Virgo Potens

1 of 2 Month of the Immaculate Heart of Mary ~ August 1st INTRODUCTION AS IN her mortal life, so also in the science of Sacred Theology the Mother of God is associated always with Christ. She forms with Him the foundation and cornerstone as well as the capstone of the economy of salvation. She not only brought the Incarnate Word into the world, she intimately shared in the work He came to accomplish, the redemption of men. Because of the full implications of her relationship with God and men she occupies a unique and exalted place in the dogma and liturgy of the Church and in the entire divine plan of Creation. (continued)

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NOVENA - St. Jean-Marie Baptiste Vianney Patron of Priests (July 31st ~ August 8th) Traditional Feast Day ~ August 9th Posted at Christus Regnat ~ https://t.me/RexUniversi

2 of 2 July 31st ~ St. Ignatius Loyola ~ Confessor On his recovery he ascended Montserrat and in the Benedictine Abbey there he laid down his sword at the feet of the Blessed Virgin. He learned here to love the Psalms and canticles of the Divine Office which he was later to recommend to the faithful; he desired that those who were to make his Spiritual Exercises should choose a dwelling whence they could easily go to the Offices of Matins and Vespers as well as to Mass. Among the Benedictines of St. Paul's in Rome, Ignatius pronounced his vows and was regularly elected the first general of his new Society. The name of Loyola and the Society founded by him are synonymous with the highest degree of Catholic life and activity, so that the enemies of the Church, whilst they may show toleration for other religious Orders, keep up an undying hatred· for that of St. Ignatius, in which they justly recognize the most efficient and invincible army which Providence has placed under the immediate command of the Vicar of Christ. Ignatius and his companions, by means of the Spiritual Exercises, tried to raise the clergy to a higher realization of their own dignity and mission. Their zeal for the Liturgy led them to restore the churches to their former cleanliness, dignity, and magnificence. Drawn by these exterior attractions, the faithful were the more easily induced to frequent the Sacraments and the Offices of the Church. From the very beginning they undertook works of education and missionary labors. With the sweet name of Jesus on his lips and in his heart, St. Ignatius gave his soul to God on July 31, 1556. His body is preserved in Rome in the magnificent church built by Cardinal Alessandro Farnese and dedicated to his memory. ~ The New Roman Missal, 1937 St. Ignatius Loyola, pray for us.

1 of 2 July 31st ~ St. Ignatius Loyola ~ Confessor St. Ignatius, founder of the Society of Jesus, was born at Loyola in Spain, in the year 1491. He served his king as a soldier till his thirtieth year. Convalescing from a severe wound received at the siege of Pampeluna, he was given, in the absence of other books, the Lives of Jesus Christ and of the Saints. It dawned on his chivalric nature that the Church has need of her army to defend under the sovereign Pontiff the interest of God against heresy and all evil. (continued)

Sang précieux de notre Rédempteur, c’est par vous que nos àmes seront sauvées. Precious Blood of Our Saviour, it is through thee that our souls will be saved.

Mary’s sheep. Mary’s sheep shall only slake her thirst at the Saviour’s living fountains. Month of the Precious Blood ~ July 31st The Mystery of the Precious Blood Sinner, saint, and common Christian, all in their own ways, require the Precious Blood each moment of their lives; and as the manna in the mouths of the Israelites had the savour which each man wished it to have, so is it with the sweetness, the variety, and the fitness of the graces of the Precious Blood. ~ Frederick William Faber, D.D., The Precious Blood: or, The Price of Our Salvation (1860)

Month of the Precious Blood of Jesus~ July 31st “This beautiful one in his robe” is, then, the “lamb that was slain from the beginning” as an eternal decree; “the lamb that was led to the slaughter” on Mount Calvary; “the lamb that taketh away the sins of the world” in the Church ; the lamb that sitteth on the throne” in heaven; “to the Lamb, benediction, and honor, and glory, and power, forever and ever” (Apoc. V, 13). ~ Rev. M. F. Walz, C. PP. S., Why Is Thy Apparel Red? or Glories of the Precious Blood (1914).

Month of the Precious Blood ~ July 30th The Mystery of the Precious Blood It is by the Blood of Jesus that the soul becomes ever more and more radiant. It is the secret source of all mystical transformations of the soul into the likeness of its Crucified Spouse. It is the wine which "inebriates" the virgins of God. Out of it come raptures, and extasies; and by it the strength of faith grows even to the gift of miracles. It fills the mind with heavenly visions, and peoples the air with divine voices. All the new nature of the man, who is "renewed in Christ Jesus," comes from this Blood, whether it be his love of suffering, his delight in shame, his grace of prayer, his unworldly tastes, his strange humility, his shy concealment, his zeal for souls, his venturous audacity, or his obstinate perseverance. ~ Frederick William Faber, D.D., The Precious Blood: or, The Price of Our Salvation (1860)

2 of 2 Month of the Precious Blood of Jesus ~ July 30th Those saints who were so highly favored with the stigmata of our Lord and who in their own blood oozing from hands and feet and side, like St. Francis of Assisi, could so beautifully but with intense pain contemplate the Precious Blood flowing from the Five Wounds of Jesus, deserve special mention in connection with the history of the Precious Blood. This rare privilege of stigmatization goes to show also how much our Saviour prizes the Five Wounds in His own Sacred Body. We must not forget also that our Lord has presented Himself to numerous saints, as He had done on the Via Crucis to Veronica, all covered with Blood and that He still appears in our own day to saintly souls in His Blood, offering us thereby fresh and continual proofs of His love for the “dyed garments from Bosra,”and reminding us again and again of the great debt we owe to the Price of our Redemption. ~ Rev. M. F. Walz, C. PP. S., Why Is Thy Apparel Red? or Glories of the Precious Blood (1914).

Month of the Precious Blood of Jesus~ July 30th It would lead us too far were we to quote all the saints who were especially devoted to the Precious Blood; St. Gertrude, St. Bridget, St. Philip Neri, St. Alphonsus and, above all, Blessed Caspar del Bufalo, the Apostle of the Precious Blood in the nineteenth century, of whom we shall write a special chapter. (continued below)

Month of the Precious Blood ~ July 29th The Mystery of the Precious Blood To its fountains, God calls the sinner, that he may be lightened of his burdens. There is no remission for him in anything else. Only there is his lost sonship to be found. But the saints are no less called by God to these invigorating streams. It is out of the Precious Blood that men draw martyrdoms, vocations, celibacies, austerities, heroic charities, and all the magnificent graces of high sanctity. The secret nourishment of prayer is from these fountains. They purge the eye for sublime contemplations. They kindle the inward fire of self-sacrificing love. They bear a man safely, and even impetuously, over the seeming impossibilities of perseverance. ~ Frederick William Faber, D.D., The Precious Blood: or, The Price of Our Salvation (1860)

2 of 2 Month of the Precious Blood of Jesus ~ July 29th “I know Thee now, Abyss of charity,” she exclaims, “O high eternal Trinity; now hast Thou manifested to me Thy truth and Thine inestimable charity in the Blood of Thy Son. It is there we see Thy power which was able to wash away our sins in that Blood, and Thy wisdom whereby Thou didst find a way to cover our humanity with the cloak of Thy Divinity and so take away the lordship of the devil over us; then we see also Thy love and charity, whereby Thou didst purchase us with that Blood, having no need at all of us.” This Blood, she writes, takes away all pain and dispenses every joy; it deprives man of himself and causes him to be absorbed in God. This great saint, whose power over men was something wonderful and who accomplished so much in the Church, seemed to be inebriated with divine love, which she drew from the fountains of the Precious Blood and from which she invited all men to drink in the words of the Psalmist, “O taste and see that the Lord is sweet” (Ps.XXXIII,9). ~ Rev. M. F. Walz, C. PP. S., Why Is Thy Apparel Red? or Glories of the Precious Blood (1914).

Month of the Precious Blood of Jesus~ July 29th It was of St. Bonaventure that St. Francis de Sales said, he seemed in his writings to use no other ink than the Blood of Christ; but the expression might be applied with still more singular propriety to the writing of St. Catherine of Siena. She never began a letter without these words, “I write to you in the Precious Blood.”. This name was never absent from her lips; the one subject of her continual exhortations was that men should forget themselves and keep the vessel of their memory ever filled with the Blood of their Redeemer. She seemed to recognize all the attributes of God mirrored, as it were, in the sea of the adorable Blood. (continued below)

2 of 2 Month of the Precious Blood ~ July 28th The Mystery of the Precious Blood Nevertheless the Precious Blood belongs in an especial manner to men. Much more, therefore, does God invite them to come to its heavenly baths, and receive therein, not only the cleansing of their souls, but the power of a new and amazing life. Every doctrine in theology is a call to the Precious Blood. Every ceremony of the Church tells of it. Every sermon that is preached is an exhortation to the use of it. Every Sacrament is a communication of it. Every supernatural act is a growth of it. Everything that is holy on the earth is either leaf, bud, blossom, or fruit of the Blood of Jesus. ~ Frederick William Faber, D.D., The Precious Blood: or, The Price of Our Salvation (1860)

1 of 2 O Jesus, que votre sang précieux sanctifie les justes et rende la vie aux pêcheurs! O Jesus, may Thy precious blood sanctify the just and give life to sinners!

2 of 2 Month of the Precious Blood of Jesus ~ July 28th St. Magdalen de Pazzi was all aglow with devotion to the Precious Blood and sees in this sea of mercy a magnet that attracts all hearts with sweet violence. St. Gertrude saw the Precious Blood issue from the Wounds of the Saviour as from living springs and their overflow fructify the entire Church, even as the rivers of Paradise irrigated that beautiful garden and kept everything fresh and green and filled with the sweetest fruits. “I, wisdom, have poured out rivers. I, like a brook out of a river of amighty water; I, like a channel of a river, and like an aqueduct, came out of paradise. I said: I will water my garden of plants, and I will water abundantly the fruits of my meadow. And behold my brook became a great river, and my river came near to a sea” (Eccl. XXIV). ~ Rev. M. F. Walz, C. PP. S., Why Is Thy Apparel Red? or Glories of the Precious Blood (1914).

Month of the Precious Blood of Jesus~ July 28th Among the Fathers, St. Chrysostom and St. Augustine show great zeal for the devotion to the Precious Blood. The former thoroughly imbued with veneration and all aflame with love towards this sacred Blood, represents it to us as a stream that irrigates the entire earth and by its fertility produces a rich spiritual harvest. St. Ambrose calls the Blood of Christ true gold of inestimable value. St. Bernard speaks of the Precious Blood as of a trumpet that calls to heaven for mercy. St. Thomas designates it as the key that opens the heavenly treasures, just as it was the means by which heaven itself was opened to us. (continued below)

Month of the Precious Blood of Jesus~ July 28th Among the Fathers, St. Chrysostom and St. Augustine show great zeal for the devotion to the Precious Blood. The former thoroughly imbued with veneration and all aflame with love towards this sacred Blood, represents it to us as a stream that irrigates the entire earth and by its fertility produces a rich spiritual harvest. St. Ambrose calls the Blood of Christ true gold of inestimable value. St. Bernard speaks of the Precious Blood as of a trumpet that calls to heaven for mercy. St. Thomas designates it as the key that opens the heavenly treasures, just as it was the means by which heaven itself was opened to us. (continued below)