December 16, 2018
Third Sunday of Advent
Dear Family of Mary!
Today the priest wears rose colored vestments to signify that we should rejoice because our Savior has come and will come again! We are saved by the Blood of the Lamb, and our life with Christ is secured! The words of the Collect for this day say it well:
“O God, who see how your people faithfully await the feast of the Lord’s Nativity, enable us, we pray, to attain the joys of so great a salvation and to celebrate them always with solemn worship and glad rejoicing, through Our Lord Jesus Christ, Your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, on God, for ever and ever.”
So today we will pray for the gift of joy! Our Lady has often encouraged us to be joyful. Here is one message:
“Dear children! Today I am with you in a special way, holding little Jesus in my lap and I invite you, little children, to open yourselves to His call. He calls you to joy. Little children, joyfully live the messages of the Gospel, which I am repeating in the time since I am with you. Little children, I am your Mother and I desire to reveal to you the God of love and the God of peace. I do not desire for your life to be in sadness but that it be realized in joy for eternity, according to the Gospel. Only in this way will your life have meaning. Thank you for having responded to my call. (December 25, 1996)
Baby Jesus calls us to joy!!! Is it not true that babies call us to joy? You cannot look upon a little one without smiling inside and out. Their innocence, their inquisitiveness, their openness and trust, their beauty, everything about them calls forth a response of joyful delight in us. How much more does the Baby Jesus evoke joy in our souls as we behold Him in His Nativity in Bethlehem.
Our Lady brings Jesus to us in a special way at Christmas. In this apparition, she was holding Him on her lap. She wants us to be intimate with Her Son. This is all she desires, to bring us into close proximity to Him, and to let His pure love penetrate us to the depths.
May we meditate on the Infant Jesus every day of this novena and every day afterwards. Baby Jesus is calling us to joy! May we respond to His call with open hearts and trust! Let us pray:
May the Virgin Mary help us to open the doors of our hearts to Christ, Redeemer of man and of history; may she teach us to be humble, because God looks upon the lowly; may she enable us to grow in understanding the value of prayer, of inner silence, of listening to God’s Word; may she spur us to seek God’s will deeply and sincerely, even when this upsets our plans; may she encourage us while we wait for the Lord, sharing our time and energies with those in need.
Mother of God, Virgin of expectation, grant that the God-who-comes will find us ready to receive the abundance of his mercy.
May Mary Most Holy, “Woman of the Eucharist” and Virgin of Advent, prepare us all to joyfully welcome Christ’s coming and to celebrate worthily his sacramental presence in the mystery of the Eucharist. -St. John Paul II
We can add our Rosary to these prayers as part of the Novena!
In Jesus, Mary and Joseph!
Cathy Nolan
©Mary TV 2018
