Every 1st Friday of the month, many parishes offer a Holy Hour where the community comes together to offer praise, prayer and adoration to our Lord in the presence of the Eucharist. Our Church of St Michael welcomes the community to Holy Hour on Friday, 5 May at 7pm. There will be songs of joyous praise, scripture to inspire you, intercessions for those in need in the community. Yes, you can go to a quiet place to spend an intimate hour communing with Jesus. So why share this communal space with fellow parishioners?
- A Special Invitation to Pray, and to Pray together
Peace. Strength. Consolation. Together as a community, we adore the Blessed Sacrament to receive abundant graces. “Our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament has His hands full of graces and He is ready to bestow them on anyone who asks for them” (St Peter of Alcantara).
Where there is prayer and worship, the Holy Spirit is present to lead us. Always. The church in Antioch saw this truth in action: “While they were worshiping the Lord and fasting, the Holy Spirit said, ‘Set apart for me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them.’ So after they had fasted and prayed, they placed their hands on them and sent them off” (Acts 13:2-3).
- Praying together edifies one’s belief
In coming together as a community, we are helping to build and encourage one another so that we grow in our holiness. The author of Hebrews wrote “And let us consider how to provoke one another to love and good deeds, not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day approaching (Heb 10:24-25).
- Singing together builds belonging and confesses our faith
Music has a way to strike our hearts and is a tool that helps unite believers as we respond to God. Ephesians 5:19 – as you sing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs among yourselves, singing and making melody to the Lord in your hearts. In many songs like “In Christ alone, my hope is found!”, we hear confessions of faith around us and many of us are choked with tears of love and emotional gratitude.
- Embracing rays of hope and courage
The late author and priest Fr John Hardon, urges lay people to recognise the importance of Eucharistic Adoration. “Not only does our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament give us the courage to cope with our natural fears, He also gives us the ability to undertake great things for the sake of His name and the power to undergo great trials in our loyalty to His cause.”
Since receiving the Eucharist is an act of adoration toward our Lord, Eucharistic Adoration outside of Eucharistic Celebration should be seen as a natural consequence of the Eucharistic Celebration itself, an act that “prolongs and intensifies all that takes places during the liturgical celebration itself”.
Indeed, “only in adoration can a profound and genuine reception mature. And it is precisely this personal encounter with the Lord that then strengthens the social mission contained in the Eucharist, which seeks to break down not only the walls that separate the Lord and ourselves, but also and especially the walls that separate us from one another” (Sacramentum Caritatis, February 22, 2009).
- Growing spiritually together in Jesus
Jesus calls us to faith and that we may come to him in humility as we see him in the Sacred Host. “The Blessed Sacrament is the ‘Living Heart’ of each of our churches and it is our very sweet duty to honour and adore the Blessed Host, which our eyes see, the Incarnate Word, whom they cannot see” (Pope Paul VI, Credo of the People of God). The spiritual lives of our families are also strengthened through our Holy Hour.
The Church and the world have a great need of eucharistic worship. Jesus waits for us in this sacrament of love. Let us be generous with our time in going to meet Him in adoration and in contemplation that is full of faith and ready to make reparation for the great faults and crimes of the world. May our adoration never cease. (Pope John Paul II, Dominicae Cenae, Feb 24, 1980)
Come let us adore Him. See you at Holy Hour @ Church of St Michael, Friday 5 May, 7pm.