SPIRITUAL EXCERCISES & RSV BIBLE EXTRACTS - WEEK 146
STARTS THURSDAY 11th NOVEMBER 2010
THE GLORY OF ‘MARIAN HOLINESS OF LIFE’
1. PREPARATION FOR HEAVEN
Weekly message No. 141 (6th November 1986).
Praying every day for the Holy Souls.
“Dear children! Today I wish to call you to pray daily for souls in purgatory. For every soul prayer and grace is necessary to reach God and the love of God. By doing this, dear children, you obtain new intercessors who will help you in life to realize that all the earthly things are not important for you, that only Heaven is that for which it is necessary to strive. Therefore, dear children, pray without ceasing that you may be able to help yourselves and the others to whom your prayers will bring joy. Thank you for having responded to my call.”
PRACTICAL:
During this week make a sacrifice each day, or, offer Holy Mass for the souls in Purgatory.
Thursday: Decision to serve God alone.
Matthew 6:24.
24No one can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon.
Friday: Sacrifice offered for the fallen - prompted by the belief in the resurrection.
2 Machabees 12:43-45.
43He also took up a collection, man by man, to the amount of two thousand drachmas of silver, and sent it to Jerusalem to provide for a sin offering. In doing this he acted very well and honourably, taking account of the resurrection. 44For if he were not expecting that those who had fallen would rise again, it would have been superfluous and foolish to pray for the dead. 45But if he was looking to the splendid reward that is laid up for those who fall asleep in godliness, it was a holy and pious thought. Therefore he made atonement for the dead, that they might be delivered from their sin.
Saturday: Jesus, after his death, “in the spirit,” went to preach to the “spirits in prison.”
1 Peter 3:18-20.
18For Christ also died for sins once for all, the righteous for the unrighteous, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh but made alive in the spirit; 19in which he went and preached to the spirits in prison, 20who formerly did not obey, when God’s patience waited in the days of Noah, during the building of the ark, in which a few, that is, eight persons, were saved through water.
Sunday: By sacrificing himself to bear the sins of many, Jesus brings salvation to those who are waiting for him.
Hebrews 9:26-28.
26For then he would have had to suffer repeatedly since the foundation of the world. But as it is, he has appeared once for all at the end of the age to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself. 27And just as it is appointed for men to die once, and after that comes judgment, 28so Christ, having been offered once to bear the sins of many, will appear a second time, not to deal with sin but to save those who are eagerly waiting for him.
Monday: “Set your hearts on God’s kingdom first and on his saving justice …”
Matthew 6:33.
33But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things shall be yours as well.
Tuesday: “Let your thoughts be on things above, not on the things that are on the earth …”
Colossians 3:1-4.
1If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. 2Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth. 3For you have died, and your life is hid with Christ in God. 4When Christ who is our life appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.
Wednesday: Our homeland is in heaven.
Philippians 3:20-21.
20But our commonwealth is in heaven, and from it we await a Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ, 21who will change our lowly body to be like his glorious body, by the power which enables him even to subject all things to himself.