" Say the Rosary every day...Pray, pray a lot and offer
sacrifices for sinners...I'm Our Lady of the Rosary.
Only I will be able to help you.
...In the end My Immaculate Heart will triumph." Our Lady at Fatima
"Pray! Pray very much! Offer prayers and sacrifices constantly to the Most High." "Make everything you can a sacrifice, and offer it to God as an act of reparation for the sins by which He is offended..." These were the words at the Angel's second appearance to the three children of Fatima.
The faithful receive abundant grace of God. You are not far from the kingdom of God.
Mary calls us to her Son to lead us to our God in heaven.
In this novena to Our Mother of Perpetual Help we pay tribute to the Blessed Virgin Mary in asking for her assistance. This picture of the Blessed Mother with her Divine Son above has helped her provide strength, comfort and even miracles to the faithful for centuries!
Mary was the Mother of Jesus and His Associate in the Work of Redemption. By devout and assiduous prayer to her we can go to Jesus through Mary.
Look at the picture. The Greek letters (MP QY) near Mary's crown are a shortened form of the Greek words for Mother of God. The angel with the lance, reed and sponge is the Archangel Michael. The Archangel Gabriel holds the cross and nails. The letters beside Jesus are a shortened form of Jesus Christ. Jesus the child appears fearful clasping His mother but looking in a frightened manner at the instruments of the passion. The loosened sandal indicates that his trembling has shaken the clasp from it. Mary holds her child in a protecting manner but while she cares for him her eyes are upon us. The icon speaks to us in different ways but it invites us to see Mary as our help always as she protects her Son, the Church and us.
Feast Day: June 27
The two great commandments that contain the whole law of God are: 1. Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind, and with thy whole strength;
2. Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.
And one of them, a doctor of the Law, putting him to the test, asked him, "Master, which is the great commandment in the Law?" Jesus said to him, "'Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind.' This is the greatest and the first commandment. And the second is like it, 'Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.' On these two commandments depend the whole Law and the Prophets." (Matthew 22:35-40)
A reading from the first Letter of Saint Paul to the Corinthians 12: 31--13:13 Brothers and sisters: Strive eagerly for the greatest spiritual gifts. But I shall show you a still more excellent way. If I speak in human and angelic tongues, but do not have love, I am a resounding gong or clashing cymbal. And if I have the gift of prophecy, and comprehend all mysteries and all knowledge; if I have all faith so as to move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. If I give away everythinh I own, and if I hand my body over so that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing. Love is patient, love is kind. It is not jealous, it is not pompous, it is not inflated, it is not rude, it does not seek its own interests, it is not quick-tempered, it does not brood over injury, it does not rejoice over wrongdoing but rejoices with the truth. It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never fails. If there are prophecies, they will be brought to nothing; if tongues, they will cease; if knowledge, it will be brought to nothing. For we know partially and we prophesy partially, but when the perfect comes, the partial will pass away. When I was a child, I used to talk as a child, think as a child, reason as a child; when I became a man, I put aside childish things. At present we see indistinctly, as in mirror, but then face to face. At present I know partially; then I shall know fully, as I am fully known. So faith, hope, love remain, these three; but the greatest of these is love.