Dr. Wojciech Kosek
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Meditations led by four people:
B, D – women; P, W – men.
This translation was published here on 14 Dec 2023.
To see the original Polish text ← click, please!
(Duration of meditations: about 25 min.)
(Duration of meditations with songs: about 35 min.)
D In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. O Jesus, Holy Host! In this hour of our first Saturday adoration, we wish especially to make reparation for the pain that afflicts Your Heart, O Jesus, and the Heart of Your Immaculate Mother. Today, we do not want to think about our own needs, but above all, we want to make reparation with this prayerful presence for the insults that cause the pain of Your Hearts. Jesus! Mary! We ask for such mature love that we think of You – of You, Jesus; of You, Mary… (0:45)
W In the first part of our prayer vigil, we wish, O Jesus, to contemplate by the power of Your grace the mystery of Your Incarnation and Birth from the Immaculate Virgin Mary – the mystery that opens before our hearts in every sacramental Holy Communion. We wish this prayer to simultaneously be a fulfillment of one of the elements of the first Saturday devotion – a meditation on the mysteries of the Rosary. For, in a spirit of obedience to the teaching of the Holy Church, we believe that the encounter with You, O Jesus, the Incarnate Son of God, in the mystery of Holy Communion, which we have just received during the Eucharist, is the loftiest, fullest realization of that Rosary path of contemplation that Mary included in the first four Joyful Mysteries of the Holy Rosary. (1:15)
W Song: O the Silent White Host – 1-2 stanza (1:23)
B O Jesus! We believe that You will bring us into the depths of this mystery by the power of the grace You have given us with the Most Holy Communion at the Holy Mass. We confess with the deepest reverence that in the Blessed Sacrament, we have received You, the true Incarnate God, the God who willed to enter our world as a man, as one of us. A MOMENT OF SILENCE Now let us tell Jesus in silence the words of love coming from the heart… and words of faith that He is here. He is physically… in His flesh. He is and loves… He is because loves… A MOMENT OF SILENCE (0:58)
P You are already with me, O Jesus the Beloved! I welcome and adore You, King of kings and Lord of lords! With most profound reverence, I fall to my knees before You and confess with a contrite heart: O Jesus, I am not worthy to have You come under my roof. However, since You, King of kings and Lord of lords, have wished to visit me, poor and unworthy, command graciously by the power of Your royal authority so that I will be miraculously transformed and enabled to meet You. I desire that You read in my heart the kind of love that You desire to be loved by me. I desire that You experience in our meeting such pure love with which You are loved not only by the angels and saints in heaven but with which You are loved by Your Immaculate Mother, Mary. She, when she gave birth to You, abided by You, and so gazing upon Your Divine Face, abided in awe, abided in awe… (1:31)
P Song: O my Jesus in the Host Hidden – 1-2 stanza (1:10)
D Immaculate Mary! On the 13th of July, 1917, at Fatima, you communicated to Jacinta, Francisco, and Lucia the request for the devotion for your Immaculate Heart and to receive Holy Communion in reparation on the first Saturdays of the month. We, the community of Divine Providence Parish, wish to abide today together with our priests for the next prayer vigil. (0:31)
W Drawing inspiration from Your Immaculate Heart, we wish to make reparation for the insults inflicted on God in the Trinity of One, and in particular – in obedience to the Church-recognized revelations of the Angel of Peace, who appeared to three shepherd children at Fatima in 1916 – to make reparation for all insults that affect Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament. At the same time, we wish to make reparation for you as well, O Mary, because everything that offends God affects you painfully also, and everything that directly targets you painfully affects God as well. (0:45)
B We know that the fulfillment of one of the four conditions of this devotion is the reception of Holy Communion. Just now, Jesus, your Son, has come to each of us under the covering of the Most Holy Host. We do not want, however, to fulfill this condition in a minimalist way: we want to receive Jesus in such a way as He expects us to do – with gratitude that here He is…, with a quieting of all tension, which so often, as it were, forces us to leave Him almost immediately after the Eucharist is over… We want to be with You for Jesus, present so close… We want to love Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament, imitating You in this love… (1:00)
P In obedience to the teachings of the Church, we wish to fulfill our devotion to your Immaculate Heart, Mary, not so much by words addressed to you but by becoming like you in the love directed to Jesus. Behold today, as we contemplate the mystery of the Presentation of Jesus in the temple of Jerusalem, we see you gazing in awe at the Child you bore forty days earlier in the grotto of Bethlehem. You contemplate with awe the face of the Incarnate God… He, the incomprehensible God, really was then corporeally – like every human being – with you, with Joseph, with Simeon, with Anna… (0:50)
D Moreover, behold, He is now also corporeally with us: He, Jesus, coming in hiding under the whiteness of the Immaculate Host; He, the same Jesus Christ, God, who entered our world two thousand years ago like a true man in hiding, in your, Mary, Immaculate Womb. Jesus, present corporeally with us now, desires from us the same loving gaze upon Him, that is, the same attitude of contemplation that you, Mary, gave Him from His first moments on our planet. (0:42)
D Song: Fall to Your Knees – 1-4 stanza (0:59)
W Dearest Lord Jesus! You have been looking for us, and here we are… We are – the priests and faithful of the Parish of Divine Providence. We have heard Your voice, Your invitation to today’s vigil, an invitation to the meeting of friends of God and Mary. We are here to love You, God, who, as the Son of the Immaculate Mary, is physically here with us just as we are physically here. We believe this is how You are here, although we cannot experience this with our eyes, hearing, or any of our senses. However, the certainty of faith alone is enough for us: You are here as present as any of us humans. We believe and adore this mystery of Your loving presence. (1:05)
B Jesus, how good it is to be with You, present in various ways in the world! I believe that when I help a sick person, I am also spiritually with You as the One co-suffering in our fellow man. I believe that when I read the Scriptures, You spiritually are with me and helping me to understand and put them into practice. I believe that when I pray in the community at home, You are also there spiritually with us and cause us to be in communion with one another. I believe that when a priest celebrates the Holy Mass, You, o Jesus, are especially closely united with him: he lends his humanity to You so that You can celebrate the Holy Mass through him.
P Dearest Jesus! From the Church, I receive this astonishing truth of faith with gratitude that among the various ways of Your presence in the world, there is one unique way, incomparably more perfect than all the others: You are present uniquely in the Most Holy Host. You are present here in a different way than in a neighbor in need, in a different way than in the reading of Scripture, in a different way than in prayer in community, in a different way than in the celebrant… (0:40)
D Here, in the Sacred Host, in Your marvelous mystery of the Eucharistic presence, You are not only spiritually but bodily present though imperceptible to my eyes or ears. You are just as I am here now, just as each of us is here… You are here in Your human body! (0:25)
D Song: Jesus, Veiled in the Sacred Host – 1-3 stanza (1:36)
W You are here in the flesh, therefore, just as You were two thousand years ago in Nazareth, Bethlehem, Egypt, Jerusalem… You are here as God who truly became man a moment after the Immaculate Mary with faith uttered the word full of love, “Let it be done to me according to your word.” You are here as You were with people from the moment of Your Incarnation following Annunciation until the moment when the cloud received You out of the Apostles’ sight at Ascension. (0:40)
B You are here as You were among men for some thirty-three years of Your mortal life. Moreover, though neither my eyes can see Your figure, nor my ears can hear Your voice, nor can I in any other way by my senses get to know that You are indeed in the same way as I am, that is, in the flesh, yet I know and confess with great emotion that You, God Incarnate, are here in the flesh. (0:43)
P How fortunate, O Jesus, that now I can be with You not only in a spiritual way but in the way that friends are with each other: present in the same place, physically present close to each other… I gaze lovingly at the Most Holy Host, and I know that our gazes here meet: You look at me, I look at You… It is love, it is contemplation… (0:31)
D I am at Your feet, listening to Your voice… I am at Your feet, consciously losing – supposedly – time… giving time for loving You… You know, I use this earthly time, Your gift to me, I use it like Mary, sister of Lazarus and Martha, about whose meeting with You St. Luke wrote: (0:40)
W Jesus “entered a village where a woman whose name was Martha welcomed him. She had a sister named Mary who sat beside the Lord at his feet listening to him speak. Martha, burdened with much serving, came to him and said, “Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me by myself to do the serving? Tell her to help me.” The Lord said to her in reply, “Martha, Martha, you are anxious and worried about many things. There is need of only one thing. Mary has chosen the better part and it will not be taken from her.” (Luke 10:38–42) (0:57)
B Jesus! My heart is moved by the praise given to Mary sitting at Your feet. I juxtapose Your reaction in her defense with the event described a little further by St. Luke thus: (0:19)
P Someone in the crowd said to him, “Teacher, tell my brother to share the inheritance with me.” He replied to him, “Friend, who appointed me as your judge and arbitrator?” (Luke 12:13–14) (0:18)
P Song: I Bow to You – 1-3 stanza (1:32)
D Mary has chosen the good part… O Jesus, why didn’t You stand up for the busy Martha, who wanted to receive You in the best possible way with a perfectly prepared meal? Why do you praise Mary, who left her sister in the kitchen and contented herself to sit at Your feet? Is it fair to do so? (0:29)
W Moreover, is it fair that You, on the one hand, did not want to settle the brothers’ dispute over the division of the inheritance and, on the other hand, wanted to take a stance on Martha’s claims against Mary? How should we understand the difference between Your attitudes in both situations? Could it be that the defense of Mary, who was listening to Your words, was more important than the defense of the wronged heir? (0:37)
B Mary has chosen the good part… Mary recognizes that the culinary arts are not worth pursuing right now. Mary is deeply convinced that You care more about listening to You than satisfying Your hunger with exquisite dishes. Mary recognized the time of Your visitation; she recognized that now when You have come to their house, it is worth serving the most straightforward meal – bread and wine – and, having abandoned everything else, sit down at Your feet and listen to the words of Your teaching, look in Your loving eyes, to contemplate You… to be close to You, so close that one could respond to Your love with the love of presence. (1:05)
P Mary knows that the time when You, Divine Teacher, are especially for her does not happen often enough for her to devote it to other activities now. Mary knows that we, her sisters and brothers, often take too much care of our daily affairs, and thus we lack time for You, o Jesus, for sitting at Your feet when You bodily are with us. (0:35)
D Mary has chosen the good part… O Jesus, with Your response to the voice of complaint of this brother and sister, You confirm that we are often overly concerned with everyday matters, we grieve over the loss of material things, but we do not grieve over the passing of the unique time of Your visitation. Mary, who had time to sit at Your feet when You physically, “in the flesh,” entered her home, has chosen the good part… Will I, then, following her example, see today in a new way the time of this extraordinary visitation when You enter “in the flesh,” in Holy Communion, at the threshold of my heart? (1:02)
D Song: The Hidden Jesus – 1-2 stanza (1:43)
W Will not I lack the time and strength to sit at Your feet, look into Your loving eyes, lay my head on Your Heart, and love You with my presence…? Will I want to decide to arrange the earthly days of my life so that only exceptionally will I run immediately after the Holy Banquet to really urgent tasks? Will not I lack the strength to love You, o my God and my Bridegroom, as You long to be loved? (0:46)
B I believe, o Lord, that our love reaches its summit in Eucharistic union. I believe, o Jesus, that the time beginning with the reception of Holy Communion is one of the whiles especially desired by You. I believe that this time cannot be replaced by any other moment of my looking to Heaven or walking on earth or my loving You in prayer or service to our beloved sisters and brothers. I believe that You have a special right to my time of love when You come to me in the Sacred Host. (0:47)
P I believe, O Jesus, that it should be with our love as with love between spouses. Namely, I notice that in a family, spouses devote their time and whole lives with joy and great commitment to their children. Nevertheless, they consider it a special privilege to devote time to be with each other exclusively as husband and wife, gazing lovingly at each other in their sacramental union. In the same way, I, while repeatedly giving time to serve Your Kingdom, have the right to devote time to our exclusive mutual love, to contemplation, and You, o Jesus, likewise have the right to expect from me that unique time when You are present sacramentally, bodily with me and in me. (0:56)
P Song: From Distant Fatima – 1-5 stanza (1:40)
P This song was an introduction to the Holy Rosary. See on the Internet ← click, please!