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Day 9 - Pray the Rosary Every Day

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Light a candle as a sign that in your home lives a pilgrim of Fatima by the heart. Our Lady watches over your way. 

Prayer of the Angel of Peace:  My God, I believe, I adore, I hope, and I love You. I ask pardon of You for those who do not believe, do not adore, do not hope and do not love You.

The thirteenth of May in Cova da Iria, appeared, oh so, brilliant, the Virgin Maria. Ave Maria!

To the three little shepherds our Lady appeared; the light of her grace to Her Son souls endeared. Ave Maria!

The Virgin Maria encircled with light - our own dearest Mother and heaven’s delight. Ave Maria!

  • Recalling the apparition of May 13, 1917 in Fatima, we pilgrims by the heart contemplate the Lady of the light. Get close to Her, full of grace, who reflects the light which is God, and drink in silence, the light from Her hands. The light which is God communicates itself to you intimately and enlightens you from within, allowing you to see yourself in God and, therefore, recognize yourself as His beloved child, and the child of the Mother of Jesus, the Woman with the immaculate heart, the servant of peace, Our Lady of Fatima. It is through silence that the experience of this light is offered to you.
  • Go deep down into the holy silence in your heart, and in that silence experience the joy of this day in 1917, when Our Lady appeared in the Cova da Iria to Lucia, Francisco and Jacinta, poor shepherd children of no worldly consequence, who were chosen to see Our Lady.
  • Although you are not able to be in Fatima now, in the silence of your heart you are invited to the real joy that Fatima offers: the joy of the encounter with the One who loves us and calls us to conversion by Mary’s voice. Listen to how Lucia recounts the last moments of the May apparition:

“Then, moved by an interior impulse that was also communicated to us, we fell on our knees, repeating in our hearts: O most Holy Trinity, I adore You! My God, my God, I love You in the most Blessed Sacrament. After a few moments, Our Lady spoke again:”  “Pray the Rosary every day, in order to obtain peace for the world, and the end of the war (World War I).”  “Then she began to rise serenely, going up towards the east, until she disappeared in the immensity of space. The light that surrounded her seemed to open up a path before her in the firmament, and for this reason we sometimes said that we saw heaven opening.”

  • Listen to a quote from the Gospel of John 19: 25-27 “Standing by the cross of Jesus were his mother and his mother’s sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary of Magdala. When Jesus saw his mother and the disciple there whom he loved, he said to his mother, “Woman, behold, your son.” Then he said to the disciple, “Behold, your mother.” And from that hour the disciple took her into his home.”
  • We have a Mother - Mary, the Mother of Jesus has been given to us to be our Mother. Thus Pope Francis said and repeated when he came to Fatima on May 13 2017, to mark the 100th anniversary of the apparitions and for the rite of canonization of Blessed Francisco and Jacinta - “…, two candles which God lit to illumine humanity in its dark and anxious hours,” as Saint John Paul II said in their beatification.
  • In this dark and restless time for humankind, the request to pray the Rosary in order to bring peace to the world assumes a particular meaning. Peace in a biblical and theological sense, is not only the absence of war. It is the fullness of God’s blessings. When a global pandemic such as the world is experiencing in 2020, brings an increase in poverty and misery on a local and global level, history teaches that the convergence of these facts boosts conflicts between people, between nations and inside nations, within societies as well as families, and within people’s hearts.
  • It is time to pray the Rosary to achieve world peace. The One who asks it of us, is Our Lady of Fatima, whom we have contemplated along this pilgrimage by the heart, when we dared to cross the thresholds of the mystery of the suffering - the sufferings of people and of God.
  • We have contemplated Her as the Mother who listened and drank in the meaning of the words spoken by her innocent and agonizing Son while standing by the Cross, and we have contemplated Her in Fatima as our Mother, feeling sorrow for those suffering the tragedies of the first world war.
  • The practice of the Rosary to which Fatima invites us, is the one based on the silent contemplation of the mysteries of Christ, of which the preference for solitary prayer by Francisco is an example. And in addition the writings of Lucia, over the years, began justifying this option. She writes: “How I see the message through the times and events.”
  • Thus, as the heavenly Messenger rose to Heaven, She asked us to pray the rosary every day, the prayer that leads us soon after its beginning, to be absorbed in it and to live the principal mysteries of God and His redemptive work, carried out by Jesus Christ, our Savior.

My God, You inhabit the innermost depths of my heart and You call me to become a pilgrim by the heart and to meet You there. Most Blessed Trinity, I deeply adore You. My God, my God I love You in the Blessed Sacrament. Give me the contemplative prayer of a silent heart, the prayer of the simple and little ones. O Trinity, O Bread from the Heaven, You who are my source and my way. Lead me every day, pilgrim by the heart that I am, and by the practice of silence, strengthen my faith, my hope and my desire to worship and love You as You deserve.

Lord Jesus, I contemplate your mother’s heart, mother of mine, Our Lady of Fatima. Each day I wish to honor the name She introduced herself with in Cova da Iria, and pray the Rosary, contemplating in the silence of my heart, the mysteries of Your life, death and resurrection, and of Your Mother in You. I will pray in Her heart, because in Her immaculate heart, full of the grace of Your presence, is where You offer Yourself more deeply to my heart. And today, away from the Little Chapel in Fatima, I know that in our Mother’s immaculate heart, I shall always listen to the merciful beating of Your heart. Amen.

Conclusion of a Pilgrimage by the Heart 

  • With the onset of the 2020 global pandemic, we have been given the opportunity to live perhaps the most extraordinary month of May of our lives, the most interior, perhaps the most deeply reflected, the most prayerful, and maybe even, the most authentic! It may be that you have gone further in the awareness of what it means to be a pilgrim and that you now desire to plunge deeper into the spiritual experience of pilgrimage, going further in perfecting your condition of pilgrim by the heart, in preparation for the time when you return to Fatima, physically or contemplatively.
  • Our Lady of Fatima has called for you and accompanied you for ten days of grace, and will always be available to help you so that every pilgrimage you make will be a pilgrimage by the heart. Remember that She watches over you and invites you to the fountain of grace deep within your heart, where you can worship God and experience His love enveloping you in the same way the light from our Lady’s hands enveloped the little shepherd children. There He will communicate with you intimately, revealing your truth and your purpose in the redemption of souls.
  • Pilgrim by the heart, pray the Rosary daily. Contemplate the mysteries with reverence, faith and devotion. Pray for world peace and for all that weighs heavy on your heart. Pray it faithfully, even if only one decade each day, and do so with unwavering faith, certain that God hears and answers every prayer. In His infinite wisdom, God may not grant what you want, but will answer nonetheless and grant you what you need.

Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with you. Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb, Jesus. Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners now and at the hour of our death. Amen.

Mother of Heaven, be attentive to the supplications of a world facing tribulation. Answer the cry of the poor and the sick, give comfort and hope to all those who suffer, give strength and compassion to all those who work and care for those who are suffering.  Bring peace to the world. In your immaculate heart, be for all your children, a refuge and a way to God. Our Lady of Fatima, pray for us. Saints Francisco and Jacinta Marto, pray for us. Amen, Alleluia!