Letter sent by the Congregation to promote Eucharistic adoration for the sanctification of priests and spiritual maternity.
Your Excellency,
In today’s world a great many things are necessary for the good of the Clergy and the fruitfulness of pastoral ministry. With a firm determination to face such challenges without disregarding the difficulties and struggles, and with an awareness that action follows being and that the soul of every apostolate is Divine intimacy, it is our intention for the departure point to be a spiritual endeavor.
In order to continually maintain a greater awareness of the ontological link between the Eucharist and the Priesthood, and in order to recognize the special maternity of the Blessed Virgin Mary for each Priest, it is
our intention to bring about a connection between perpetual Eucharistic adoration for the sanctification of priests and the initiation of a commitment on the part of consecrated feminine souls —following the typology of the Blessed Virgin Mary, Mother of the Eternal High Priest, and Helper in his work of Redemption—who might wish to
spiritually adopt priests in order to help them with their self-offering, prayer, and penance. Adoration always involves an act of reparation for sins.
With that in mind, we suggest a particular intention in this regard. According to the constant content of Sacred Tradition, the mystery and reality of the Church cannot be reduced to the hierarchical structure, the liturgy, the sacraments, and juridical ordinances. In fact, the intimate nature of the Church and the origin of its sanctifying efficacy must be found first in a mystical union with Christ.
According to the doctrine and the very structure of the Dogmatic Constitution on the Church, Lumen Gentium, such a union cannot be conceived separately from the Mother of the Word Incarnate—the one whom Jesus desired to be intimately united with Himself for the salvation of all humanity.
Therefore, it is no accident that on the same day in which the Dogmatic Constitution on the Church was promulgated—21 November 1964—Pope Paul VI also proclaimed the Blessed Virgin Mary as “Mother of the Church,” i.e., mother of the faithful and the pastors.
With reference to the Blessed Virgin Mary, the Second Vatican Council expresses itself in these words: “She conceived, brought forth and nourished Christ. She presented Him to the Father in the temple, and was united with Him by compassion as He died on the Cross. In this singular way she cooperated by her obedience, faith, hope and burning charity in the work of the Savior in giving back supernatural life to souls. Wherefore she is our mother in the order of grace.” (LG 61)
Without adding or detracting from the singular mediation of Christ Jesus, the Blessed Virgin Mary is acknowledged and invoked in the Church under the titles of Advocate,
Helper, Benefactress, and Mediatrix. She is the model of maternal love who must inspire all those who cooperate—through the apostolic mission of the Church—in the
regeneration of all humanity (cfr. LG 65).
In light of these teachings, which belong to the ecclesiology of the Second Vatican Council, the faithful are called to turn their eyes to Mary—shining example of every virtue —and imitate her as the first disciple. It is she to whom every other disciple was entrusted by Christ as she stood at the foot of the cross (cfr. Jn 19:25-27).
By becoming her children, we learn the true meaning of life in Christ.
Thereby—and precisely because of the place occupied and the role served by the Most Blessed Virgin in salvation history—we intend in a very particular way to entrust
all priests to Mary, the Mother of the High and Eternal Priest, bringing about in the Church a movement of prayer, placing 24 hour continuous Eucharistic adoration at the centre, so that a prayer of adoration, thanksgiving, praise, petition, and reparation, will be raised to God, incessantly and from every corner of the earth, with the primary intention of awakening a sufficient number of holy vocations to the priestly state and, at the same time, spiritually uniting with a certain spiritual maternity—at the level of the Mystical Body—all those who have already been called to the ministerial
priesthood and are ontologically conformed to the one High and Eternal Priest.
This movement will offer better service to Christ and his brothers —those who are at once “inside” the Church and also “at the forefront” of the Church, standing in Christ’s
stead and representing Him, as head, shepherd and spouse of the Church (cfr. Pastores Dabo Vobis 16).
We are asking, therefore, all diocesan Ordinaries who apprehend in a particular way the specificity and irreplaceability of the ordained ministry in the life of the Church, together with the urgency of a common action in support of the ministerial priesthood, to take an active role and promote—in the different portions of the People of God entrusted to them—true and proper cenacles in which clerics, religious and lay people—united among themselves in the spirit of true communion—may devote themselves to prayer, in the form of continuous Eucharistic adoration in a spirit of genuine and authentic
reparation and purification.
May Mary, Mother of the One, Eternal High Priest, bless this initiative, and may she intercede before God, pleading for an authentic renewal of priestly life, taking as a model
the only possible model: Jesus Christ, the Good Shepherd
I greet you cordially in the bond of ecclesial communion, with sentiments of profound
collegial affection.
Cláudio Card. Hummes
Prefect
Mauro Piacenza
Secretary
From the Vatican, 8 December 2007
Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary
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To join The Confraternity of Spiritual Mothers for Priests
email us your name and address at:
spiritualmother4priests@gmail.com
or mail your request with your name and address information to:
Spiritual Mothers
908 Queens Court
Santa Maria, CA 93454
Your names will be written in our member book and your intentions will be prayed for. Thank you
and
God Bless you!
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C O N F R A T E R N I T Y O F S P I R I T U A L M O T H E R S F O R P R I E S T S
Benedict XVI
Meeting with The Priests and Deacons in Freising, Germany, 14 September 2006
Pray the Lord of the Harvest to Send out Laborers!
“Pray the Lord of the harvest to send
out labourers.” This means that the
harvest is ready, but God wishes to enlist helpers to bring it into the storehouse.
God needs them. He needs people to say: Yes, I am ready to become your harvest labourer; I am ready to offer help so that this harvest which is ripening in people’s hearts may truly be brought into the storehouses of eternity and become an enduring, divine communion of joy and love.
“Pray the Lord of the harvest” also
means that we cannot simply “produce”
vocations; they must come from God.
Unlike other professions, we cannot
simply recruit people by using the right
kind of publicity or the correct type of
strategy. The call which comes from the
heart of God must always find its way
into the heart of man. And yet, precisely
so that it may reach into hearts, our
cooperation is needed.
To pray the Lord of the harvest means
above all to ask him for this, to stir his
heart and say: “Please do this! Rouse
labourers!
Enkindle in them enthusiasm and joy for the Gospel! Make them understand that this is a treasure greater than any other, and that whoever has discovered it, must hand it on!”
We stir the heart of God. But our prayer
to God does not consist of words alone; the words must lead to action so that from our praying heart a spark of our joy in God and in the Gospel may arise, enkindling in the hearts of others a
readiness to say “yes.”
As people of prayer, filled with his light,
we reach out to others and bring them
into our prayer and into the presence of
God, who will not fail to do his part. In
this sense we must continue to pray the
Lord of the harvest, to stir his heart, and
together with God touch the hearts of
others through our prayer.
And he, according to his purpose, will bring to maturity their “yes,” their readiness to respond; the constancy, in other words, through all this world’s
perplexity, through the heat of the day
and the darkness of the night, to
persevere faithfully in his service.
Hence they will know that their efforts,
however arduous, are noble and
worthwhile because they lead to what is
essential, they ensure that people receive
what they hope for: God’s light and
God’s love.
Benedict XVI
Meeting with The Priests and Deacons in
Freising, Germany, 14 September 2006
Meeting with The Priests and Deacons in Freising, Germany, 14 September 2006
Pray the Lord of the Harvest to Send out Laborers!
“Pray the Lord of the harvest to send
out labourers.” This means that the
harvest is ready, but God wishes to enlist helpers to bring it into the storehouse.
God needs them. He needs people to say: Yes, I am ready to become your harvest labourer; I am ready to offer help so that this harvest which is ripening in people’s hearts may truly be brought into the storehouses of eternity and become an enduring, divine communion of joy and love.
“Pray the Lord of the harvest” also
means that we cannot simply “produce”
vocations; they must come from God.
Unlike other professions, we cannot
simply recruit people by using the right
kind of publicity or the correct type of
strategy. The call which comes from the
heart of God must always find its way
into the heart of man. And yet, precisely
so that it may reach into hearts, our
cooperation is needed.
To pray the Lord of the harvest means
above all to ask him for this, to stir his
heart and say: “Please do this! Rouse
labourers!
Enkindle in them enthusiasm and joy for the Gospel! Make them understand that this is a treasure greater than any other, and that whoever has discovered it, must hand it on!”
We stir the heart of God. But our prayer
to God does not consist of words alone; the words must lead to action so that from our praying heart a spark of our joy in God and in the Gospel may arise, enkindling in the hearts of others a
readiness to say “yes.”
As people of prayer, filled with his light,
we reach out to others and bring them
into our prayer and into the presence of
God, who will not fail to do his part. In
this sense we must continue to pray the
Lord of the harvest, to stir his heart, and
together with God touch the hearts of
others through our prayer.
And he, according to his purpose, will bring to maturity their “yes,” their readiness to respond; the constancy, in other words, through all this world’s
perplexity, through the heat of the day
and the darkness of the night, to
persevere faithfully in his service.
Hence they will know that their efforts,
however arduous, are noble and
worthwhile because they lead to what is
essential, they ensure that people receive
what they hope for: God’s light and
God’s love.
Benedict XVI
Meeting with The Priests and Deacons in
Freising, Germany, 14 September 2006