Ecce・Fiat・Magnificat

“You are the light of the world. A city set on a mountain cannot be hidden. // Just so, your light must shine before others, that they may see your good deeds and glorify your heavenly Father.” —Mt 5:14, 16 “My God, I believe, I adore, I hope and I love Thee. I ask for pardon for all those who do not believe in Thee, do not adore Thee, do not hope in Thee, do not love Thee.”

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List of Spiritual Books

So here’s the books I’ve found (or they found me) to be helpful along in my faith. I’m going to try to list them in somewhat chronological order, but I may fail at that. What’s in parenthesis is what I haven’t finished & what’s in brackets I’m currently reading. If you have any questions on any of them, let me know. I can try to give a little explanation of them.

. Blessed are the Bored in Spirit - Mark Hart . (Ignatius The Holy Bible RSV) . YouCat . Diary of St. Maria Faustina Kowalska . Story of a Soul - St. Therese of Lisieux . The Imitation of Christ - Thomas á Kempis . (The Imitation of Mary - Thomas á Kempis) . 33 Days to Morning Glory – Fr. Michael Gaitley M.I.C. . (Mother Angelica’s Private & Pithy Lessons from Scriptures) . Consoling the Heart of Jesus – Fr. Michael Gaitley M.I.C. . The ‘One Thing’ is Three – Fr. Michael Gaitley M.I.C. . Poor in Spirit – Gabriel-Marie Cardinal Garrone (about St. Jean Jugan, founder of the Little Sisters of the Poor) . The Secret of the Rosary - St. Louis de Montfort . (Catechism of the Catholic Church) . Christ in His Mysteries – Blessed Columba Marmion . Christ The Life of the Soul – Blessed Columba Marmion . Praying for Priests – Kathleen Beckman L.H.S. . Under the Mantle – Fr. Donald Calloway M.I.C. . (The Interior Castle - St. Teresa of Avila) . You Set My Spirit Free - St. John of the Cross paraphrased by David Hazard . The Cross and the Beatitudes - Fulton Sheen . (Life of Christ - Fulton Sheen) . Finding God Through Meditation -St. Peter Alacantara . (Manual For Spiritual Warfare - TAN Books) . [30 Days with Teresa of Avila - Daniel Burke & Anthony Lilles] . [The Redeemer’s Call to Consecrated Souls] . (St. John Paul the Great: His Five Loves - Jason Evert) . Divine Mercy Minutes with Jesus - Rev. George W. Kosicki C.S.B. . Thoughts of St. Therese

and the book by St. Louis de Montfort about total consecration to Mary, that I don’t remember the name of. Lol

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“With God there is neither past nor future, and everything has always been before him as present and visible in his eternal light. He cast his divine gaze upon me from all eternity; he looked upon me with the eye of mercy; he thought of me tenderly and ardently; he disposed and ordained, with wonderous kindness, everything that was to happen to me in body and soul and in every circumstance, development, and event of my existence and life, even to the hairs of my head….

“The Eternal Father willed to send his Son and to deliver him up to death of the cross to redeem me. The Son willed to take human flesh and to do and suffer all that he did and suffered in this world for me. The Holy Spirit willed to form the humanity which was united to the Son in the sacred womb of the Blessed Virgin for love of me and to come into this world himself to be my light, my sanctification, the Spirit of my spirit and the heart of my heart. Lastly, the Most Holy Trinity willed to bestow upon me all the corporal and spiritual, temporal and eternal favors that he has since given me and will ever give me. And so God had great designs for me from all eternity. Thus, O my God, you did bear me in your mind and in your heart from all eternity. Thus you did think of me and love me an eternity before I was capable of knowing and loving you. There never was a time, O God of Love, when your mind and your heart were not concerned about me. What is a man that you should magnify him? Or why do you set your heart upon him? (Jb 7:17). It would almost seem, O Eternal Goodness, that you have no sooner thought of yourself than you have thought of me, no sooner loved yourself than you have loved me, since you have thought of me and loved me from all eternity.

“My God, what shall I do, what shall I render to you for your eternal love of me? Surely if I had existed from all eternity I should have given and consecrated to you my whole soul, my whole heart, all my thoughts, designs and affections. But not having existed from all eternity, I should at least have turned to you with my whole mind and will as soon as I was capable of doing so. Alas! I can truly say with Saint Augustine, “Too late have I loved have I loved you, O Eternal Goodness.” Forgive me, I beseech you, O my God. I wish to begin now to love, serve, and honor you with all my heart, with all my soul and with all my strength; I beg you to grant me that grace by the infinite love you have borne me from all eternity and give me grace to return your love.”

—St. John Eudes

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Prayer to Love God

I love you, O my God, and my only desire is to love You until the last breath of my life. I love you, O most infinitely lovable God, and I would rather die loving You, than live without loving You. I love You, Lord and the only grace I ask is to love You eternally. My God, if my tongue cannot say in every moment that I love You, I want my heart to repeat it to You as often as I draw breath. Amen.

—St. John Vianney

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O Name of Jesus! O Name of the Lord! In Thee are Love and Happiness.

“St. Paul tells us that we must do all we do, whether in word or work, in the Name of Jesus. ‘All whatsoever you do in word or in work, do all in the Name of the Lord Jesus Christ…’ (Col. 3:17)

In this way, every act becomes an act of love and of merit, and, moreover, we receive grace and help to do all our actions perfectly and well. 

We must therefore do our best to form the habit of saying “Jesus, Jesus, Jesus” very often every day. We can do so when dressing, when working - no matter what we are doing -  when walking, in moments of sadness, at home and in the street, everywhere.

Each time we say “Jesus” devoutly, we 1) give God great glory, 2) we receive graces for ourselves, 3) we help the souls in Purgatory.”

- The Wonders of the Holy Name, Fr. Paul O’Sullivan, O.P.

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“The Lord loves us more dearly than we can love ourselves; but the soul in her distress supposes that the Lord has forgotten her, even has no wish to look upon her, and she suffers and pines. But it is not so, brethren. The Lord loves us without end, and gives us the grace of the Holy Spirit, and comforts us….The soul is like a bride, and the Lord the Bridegroom; and they love each other, and yearn for one another. The Lord in His love longs for the soul and grieves if there is no place in her for the Holy Spirit; while the soul, having come to know the Lord, yearns after Him, for in Him lie her life and her joy.”

— St Silouan the Athonite

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“It is suffering, more than anything else, which clears the way for the grace which transforms human souls. Suffering, more than anything else makes present in the history of humanity the powers of the Redemption.”

— Pope St. John Paul II (via lean-to-the-write)

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“I understood that all striving for perfection and all sanctity consist in doing God’s will. Perfect fulfillment of God’s will is maturity in sanctity; there is no room for doubt here. To receive God’s light and recognize what God wants of us and yet not do it is a great offense against the majesty of God. Such a soul deserves to be completely forsaken by God. It resembles Lucifer, who had great light, but did not do God’s will. An extraordinary peace entered my soul when I reflected on the fact that, despite great difficulties, I had always faithfully followed God’s will as I knew it. O Jesus, grant me the grace to put Your will into practice as I have come to know it, O God.”

— St. Faustina, Diary 666

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The Epiphany of the Lord

“For by gold the power of a king is signified, by frankincense the honor of God, myrrh the burial of the body & accordingly they offer Him gold as King, frankincense as God, myrrh as Man.”

— St John Chrysostom

Prints, plaques & holy cards available for purchase. (website)

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And heaven and nature sing

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“See how I give you gold—my Divine Love; and incense—all my holiness and devotion; and, finally, myrrh—the bitterness of all I suffered in my Passion. I give you them as your own, to such a degree that you will be able offer them to me as gifts, as good things belonging to yourself.”

— Jesus Christ to St. Mechtilde (Le Livre de la grace spéciale, Part I, Ch.8.)

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“The symbolism of the gifts, therefore, has reference both to Him to whom they were offered and to those who were presenting them. Gold, the most precious of metals, is a symbol of royalty; and then again it is a mark of the love and fidelity that each person owes to his monarch. Incense is universally recognized as a symbol of divine worship; it is offered to God alone. By preparing this gift the Magi showed that they wished to declare the divinity of Him whose birth the star was announcing, and to recognize that divinity by the supreme adoration which can be rendered only to God. Finally, they had been inspired to bring myrrh to Him. What did they wish to indicate by this myrrh, which serves to dress wounds and embalm the dead? This gift signified that Christ was man, and a man susceptible of suffering, who would die one day. Myrrh symbolized also the spirit of penance and immolation that should characterize the life of disciples of the Crucified One.”

— Blessed Columba Marmion, “Christ in His Mysteries,” pg 171

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Bartolome Esteban

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“So submissive was he to her care that the door that slammed in her face at Bethlehem also slammed on him. If there was no room for her in the inn, then there was no room for him. As she was the ciborium before he was born, so she was his monstrance after Bethlehem. To her fell the happy lot of exposing, in the chapel of a stable, the “Blessed Sacrament,” the body, blood, soul, and divinity of Jesus Christ. She enthroned him for adoration before Wise Men and shepherds, before the very simple and the very learned.”

— Venerable Archbishop Fulton Sheen

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Offering Three Gifts

Dearly beloved, the last verse of the Gospel reading, which is still ringing in your ears, is inteneded for the instruction of believers. It tells how, when they had entered the house in which the blessed Virgin Mother was staying with her child, they opened their treasures and offered the Lord three gifts—gold, frankincense, and myrrh—thereby acknowledging him as true Lord, true Man, and true King.

Holy Church also offers these same gifts to her Savior every day without ceasing. She offers him frankincense by acknowledging and believing him to be the true Lord and Creator of all. She offers him myrrh when she affirms that he assumed the substance of our flesh, in which he willed to suffer and to die for our salvation. And she offers him gold by believing without doubt that he reigns eternally with the Father and the Holy Spirit.

Alternatively, the offering of these gifts may be taken in a mystical sense. Heavenly wisdom is symbolized by gold, according to the verse of Solomon which says: A priceless treasure lies in the mouth of the sage; and elsewhere in Scripture says: The mouth of the just will utter wisdom. By frankincense pure prayer is to be understood, as the psalmist says: Let my prayer rise like incense in your sight, O Lord. For when our prayer is pure, it yields a purer fragrance to the Lord than the smoke of burning incense, just as such smoke rises upward, so does our prayer ascend to the Lord. Myrrh can be taken as the mortification of our flesh.

Thus, we offer the Lord gold when we shine in his sight with the light of heavenly wisdom. We offer him frankincense when we send up pure prayer before him, and myrrrh when, mortifying out our flesh with its vices and passions by self-control, we carry the cross behind Jesus.

— St. Bruno of Segni

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“Adoration of Magi” tapestry by William Morris

Gospel Reading for Epiphany Sunday When Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea, in the days of King Herod, behold, magi from the east arrived in Jerusalem, saying, “Where is the newborn king of the Jews? We saw his star at its rising and have come to do him homage.” When King Herod heard this, he was greatly troubled, and all Jerusalem with him. Assembling all the chief priests and the scribes of the people, He inquired of them where the Christ was to be born. They said to him, “In Bethlehem of Judea, for thus it has been written through the prophet: And you, Bethlehem, land of Judah, are by no means least among the rulers of Judah; since from you shall come a ruler, who is to shepherd my people Israel.” Then Herod called the magi secretly and ascertained from them the time of the star’s appearance. He sent them to Bethlehem and said, “Go and search diligently for the child. When you have found him, bring me word, that I too may go and do him homage.” After their audience with the king they set out. And behold, the star that they had seen at its rising preceded them, until it came and stopped over the place where the child was. They were overjoyed at seeing the star, and on entering the house they saw the child with Mary his mother. They prostrated themselves and did him homage. Then they opened their treasures and offered him gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh. And having been warned in a dream not to return to Herod, they departed for their country by another way. —Matthew 2:1-12