Dr. Wojciech Kosek
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Meditations led by seven people:
D, A, B – women; Z, L, W, P – men.
This translation was published here on 21 Dec 2023.
To see the original Polish text ← click, please!
(Duration of meditations with songs: about 70 min)
P Beloved Savior! We want to focus our adoration after Holy Mass today on meditating on the mystery of the Eucharist. Why is this the case? Behold, we wish to accompany You during Your agony in Gethsemane; we wish to embrace with You in love the Divine plan for the salvation of humankind and within it that which is most precious and, at the same time, most vulnerable to our lack of respect. We kneel in Gethsemane beside You, raising our hands to the Father in a prayerful gesture of supplication for the fulfillment of His holy Will. (0:47)
A The desires of Your Heart now become our desires as well. Not wanting to obtain anything selfishly for ourselves, we focus our attention today on You and on what is the greatest object of Your concern. We believe that the Holy Mass and Your presence under the sacramental species of Bread and Wine are treasures hidden in Your Heart, for which we so commonly and so often do not give due thanks, treasures that we often receive too hastily, not appreciating their incomprehensible greatness. (0:45)
A Song: Garden of Olives – 1st stanza (1:20)
Z O Beloved Lord Jesus! As I stood at the threshold of my home more than an hour ago to leave for the church for this present meeting with You, I turned to You in prayer with the knowledge that You are with me. I know that You are always with me whenever I turn to You in prayer. Yes, we were with each other then when I crossed the threshold of my home to come here. However, the Church, our Mother, tells me I will not fully meet You in my home. It is the reason I went out to talk to You in the church, to be with You physically here – just as Mary was with You in the Holy Land. (0:51)
Z Song: Adoro Te Devote – 1st stanza (0:39)
B Dearest Jesus, I believe I have come to a particularly close encounter with You – present in the Blessed Sacrament. There, at home, I am with You spiritually, while here I am spiritually and physically. In our encounters outside the temple, we are with each other but not as close as we wish. There we are like friends who can only meet on the phone, who are therefore admittedly present with each other, but at a distance – able to talk only on the phone, unable to fully see each other, touch each other, hug each other – physically far apart. Here in the temple, where You receive us at Your place, we are physically with You together, bodily in the same place. (0:59)
B Song: Adoro Te Devote – 2nd stanza (0:39)
P Beloved Jesus! In order to direct my eyes to You, I cannot look to some chosen place in my room about which I could say that You are physically there just as I am there, in my room. Moreover, neither does any image of You give me this opportunity. In the temple, on the other hand, when I kneel before the Most Holy Host, I have the assurance that here I am before You, Dearest Jesus, before Your Divine Majesty, hidden in the flesh, from the Immaculate Mary taken. (0:53)
P Song: Adoro Te Devote – 3rd stanza (0:39)
D Beloved Jesus! I believe our physical proximity here in the temple – is a gift of Your loving Heart for me. Being able to look into each other’s eyes while meeting with You and talking about everything that troubles both Your and my heart – is a wonderful gift to me and You. So I came. I came to visit You, Jesus, in Your home. So here we are together in a different way than when we were together in my home. Here, at Your house, we are not “at a distance” but close to each other. (0:49)
D Song: Adoro Te Devote – 4th stanza (0:39)
W Beloved Savior! We received You in Holy Communion a few minutes ago during the Holy Mass. So now we are close, very close to each other! The desire to be united with You now is satisfied. It is worthwhile now, therefore, to remain in the temple… it is worthwhile now to abide in Your presence… it is worthwhile now to direct all thoughts and feelings of the heart towards You, O Beloved! It is worthwhile now when, by the power of the grace of the Sacrament of Holy Communion, we are in such a degree of union, which can only be illustrated by the most intimate meeting of husband and wife in conjugal union… Jesus! I fervently desire to truly experience Your closeness to the depths of my heart and love You as You Yourself desire to be loved. (0:59)
W Song: Adoro Te Devote – 5th stanza (0:39)
A O Jesus! I want to love You by the power of our Eucharistic union, by the power of our mutual, such close presence… I believe that it is now an opportune time to reflect on this gift of Your love – the Holy Mass. I desire that we value and comprehend it more and more to respond ever more fully to this unfathomable gift of Your love for us. Participation in the Holy Mass – is a great grace for each of us. You give us every day this grace out of love; Your love bestows upon us this gift of inestimable value every day. I know that it is worthwhile that my response of love to Your gift is to know its depths more fully. (0:55)
A Song: Adoro Te Devote – 6th stanza (0:39)
L Jesus! We now want to consider the wonderful depth of the gift of the Holy Mass and the time of prayer after it. Based on the Church’s teaching, we can discover that just as in our sky, the power of the light of the full moon is greater than the power of the light of thousands of stars visible there, so the prayer of the Rosary has greater spiritual power than the Way of the Cross, Bitter Lamentations, prayer of the Chaplet of Divine Mercy at fifteen o’clock or a prayer of vigil with You in the Garden of Gethsemane every Thursday evening. (0:39)
Ł Song: Adoro Te Devote – 7th stanza (0:39)
B Based on the teachings of the Church, we can also discover that just as the beauty and power of the sun are greater than the beauty and power of the moonlight, so the spiritual beauty and power of the Holy Mass and the prayer of adoration after it are incomparably greater than the beauty and power of the Holy Rosary. Where is the difference, and on what basis can such statements be made? The Church teaches that the Holy Mass is the greatest miracle and the greatest gift of Almighty God. The Holy Rosary is the Church’s distinguished gift from Mary, who is the greatest personal masterpiece of the Creator God. (0:42)
B Song: I Know in Whom I Believe – 1st stanza (1:50)
Z Jesus! We want to reflect momentarily on the Holy Mass’s extraordinary and often barely noticed properties. It is a gift of God Himself, Jesus Christ, who, on the night before His Passion, instituted it as a supernatural time machine, which carries us back in time as far as two thousand years and makes us participants in the Last Supper. It is remarkable that during every Holy Mass, even the most modestly celebrated, we participate in the miracle of being carried back in time! (0:42)
Z Song: The Hidden Jesus – 1st stanza (0:53)
D We believe that all gathered around a validly ordained priest-celebrant were taken today (as in every celebration) into the Upper Room for the Last Supper with the beginning of the Holy Mass. Being in our Church of Divine Providence, we were seeing with the eyes of the body the priest at the altar whom we knew and who, dressed in the liturgical vestments in force in the 21st century, celebrated the Holy Mass according to the current liturgical regulations. With the eyes of faith, on the other hand, we were seeing countless multitudes of Your priests, arriving from all places and times of history, gathered around You, O Jesus, who are the Messiah, celebrating at the sacrificial table of the Last Supper the Paschal memorial of His Sacrifice. (0:55)
D Song: The Hidden Jesus – 2nd stanza (0:53)
P Our participation in the Holy Mass each time is always a participation in this Your only celebration, which You, in the Upper Room of the Last Supper among the Apostles, celebrate a dozen hours before Your Death on Calvary. Yes, we believe that the chief celebrant is You Yourself, Jesus, whom we do not see with the eyes of the body but of spirit. Moreover, we believe that as the chief celebrant of this Sacrifice, You are in a challenging situation in the Upper Room – You know that in a dozen hours or so, You will be unjustly condemned to death, and that sentence will be carried out. (0:47)
P Song: The Hidden Jesus – 3rd stanza (0:53)
A Jesus! As the chief celebrant of the Eucharistic Sacrifice, You are in the Upper Room in the extremely difficult situation of a man already being delivered to death by Israel’s highest religious authority. As the celebrant-sacrificer, You are in the situation of a man who knows He will die on the cross at Calvary in just a dozen hours. My heart, in love with You, therefore asks: Is there any possibility of helping You in this challenging situation, to help You in real life and not only in imagination?… Is there any possibility of giving support in a real way to You, who are so burdened by the prospect of the agony that is so near? And my heart, enamored of You, discovers with gratitude and amazement that Your love already two thousand years ago, seeing my desire to assist You in that critical situation, left such a way in the Church… (1:13)
A Song: Be Hail, Living Host – 1st stanza (0:50)
W Yes, all of us, in love with You, O Jesus, can assist You, even though You belong to a different point in historical time than the time of our lives. At every Holy Mass, we are there with You as the Messiah, the Son of God, who, during the Transubstantiation, offers Sacrifice to the Father of Yourself dying on Calvary at a time several hours forward towards this celebration. Jesus! We believe, therefore, that it is not so much that You celebrate Holy Mass for us at the altar in our church in the 21st century but that we participate in the one Mystery of the Holy Mass that You Yourself celebrate among the Apostles in the Upper Room at the table of the Last Supper around the year 33 of Your era. We participate there with all the other participants of the Holy Masses, who have come from all places and times of history into the Cenacle in the 33rd year of Your era. By Your Will, however, we see neither You, the Apostles, nor the Upper Room. However, with the eyes not of flesh but of faith, we see You, High Priest, who is truly the only One worthy to offer Your Body and Blood to the Father as a sacrifice for sinners. With the eyes of flesh, we do not see You. However, You see us perfectly – we are very close to You, by Your Divine right hand carried into Your time. (1:48)
W Song: Be Hail, Living Host – 2nd stanza (0:50)
B When we attend Holy Mass, we are at the Last Supper. So we reflect: What happened at the Last Supper? What do we participate in when we participate in the Holy Mass as the Last Supper? Behold, You, O Jesus, celebrated the Passover, i.e., a liturgy composed of four parts. Within the third part of the Passover, You performed the Transubstantiation of bread and wine into Your Body and Blood offered on Golgotha. Jesus! You fed the Apostles with this sacrificial Body and Blood; moreover, You fed them and us, people from another historical time. Yes, O Jesus, You fed not only the Apostles but also us, the people of the 21st century. (0:56)
B Song: Be Hail, Living Host – 3rd stanza (0:50)
L Therein lies the extraordinary, supernatural property of the Holy Mass as a time machine – it truly takes us back to the time of the Last Supper and thus gives us to eat some of the same supernatural Bread and Wine – Your Body and Blood – that the Apostles ate in the Upper Room. We eat from the same supernatural Bread and Wine, not just from Bread and Wine similar to that Bread and Wine! [1] This miracle of carrying over backward in time is given to us by God in every Eucharist! (0:42)
Ł Song: Be Hail, Living Host – 4th stanza (1:20)
D Shouldn’t this amaze and fascinate us? Let us think! How unimaginably powerful God is, and at the same time, how unimaginably modest if He performs such a miracle under the cover of such modest-looking liturgical signs… How hidden is He in the mystery of His gifts if subsequent generations of believers still are discovering what the Eucharist is… (0:36)
D Song: Be Hail, Living Host – 5th stanza (1:20)
Z Jesus! What is astonishing is that You did not reveal the entire richness of the Eucharist to the Apostles at once. On the contrary, it is available only to those who love to participate in it more and more deeply. St. John Paul II wrote about it in the Encyclical Ecclesia de Eucharistia (No. 2b), “Did the Apostles who took part in the Last Supper understand the meaning of the words spoken by Christ? Perhaps not. Those words would only be fully clear at the end of the Triduum sacrum, the time from Thursday evening to Sunday morning. Those days embrace the mysterium paschale; they also embrace the mysterium eucharisticum.” (1:04)
Z Song: Be Hail, Living Host – 6th stanza (1:20)
A So during the Holy Mass, we are at the Last Supper with You, Jesus, and there, together with the Apostles, we eat the same Bread and drink from the same Chalice. It is extraordinary… In every Holy Mass, we are taken back in time to the hour of the Last Supper! However, the extraordinariness does not end there! For, what does eating this Body and Blood of the Lord mean? (0:29)
A Song: Be Hail, Living Host – 7th stanza (1:20)
P The Church gives us the certainty of faith that the Apostles, while eating this Food, were taken from the Upper Room slightly forward in time: to Golgotha, where You are in a state of dying on the cross, O Jesus, giving Your life for the sinners. At the moment of the Transubstantiation in the Upper Room, You launched the time machine forward. At that exact moment, the Apostles were genuinely taken to the place next to Your feet nailed to the tree of the cross; the Apostles were indeed placed next to Mary and the other women on Golgotha. We note, O Jesus, that although Your Death had not yet occurred in history measured by the clock time and although in this time You and the Apostles were still in the Upper Room, the miracle of participating in Your Death took place! Namely, thanks to the miracle of the Transubstantiation, they were already participating in this future event of Your Death while being with You in the Upper Room! (0:58)
P Song: Be Hail, Living Host – 8th stanza (1:20)
B Dear Jesus! Thus, we, too, eating the same Food with the Apostles, are being carried forward in time – from the Upper Room to Golgotha – and stand there as witnesses of Your Death, standing right next to Immaculate Mary and the other women! During each Transubstantiation and Holy Communion, we stand as true witnesses of Your Death and the Sorrows of Your Blessed Mother. Through this, we have the opportunity to express our sympathy to You and Mary, to shed tears of sorrow for our sins – the cause of this drama! Being truly right next to You, the dying Savior, we have the opportunity to make a firm decision to correct ourselves. We also have the opportunity to beg for Your saving help and Mary’s maternal help so we may be faithful to these resolutions. What is more – we receive an immediate answer to this request: Your Blood flows down from the tree of the Cross on us as well, standing, after all, not in imagination, but in real, bodily terms at that Cross. (1:23)
B Song: Let us Love the Lord – 1st stanza (0:40)
W Dearest Jesus! Although during the Holy Mass, we do not perceive with our senses any sound or any other sign from Golgotha, God makes us witnesses of Your Death, witnesses the more credible, the deeper and the more seriously we enter into the reality of the Mystery in which we, moved there above centuries, are given to participate. On the other hand, we know that, by God’s will, St. Padre Pio was additionally granted an extraordinary grace so that he could participate with his whole being in the Event of Golgotha: when he celebrated Mass, at the moment of Transubstantiation, he physically shared in his body in Your pain, Savior dying on the cross! We are aware, however, that such grace is not necessary for salvation. On the contrary, we understand that it is Your desire, Jesus, for us to participate in Your Death without additional help, thanks to our firm belief in the truth of the Catholic Church’s teaching that every Mass is the making present of the Sacrifice that the Son of God made on the Cross at Golgotha. (1:23)
W Song: Let us Love the Lord – 2nd stanza (0:40)
D Jesus! The Holy Mass – what an amazing miracle! The third part of it takes the Apostles and us from the Upper Room to Golgotha, but at the same time, leaves us all still at You, Jesus, celebrating the Last Supper. So we are both in the Upper Room and on Golgotha because the Apostles with You are both in the Upper Room and on Golgotha. (0:26)
D Song: Let us Love the Lord – 3rd stanza (0:40)
L We know that the wonders contained in the Holy Mass do not end there: the third part of the Eucharist, that is, the Transubstantiation and Holy Communion, is followed by the fourth part: the glorification of You. Through the singing of hymns or silence, we worship You, Jesus, as the conqueror of hell, Satan, and death, as the One who from the Father right now receives the reward of eternal life – for Himself as a man and for each of us. We believe, O Jesus, that during the time of adoration after Holy Communion, You breathe the Holy Spirit into the hearts of the Apostles and the hearts of the participants of all Holy Masses. (0:46)
Ł Song: Let us Love the Lord – 4th stanza (0:40)
A The fourth part of the Holy Mass thus takes us from the Upper Room of the Last Supper to the Upper Room of the Resurrection and the Upper Room of Descent of the Holy Spirit. Moreover, behold again, we must conclude that we are still participants of the Last Supper before Your way to Death, although at the same time, the time machine takes us with the Apostles and with Mary and with all the participants of all Masses into the events of the not-too-distant future in relation to the time of the Last Supper: into the time of Your glory, O Jesus (0:36).
A Song: Let us Love the Lord – 5th stanza (0:40)
Z Jesus! In summing up our consideration, we note that the Holy Mass makes us, first of all, participants of the Last Supper, within which it makes the Apostles and us participants in Your Sacrifice on Golgotha (which takes place during Transubstantiation and Holy Communion), and then Your Resurrection, Ascension and Descent of the Holy Spirit (which takes place during glorification after Holy Communion). The Holy Mass brings us perfectly into Your earthly time, O Jesus, into Your hour of salvation. (0:39)
Z Song: Let us Love the Lord – 6th stanza (0:40)
B Beloved Jesus! In order to discover the unique character of the Mass, Your gift to the Church, we must realize that the Holy Rosary, the gift of Mary, Your Mother, cannot transport us to the time of Your life. The Rosary only brings the events to memory. Mary gave it to the Church so that its particular mysteries would be brought into the minds of those who recite them and stimulate them to gratitude for the Event that a particular mystery represents. (0:37)
B Song: Let us Love the Lord – 7th stanza (0:40)
P Similarly, celebrating the Way of the Cross or Bitter Lamentations does not make us truly present with You in Your events two thousand years ago – they only remind us of them as something immensely important but already irretrievably past. While all of these forms of devotion bear some resemblance to the Holy Mass as a means of uniting us with You, O Jesus, passing the time of Passion and the time of Glory, we must remember that, in light of the Catholic Church’s teachings, only the Holy Mass fully merits the term time machine as a means for truly real participation in those salvific events which, from the perspective of earthly time, have already passed irretrievably. (0:54)
P Song: Let us Love the Lord – 8th stanza (0:40)
D Having in mind the understanding of the Holy Mass as a time machine, taking us back in time to the Upper Room of the Last Supper, we can now more deeply understand the importance of adoration prayer, undertaken immediately after the end of the Holy Mass, whether individually or in community, which the Church strongly encourages. [2] We remember, O Jesus, that You left the Upper Room after the Last Supper and went with the disciples to the Garden of Olives, and so began to realize those Events in which You had already given them sacramental participation – carrying them through a time machine forward in time. The Apostles, therefore, although they had already participated in these Events at the time of the Last Supper, they could participate in them again after the Last Supper – they could be with You, O Jesus, in the most challenging hours of Your life! (1:07)
D Song: Here in this Sacrament – 1st stanza (0:35)
W We know that the Apostles did not live up to this opportunity – they slept in Gethsemane when You were in agony; they slept although You asked them to keep a prayer vigil with You. To make up for that abandonment of You, Holy Pope John Paul II held an hour-long prayer vigil every Thursday. As a result of private revelations, religious orders have also been established for a similar holy practice. We must remember, however, that through sacramental union with You, O Jesus, coming in Holy Communion, one can do so even more deeply, precisely after the Holy Mass. St. John Paul II gave a model for the prayer of union with You after the Holy Mass and encouraged us to do so. Jesus! We know that the Apostles, not only through sleep during Your agony in Gethsemane, did not live up to the opportunity to accompany You from the Upper Room to Death. They were also missing at the climactic moment at Golgotha. At Your pierced feet stood beside Mary and several women named Mary, but only one of the Apostles, the youngest, John. He is the model for us of perseverance and depth of union with the Master in love, he, the beloved disciple of the Lord, Your disciple… (1:35)
W Song: Garden of Olives – 3rd stanza (0:40)
A Dear Jesus! To make reparation for that absence of almost all the Apostles on Golgotha by Your side, the Church today recites the Divine Mercy chaplet at three o’clock thanks to St. Faustina of the Blessed Sacrament. We then move in spirit to Golgotha to be with You in those most difficult moments. However, here again, with the seriousness that comes from obedience to the infallible teaching of the Church, we must conclude that this spiritual standing on Golgotha is of incomparably less value to You than that undertaken through conscious participation in the Mass and the prayer immediately following it. (0:42)
A Song: Here in this Sacrament – 2nd stanza (0:35)
L Dearest Jesus! We are beginning to understand more fully that the request for prayerful presence with You at the Hour of Mercy is, in fact, the unveiling of another deep longing of Your Heart – the longing for our sacramental love for You. You desire a love based on the rock of the Catholic faith, a love spoken through sacramental presence with You, sacramental and not merely spiritual. You desire not so much the words and imaginings of standing with You on Golgotha, but the real, because sacramental, standing there with You; You desire our conscious participation in that hour of Golgotha through participation in the Holy Mass and the adoration that immediately follows it. (1:05)
Ł Song: Here in this Sacrament – 3rd stanza (0:35)
B Jesus! We believe that only remaining in prayer during the Eucharist and immediately after its completion – remaining in union with You accepted in Body and Blood – allows us to stand with You on Golgotha truly. Of the Apostles, this was first given only to St. John – he was the only one of the participants of the Last Supper who stayed with You until the end on the way from the Cenacle to Golgotha. We understand that his attitude of deep faith and love reveals to us how to participate in the Eucharist, fully love You, and fully comfort You. The sacraments infinitely exceed the possibilities of the Chaplet of Divine Mercy, the Stations of the Cross, or the Bitter Lamentations. The sacraments are chosen ways for You to bestow grace and for us to respond to Your Divine love. (1:16)
B Song: Here in this Sacrament – 4th stanza (0:35)
Z John Paul II wrote in the Encyclical Ecclesia de Eucharistia (No. 25), “The worship of the Eucharist outside of the Mass is of inestimable value for the life of the Church. This worship is strictly linked to the celebration of the Eucharistic Sacrifice. The presence of Christ under the sacred species reserved after Mass – a presence which lasts as long as the species of bread and of wine remain – derives from the celebration of the sacrifice and is directed towards communion, both sacramental and spiritual. It is the responsibility of Pastors to encourage, also by their personal witness, the practice of Eucharistic adoration, and exposition of the Blessed Sacrament in particular, as well as prayer of adoration before Christ present under the Eucharistic species.” (1:01)
Z Song: Your Heart, Jesus, is Burning with Love – 1st stanza (0:50)
D Lord Jesus! We believe that in receiving Holy Communion, we receive You not as God hidden in inaccessible spiritual spaces but as God Incarnate, God who is present with us as human, as one of us. We also remember that the consumption of Holy Communion cannot be understood as an almost immediate end to Your human, bodily presence with us. On the contrary, Your sojourn with us as God Incarnate, as Man hidden under the species of the Sacred Host, continues for some time. As we heard just now, the Church proclaims: “The presence of Christ under the sacred species reserved after Mass – a presence which lasts as long as the species of bread and of wine remain” – that is, until their whole destruction in the process of digestion. Precisely because each of us continues to conceal the most holy species of the Blessed Sacrament in our bowels after the Holy Mass, we are intimately united with You, O Christ, who, after the completion of the Last Supper as a man, goes out from the Upper Room to the Garden of Gethsemane and onward, onward… to Golgotha… (1:36)
D Song: Your Heart, Jesus, is Burning with Love – 2nd stanza (0:50)
P O Jesus, corporeally, physically present with me – present as every human being, though unknowable by our senses! This absolutely pinnacle form of Your presence allows me to truly physically go with You on the path to the Garden of Olives and next to the top of Golgotha, to go in Your time of life, to accompany You in a real, completely real way. I believe that although in the course of extended prayer after the Mass, the sacramental species probably cease to exist in the end, such close union with You, dependent after all on You, God, will continue until the end of this prayer, which I began after Holy Communion. I believe it is worth planning the day so that we have as much time as possible after the Eucharist to accompany You in prayer on this exhausting path of our salvation. (1:12)
P Song: Your Heart, Jesus, is Burning with Love – 3rd stanza (0:50)
A At the end of our reflections, let us listen to the words from Diary (No. 411) of St. Faustina of the Blessed Sacrament: “Often during Mass, I see the Lord in my soul, I feel His presence transfixing me. I feel His Divine glance, I say a lot to Him without speaking any words, I know what His Divine Heart wants, and I always do what He prefers. I love Him to the point of insanity, and I feel I am loved by God. At such times, when in the depth of my soul I meet God, I am so happy – I cannot put it into words.” (0:50)
P Song: Your Heart, Jesus, is Burning with Love – 4th stanza (0:50)
L Beloved Savior! We dedicated the first part of our adoration today after the Holy Mass to meditation on the mystery of the Eucharist. Desiring to accompany You as You were agonizing in Gethsemane, we knelt there beside You when You were raising Your hands to the Father in a prayerful gesture of supplication for the fulfillment of His Holy Will. The desires of Your Heart became our desires as well. Not wishing to obtain anything selfishly for ourselves, we have focused our attention today on You and on that which is the greatest object of Your concern. We believe that the Holy Mass and Your presence under the sacramental species of Bread and Wine are treasures hidden in Your Heart, treasures for which we so often do not give You due thanks, treasures that we often receive too hastily, not appreciating their incomprehensible greatness. (1:05)
P Song: Your Heart, Jesus, is Burning with Love – 5th stanza (0:50)
B We desire to enter in a moment the way You went with the beam of the cross on Your shoulders, burdened with it as a result of the unjustly conducted trial over You. We believe that the Divine power of our sacramental union still lasts and allows us to truly be in Your time, very close to You. We believe this passing with You on the way to Calvary will be a true consolation and strengthening for You. We believe that by carrying the beam of the cross with You, we will be able to become step by step like You in love towards God and neighbor. Amen. (0:51)