21 Holy Hours by Fr. Mateo Crawley-Boevey – Chapter 8 – In Reparation for Public and Official Outrages to Our Lord Jesus Christ and for the First Friday of July - Those Who Sing Well, Pray Twice

BY Father Mateo Crawley-Boevey, SS.CC.

Additional Devotions for Fridays Subsequent to the First
July.— For The 2nd Friday
For The 3rd Friday
For The 4th Friday

(Slowly)

How blessed and really happy were the unhappy ones in Judea who met Jesus at the turn of a narrow path and for a moment found themselves alone with Him! … How privileged were those fortunate sufferers of Naim, of Jerusalem, and of Bethany, who on meeting Jesus were free to pray and to weep on His Divine Heart! … It is thus, O Jesus of Nazareth — our Jesus of the Tabernacle — it is thus, we have met Thee during this Holy Hour …

Look at us, adorable Master, and Thou wilt recognize among us the same happy and blessed unfortunate ones of Palestine … Yes, like those of Judea and Galilee and Samaria we also have confidently sought a meeting … But less interested in our own concerns than were they, we come this evening for Thy sake and glory. Here at Thy Feet in the shadow of this altar we come to reflect on the great interests of Thy social reign.

We are here, Lord, only because of Thee, only for the defense of Thy cause, O Jesus! … We hasten to Thee because outcries of rage and blasphemy warn us that Thy enemies give themselves no respite in carrying out their determination to drive Thee from souls and to exile Thee from society.

And if the hour of Calvary is come again, if Thou must suffer, if Thou must agonize, if Thou must die, behold King of Love this little flock who asks the favor of suffering for the cause of and by the side of its Shepherd. Thou hast said to Thy confidante, Margaret Mary, with deep sorrow in Thy soul: “I need victim souls to share My agony.” Do as Thou wilt with us, Lord … we all love Thee … We love Thee ardently.

(Pause)

Rend the veil of Thy sacred Side, O well-beloved Jesus, and permit us entrance to the Holy of Holies of Thy adorable Heart … Permit Thy children to contemplate there during this Holy Hour the outrages of Thy Passion … and the cruelty of that sentence passed on Thee by the very ones whom Thou hast redeemed with Thy Blood … From Thy Tabernacle give us light to follow step by step that sorrowful way which began on the dark night of Gethsemane only to finish on the last day of the world …

Despite our unworthiness permit Thy consolers to share Thy chalice of opprobrium and agony. Give us, lovable Prisoner of the Altar, one sole favor, one unique right: to love Thee in the ignominy of Thy Cross and to unite ourselves to Thine agony through Holy Mass and the Holy Hour … And, finally, and above all, give us the right and favor to love Thee dearly unto death … O yes, the right and privilege to die while loving intensely Thy Eucharistic Heart …

(Ask for light and love to contemplate Jesus Christ in the Mysterious Sacrifice of the Eucharist)

(Pause)

Jesus: Beloved soul, here in the Host where you see Me, I live silent, mute, perpetually bound before the modern Herods. Do you not hear, rising to Heaven, the insolent questioning which they make Me undergo, I Who am sovereign Power, Truth, and the sole Master of the world? I keep silence for love of you, for you whom I save by enduring the ignominious condemnation of the rulers of the world, judges of men but never of My doctrine … They seek authority and use it against Me, … and behold Me perpetually the Victim of their abuse of power. For them, thrones; for Me, the prisoner’s bench … for them, the golden scepter; for Me, always the reed of mockery! … for them, a retinue which applauds and flatters them; for Me, jeering cohorts and executioners! … For them, diadems and homage … for Me, the crown of thorns! … For Me, forgetfulness, always forgetfulness! …

And if at times those worldly powers evoke, in spite of themselves, the remembrance of My Sovereignty, My Name alone is enough to cause a tempest of hatred, of legal persecution, and of blasphemy to break forth … Thus am I judged and condemned by the world which lives only by Me … I keep silence because in the Holy Eucharist I am the incarnation of a merciful love … but this revolt against My Sovereignty, this ignoring of My Majesty in the laws which rule nations is a direct outrage against Me, the Almighty Who dwells among men, reduced to nothingness in the Sacrament of Love … Is not this wrong, a real defiance of the Eucharistic God … an insult to Him Who speaks to you from the depths of His Tabernacle which often indeed becomes Pilate’s Praetorium? Here, consoling soul, meek and humble, I bear the affronts of slaves and the contempt of the vilest of men … I am taken out of this prison, only when earthly tribunals order Me to be scourged, and then to be shown, covered with blood, to the angry mob.

O how consoled My Divine Heart feels by your reparation … The ardent love of My own makes up for the scoffing of the powerful. You who are rich make reparation for that insult by your humility; you who are poor, by your resignation … From here, from My Tabernacle, I bless you, My very faithful friends. Speak, then, My children. Ask miracles, you, the elect of My Heart … Speak, I am the King of infinite mercy.

(Pause)

Souls: Lord Jesus, Thy Soul touched by our fidelity offers us Thy miracles and Thy pardon. Deign then to shower Thy graces of light and of strength on the powerful, on rulers who, associated to Thine authority, have above all others an urgent need of Thy light. They need it so much for themselves and their people that they may know Thee, Jesus, and may proclaim that they accept Thy redeeming Sovereignty, the only source of peace and salvation.

In reparation for the affronts which Thou hast suffered before the iniquitous Herod, and for those Thou endurest, often, alas, in the palaces of the great of this world …

(Aloud)

All: Heart of Jesus, fulfill Thy promises of victory!

In the assemblies where laws are made and in the tribunals of human justice so subject to error …

All: Heart of Jesus, fulfill Thy promises of victory!

In the timid, unsteady and changeable conscience of those who preside over the destiny of nations …

All: Heart of Jesus, fulfill Thy promises of victory!

In the councils of so many rulers expressly chosen in hateful opposition to Thy Gospel and the Church …

All: Heart of Jesus, fulfill Thy promises of victory!

In popular seditions, exploited to outrage Thy redemptive doctrine, and to repudiate Thy rights …

All: Heart of Jesus, fulfill Thy promises of victory!

In the Satanic plots made in secret for the ruin of Thy priesthood and Catholic institutions …

All: Heart of Jesus, fulfill Thy promises of victory!

In the foolhardy security, apathy, and indolence of so many Christians who would gladly be faithful to Thee if they could disregard Calvary …

All: Heart of Jesus, fulfill Thy promises of victory!

In the unrestrained ambition for wealth and high rank which leads many to scorn Thy Blood and risk the eternal damnation of their souls …

All: Heart of Jesus, fulfill Thy promises of victory!

(Pause or hymn)

Hymn `To Jesus Christ our Sovereign King` (Click/Expand or Bypass)

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To Jesus Christ, our Sov’reign King, Who is the world’s salvation, All praise and homage do we bring, And thanks and adoration.	Refrain: Christ Jesus Victor, Christ Jesus Ruler! Christ Jesus, Lord and Redeemer!
2. Thy reign extend, O King benign, To ev’ry land and nation, For in Thy kingdom, Lord divine, Alone we find salvation. (Refrain)	3. To Thee and to Thy Church, great King, We pledge our hearts’ oblation, Until before Thy throne we sing, In endless jubilation. (Refrain)

ToJesusChristOurSovereignKing

Jesus: I am Sanctity itself. Acknowledge it while kneeling here before this Host: Heaven proclaims it also, and unites during this Holy Hour with your humble adoration … Yes, I am Holiness; nevertheless the malefactor Barabbas was preferred to Me! … Alas! how often that impious choice is repeated out of hatred, disdain, forgetfulness … If you knew how cruelly that insult wounds My Heart! … and yet, I, the God of humility, dwell in the Tabernacle … The vain world cannot understand that abasement …

See how proud souls eager for vain glory pass before My altar, ambitioning the esteem and the applause of men … They pass by preferring a fleeting honor to My love … Relegated to the shadow of My sanctuary from whence I utter these words: Learn of Me that I am humble and poor … O! Yes, I am poor because I have renounced the wealth of the world to open the treasures of the eternal Paradise to you … I have become the poorest of the poor; I have become out of love a Beggar … and, that is why I am despised by the world which makes a god of gold and all that glitters … To the world I am a nobody, because, born in a stable, I lived in the obscurity of Nazareth; I died in the destitution of Calvary; and because I continue to live in these annihilations in My Eucharist. I am a rejected pauper … and the miserable, vain goods of this world are preferred to Me.

(Brief pause)

Behold Me covered with wounds … My Hands which beckon and bless are transpierced. My Feet are lacerated … My Brow bruised, My Lips livid … My Eyes blinded by Blood … My Side opened by a deep Wound. How men shudder at the sight of a God, bloodstained and crushed by sorrow … These men who would have the delights of an anticipated Eden in this exile … My love for you has brought Me to this condition. It is there I also expiate the thirst for pleasure and amusement that devours the modern world …

From the Tabernacle I constantly offer you peace and happiness but through sacrifice and by the Cross … Ah! Where are My friends, My faithful ones, My disciples? … Where are they? … They have gone away … They have left Me to look for pleasure. They have preferred sin to Me … Barabbas, the lowest of mankind, triumphs in the world upheld by the proud, the licentious … Barabbas triumphs, applauded and seconded by those who corrupt childhood, debase the people, and poison the press … Barabbas triumphs, exalted by all those who, ambitious to reach power, blaspheme Me, preferring worldly honors to Me, their Lord and Master.

And I, your Jesus, I am held chained by love, I remain alone in My Tabernacle, abandoned by the good, denied by the weak, forgotten by the greater number, condemned by unworthy rulers, and scourged by the mobs raised up against Me … I loved My own above all things, even unto death, and those of My household preferred dust … the mire of the road, to Me …

Consider and see, you My friends, if there be a sorrow greater and like unto My sorrow! …

(Pause)

Souls: Thou hast given us the example, Jesus … Thou desirest Thy disciples following in Thy train to renounce themselves and to carry lovingly the redemptive cross … We ask that grace of Thee during this Holy Hour, through the ardent charity of Mary, Mother of Sorrows. We supplicate Thee by the fervor of Margaret Mary to grant that we may love and accept a mortified life for the triumph of Thy Heart in the Holy Eucharist, and to obtain the conversion of poor sinners …

Listen, Jesus in the Host, while we offer Thee the great prayer of Gethsemane, which is the prayer of Thy annihilation on the altar, deign to hear it in Thy sweet and condescending Heart.

(Slowly and with Pauses)

We love Thee, O Jesus; grant us the grace to deem it an honor to be rejected by the world for the sake of Thine ignored Heart.

We love Thee, O Jesus; grant us the grace to deem it a happiness to be humiliated for the sake of Thy despised Heart! …

We love Thee, O Jesus; grant us the grace to deem it a privilege to be disregarded for the sake of Thy outraged Heart.

We love Thee, O Jesus; grant us the grace to deem it an honor to be scoffed at for the sake of Thine afflicted Heart.

We love Thee, O Jesus; grant us the grace to deem it an honor to be despised for the glory of Thy Divine Heart.

We love Thee, O Jesus; grant us the grace to deem it a favor to be insulted, for the triumph of Thy bruised Heart.

We love Thee, O Jesus; grant us the grace to deem it a favor to be forgotten in order to console Thy Sacred Heart.

We love Thee, O Jesus; grant us the grace to deem it a favor to be one day persecuted, for the sake of Thy Wounded Heart.

We love Thee, O Jesus; grant us the grace to regard it a delicious bitterness to be calumniated for the reign of Thy Sacred Heart.

We love Thee, O Jesus; grant us the grace to consider it a glory to be betrayed in a holocaust of reparation close to Thine immolated Heart.

We love Thee, O Jesus; grant us the grace to consider it a favor to be hated in union with Thine agonizing Heart! …

We love Thee, O Jesus; grant us the grace of choosing as a real privilege to be condemned by the world as a homage of reparation to Thine ignored Sacred Heart.

O! we entreat Thee to grant that we may receive lovingly our rightful share of the outrages and agony of Thy Eucharistic Heart.

Be consoled, well-beloved Master; each one of us wishes Thee to hear a word of humility and confidence, solemnly declaring that Thou art his sole wealth and his only hope …

What have I, Lord Jesus, that Thou hast not given me?

What do I know, that Thou hast not taught me?

What can I do, if Thou dost not help me?

And what am I, if not united to Thee?

Pardon … O! pardon my faults that have so wounded Thee!

Thou hast created me without any merit of mine.

Thou hast redeemed me without my cooperation.

Thou hast done much in creating me,

And still more in redeeming me.

Wilt Thou be less powerful or less generous in forgiving me?

For all the Blood Thou hast shed and the cruel death Thou hast suffered were not for the profit of the Angels who adore Thee,

But to my benefit and that of the sinners who implore Thee …

If I have then denied Thee, let me praise Thee,

If I have outraged Thee, let me love Thee.

If I have offended Thee, let me serve Thee.

For to live without loving Thee,

And to love without suffering for Thee,

O Jesus, that would be death without Thee.

(Pause)

Jesus: Since all here present are My intimate friends, let Me open to you My Heart, so bitterly grieved. It suffers from a Wound so deep that it penetrates even to the very depths of the soul …

Israel, the people of My Heart … yes, Israel asked for My condemnation … it has exacted My death … it has prepared for Me the Cross of Calvary! … Israel, for whom I have scourged Egypt, has scourged Me … I have broken its chains and Israel has enchained the Hands of her Savior … I have given her manna in the desert, and she has woven for Me a crown of thorns … I brought forth water from the rock to appease her thirst, and Israel has added gall of perfidy to the burning thirst of My agony … I came down from Heaven, and wished to dwell with her, in the midst of the desert, in the mysterious Ark … How many times have I not sheltered them under My wings … And behold Me wounded unto death by Israel!

Why are My people bent on stripping Me of My Sovereignty? Why do they continue to cast lots for My garments, and scatter to the wind of derision My Gospel of love and consolation?

See how the multitudes agitate, murmuring against My Law … See how whole nations carried away by pride have broken the sacred unity of My doctrine, have torn the seamless tunic of My Church!

My Heart breaks, hearing today, as of old in Pilate’s atrium, the clamor of so many nations, races, societies, who, amidst an angry crowd, point to Me and cry: “We will not have this Nazarene reign over our people.”

(Brief pause)

My Vicar is perpetually the victim of the jeers of this maddened throng! … He is My representative, My visible face on earth … In his person I continue to be buffeted by those who insult My Church.… The blow of a sacrilegious Malchus is particularly painful to Me; woe to him who places his hand on the Pontiff, the holy anointed one of My Father! …

Stay the avenging Arm of God … Intercede for them during this Holy Hour in union with My outraged Heart. I wish during this hour of grace to have mercy on them …

Yes, for the apostasy of so many nations, for so many societies who publicly affirm their unbelief, for the shameless affronts to My Vicar, for the crafty, legalized hate shown My priesthood, for the iniquitous tolerance and favors enjoyed by all the modern imitators of those who were My enemies during My lifetime, for these innumerable sins, for the populace and cohorts who struck Me … with one voice and with one soul ask pardon, ask mercy …

Souls: Prisoner of Love, Jesus in the Holy Eucharist, let our prayer reach Thee as incense of adoration and reparation which we offer Thee by the hands of Mary Immaculate …

Litany of the Sacred Heart

Lord, have mercy on us.
Christ, have mercy on us.
Lord, have mercy on us.
Christ, hear us.	Christ, graciously hear us.
God the Father of Heaven,	Have mercy on us.
God the Son, Redeemer of the world,	Have mercy on us.
God the Holy Spirit,	Have mercy on us.
Holy Trinity, one God,	Have mercy on us.
Heart of Jesus, Son of the Eternal Father,	Have mercy on us.
Heart of Jesus, formed by the Holy Spirit in the womb of the Virgin Mother,	Have mercy on us.
Heart of Jesus, substantially united to the Word of God,	Have mercy on us.
Heart of Jesus, of infinite majesty,	Have mercy on us.
Heart of Jesus, holy temple of God,	Have mercy on us.
Heart of Jesus, tabernacle of the Most High,	Have mercy on us.
Heart of Jesus, house of God and gate of heaven,	Have mercy on us.
Heart of Jesus, burning furnace of charity,	Have mercy on us.
Heart of Jesus, abode of Justice and Love,	Have mercy on us.
Heart of Jesus, full of Goodness and Love,	Have mercy on us.
Heart of Jesus, abyss of all virtues,	Have mercy on us.
Heart of Jesus, most worthy of all praise,	Have mercy on us.
Heart of Jesus, King and Center of all hearts,	Have mercy on us.
Heart of Jesus, in Whom are all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge,	Have mercy on us.
Heart of Jesus, in Whom dwells all the fullness of the Divinity,	Have mercy on us.
Heart of Jesus, in Whom the Father was well pleased,	Have mercy on us.
Heart of Jesus, of Whose fullness we have all received,	Have mercy on us.
Heart of Jesus, desire of the everlasting hills,	Have mercy on us.
Heart of Jesus, patient and most merciful,	Have mercy on us.
Heart of Jesus, enriching all who invoke Thee,	Have mercy on us.
Heart of Jesus, fountain of life and holiness,	Have mercy on us.
Heart of Jesus, propitiation for our sins,	Have mercy on us.
Heart of Jesus, loaded down with reproaches,	Have mercy on us.
Heart of Jesus, bruised for our offenses,	Have mercy on us.
Heart of Jesus, obedient unto death,	Have mercy on us.
Heart of Jesus, pierced with a lance,	Have mercy on us.
Heart of Jesus, source of all consolation,	Have mercy on us.
Heart of Jesus, our life and resurrection,	Have mercy on us.
Heart of Jesus, our peace and reconciliation,	Have mercy on us.
Heart of Jesus, Victim for sin,	Have mercy on us.
Heart of Jesus, salvation of those who trust in Thee,	Have mercy on us.
Heart of Jesus, hope of those who die in Thee,	Have mercy on us.
Heart of Jesus, delight of all the saints,	Have mercy on us.
Lamb of God, Who takest away the sins of the world,	Spare us, O Lord.
Lamb of God, Who takest away the sins of the world,	Graciously hear us, O Lord.
Lamb of God, Who takest away the sins of the world,	Have mercy on us.
Jesus, meek and humble of Heart,	Make our hearts like unto Thine.
Let us pray. O Almighty and eternal God, look upon the Heart of Thy dearly beloved Son, and upon the praise and satisfaction which He offers Thee in the name of sinners and for those who seek Thy mercy; be Thou appeased, and grant us pardon in the name of the same Jesus Christ, Thy Son, who liveth and reigneth with Thee, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, world without end. Amen.

(Pause)

Jesus: The Holy Eucharist is the marvelous consummation of My love for men, but, O! men in return, have consummated the work of their ingratitude in despising and even in outraging My love in the Holy Sacrament.

Where were you, My children, when on Calvary I suffered a loneliness more cruel than that of My tomb?

Where were you, friends of My Heart, when in My agony, My Eyes clouded by My last tears, I saw only the enraged faces of My executioners? Where were you? …

And, when thinking of you, My elect, in My soul’s infinite agony, I had thirsted for — your sympathy, why were My burning Lips wet with the gall of absence … of forgetfulness … of cowardice … of lukewarmness … coming even from those who had been the privileged guests at My intimate and family banquet. You know well that this story is not only of twenty centuries ago; contemplate Me in this Host, and tell Me if ingratitude is not the bitter daily bread of this God Who has made Himself man’s nourishment. When then, and how have I vexed you for the length of time I have been voluntary Prisoner that you should seal the door of My prison as if it were an old, empty sepulcher?

O, come and surround Me; draw near My Feet, I wish to feel you close to Me in the mystic agony of My Heart in the Holy Sacrament …

Longed-for hour, happy hour, this holy hour during which your God recovers His heritage, the price of His Blood! …

I bless you because when I was hungry you left your repose to come and break the bread of charity with Me … I look on you more than ever as My own because when I was thirsty, you gave Me your compassion and your tears … I press you to My Heart because when I was wounded and sad in the loneliness of My prison, you came to offer Me delightful companionship …

Verily, verily, I say unto you, your names will be written forever in letters of fire and blood in the inmost recesses of My Heart … a Heart vehemently in love with yours.

Rest on My Heart, My little children, as I rest on yours, chosen children of My love.

(Pause)

Souls: Master, we have come, not to rest but to suffer with Thee, to share Thy chalice, to atone for our faults, and above all to ask for the Reign of Thy Divine Heart!

That is why we will not leave Thee, Jesus, until Thou hast promised to stay with us in the intimacy of our souls, and until we have confided to Thee our ardent desires, the only desire of Thy consolers and friends … the desire to see Thee reign, to see Thee come forth Victor through Thy Sacred Heart. Reveal Thyself we conjure Thee to Thy humble apostles, because their only happiness is that of possessing Thee and witnessing the advancement of Thy Reign, the only thing capable of appeasing the ineffable ardor which inflames them.

Come, then, O most lovable Jesus, in midst of the afflictions and trials of life …