressed His wish, that the first Friday after the Octave of Corpus Christ: should be dedicated as a particular festival in honour of His adorable Heart; and that on that day all souls who loved Him should endeavour by their homage, and by their affections to make amends for the insults men have offered Him in the Sacrament of the Altar. He at the same time promised abundant graces to all who should thus honour Him present in the Blessed Sacrament.

This Presence makes us understand what our Lord said of old by His Prophet, that His delights are to be with the children of men; for He knows not how to tear Himself from them, even when they abandon and despise Him. This also shows us how pleasing to the Heart of Jesus are all those souls who frequently visit Him and keep Him company in the churches in which He is present under the sacramental species. He desired St. Mary Magdalen de Pazzi to visit Him in the Most Blessed Sacrament thirty-three times a day; and in this His beloved spouse faithfully obeyed Him, and in all her visits she approached as near as possible to the altar, as we read in her Life.

But let all those devout souls who often go to keep company with Jesus in the Most Blessed Sacrament speak -let them tell us of the gifts and inspirations they have received, of the flames of love which are there enkindled in their souls, and the Paradise they enjoy in the presence of this hidden God.

The servant of God, and great Sicilian, missionary Father Louis La Nouza, was, even in his youth and as a layman, so enamoured of Jesus Christ, that he seemed unable to tear himself from the presence of his beloved Lord. Such were the joys which he here experienced: that his director, to moderate his devotion, had to command him, in virtue of obedience, not to remain, before the tabernacle for more than an hour. The time having elapsed, he showed in obeying that in tearing himself from the bosom of Jesus Christ, he had to do himself just such violence as a child that has to detach itself from it’s mother’s breast in the very moment in which it is satiating itself with the utmost avidity. St. Aloysius also was forbidden to remain in the presence of the Most Blessed Sacrament, and as he passed before the Tabernacle, finding himself drawn, so to speak, by the sweet attractions of his Lord, and almost forced to remain there, he would with the greatest effort tear himself away, saying, in an excess of tender love: Depart from me, O Lord, depart! There it was also that St. Francis Xavier found refreshment in the midst of his many labours in India, for he employed his days in toiling for souls, and his nights he passed in the presence of the Most Blessed Sacrament.

Evening Meditation

THE PRACTICE OF THE LOVE OF JESUS CHRIST

XI.-THE MEANS OF AVOIDING LUKEWARMNESS AND ATTAINING PERFECTION

I.

The fourth means of perfection, and even of perseverance in the grace of God, is frequently to receive Holy Communion, of which we have often spoken, and often declared that a soul can do nothing more pleasing to Jesus Christ than to receive Him often in the Sacrament of the Altar. St. Teresa said: “There is no better help to perfection than frequent Communion. Oh, how admirably does the Lord bring on such a soul to perfection!” And she adds that ordinarily speaking, they who communicate most frequently are found further advanced in perfection; and that there is greater spirituality in those Religious Communities where frequent Communion is the custom. For this reason it is that, as we find declared in a decree of Innocent XI, in 1679, the Holy Fathers have so highly extolled, and so much promoted, the practice of frequent and even of daily Communion. The Holy Communion, as the Council of Trent tells us, delivers us from daily faults, and preserves us from mortal sins. St. Bernard asserts that Communion represses the movements of anger and incontinence, which are the two passions that most frequently and most violently assail us. St. Thomas says that Communion defeats the suggestions of the devil. And finally, St. John Chrysostom says that Communion pours into our souls a great inclination to virtue, and a promptitude to practise it; and at the same time imparts to us a great peace, by which the path of perfection is made very sweet and easy to us. Besides, there is no Sacrament so capable of kindling Divine love in souls as the Holy Sacrament of the Eucharist, in which Jesus Christ bestows on us His whole Self, in order to unite us all to Himself by means of holy love. Wherefore Blessed John of Avila said: “Whoever deters souls from frequent Communion does the work of the devil.” Yes; for the devil has a great horror of this Sacrament, from which souls derive immense strength to advance in Divine love.


II.

But a proper preparation is requisite to communicate well. The first preparation, or, in other terms, the remote preparation, to be able to go to Communion daily, or several times in the week, is, (1) To keep free from all deliberate affection to sin, that is, to sin committed, as we say, with the eyes open. (2) The practice of much mental prayer. (3) The mortification of the senses and of the passions. St. Francis of Sales teaches as follows: “Whoever has overcome the greatest part of his bad inclinations, and has arrived at a notable degree of perfection, can communicate every day.” The angelic Doctor, St. Thomas, says that anyone who knows by experience that his soul derives an increase of Divine love from Holy Communion, may communicate daily. Hence Innocent XI, in the above-mentioned decree, said that the greater or less frequency of Holy Communion must rest on the decision of the Confessor, who ought to be guided in this matter by the profit which he sees accrue to the souls under his direction. In the next place, the proximate preparation for Communion is that which is made on the morning itself of Communion, for which there is need of at least half an hour’s mental prayer.

To reap also more abundant fruit from Communion, we must make a good thanksgiving. Blessed John of Avila said that the time after Communion is “a time to gain treasures of graces”. St. Mary Magdalen de Pazzi used to say that no time can be more calculated to inflame us with Divine love than the time immediately after our Communion. And St. Teresa says: “After Communion let us be careful not to lose so good an opportunity of negotiating with God. His Divine Majesty is not accustomed to pay badly for His lodging, if He meets with a good reception.”