The How-To Book of Catholic Devotions, Second Edition. Mike Aquilina
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now and at the hour of our death.
Amen.
The first sentence of the prayer is the greeting of the angel Gabriel to Mary at the Annunciation (Lk 1:28). By joining our voices with that of the angel, we acknowledge God’s saving plan, give glory to Jesus (the God-man), and pay honor to Mary, who is the mother of Jesus and, by extension, is also our mother and the mother of the Church. Remember, after all, that Jesus, while dying on the cross, gave Mary to be a mother to His beloved disciple (Jn 19:26-27). We are all Jesus’ beloved disciples now, and so she is mother to us all.
As we pray the Hail Mary, we should look to this loving mother. Sometimes it helps if we pray before an image of her. We can silently recall Mary’s response to the message of the Annunciation: “Let it be to me according to your word” (Lk 1:38). This can be our prayer along with her. As she accepted God’s will in her life, we pray with her and to her for the grace to yield willingly to God’s plan for our lives.
In the second half of the prayer, we place ourselves in the loving hands of our mother and ask for her intercession that we may triumph over sin and remain faithful to God, so that one day we may join her before the throne of the risen Christ.
“Full of Grace”
“By asking Mary to pray for us, we acknowledge ourselves to be poor sinners and we address ourselves to the ‘Mother of Mercy,’ the All-Holy One. We give ourselves over to her now, in the Today of our lives. And our trust broadens further, already at the present moment, to surrender ‘the hour of our death’ wholly to her care. May she be there as she was at her son’s death on the cross. May she welcome us as our mother at the hour of our passing (cf. Jn 19:27) to lead us to her son, Jesus, in paradise.”
— CCC, n. 2677
“By each Hail Mary we give our Lady the same honor that God gave her when He sent the angel Gabriel to greet her for Him.”
— From The Secret of the Rosary,
by St. Louis de Montfort
The Glory Be
So many of our prayers contain petitions and requests. The Glory Be is a short prayer in which we seek only to give glory to God as we proclaim the great mystery of the Trinity:
Glory be to the Father,
and to the Son,
and to the Holy Spirit.
As it was in the beginning,
is now, and ever shall be,
world without end.
Amen.
This simple prayer proclaims that God is one, and yet God is three Persons: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. This is the most foundational truth of the Christian faith. The phrase “world without end” is an old-fashioned way of saying “forever.” Our God, one in three, is eternal and unchanging.
“The faith of all Christians rests on the Trinity.”
— St. Caesarius of Arles
Father, Son, and Holy Spirit
“The mystery of the Most Holy Trinity is the central mystery of Christian faith and life. It is the mystery of God in himself. It is therefore the source of all the other mysteries of faith, the light that enlightens them.”
— CCC, n. 234
3. How to Make a Morning Offering
The Catechism of the Catholic Church tells us, “The Tradition of the Church proposes to the faithful certain rhythms of praying intended to nourish continual prayer. Some are daily, such as morning and evening…. [These] are also basic rhythms of the Christian’s life of prayer” (n. 2698). As they rise from bed, many people will make the Sign of the Cross and recite a prayer that gives the day to our Lord. This action testifies to the fact we are the Lord’s and that we begin everything in and through Him.
In 1844, Jesuit Father Francois Xavier Gaulrelet penned a prayer that is still used to this day. The prayer is the Morning Offering to the Sacred Heart of Jesus:
O Jesus, through the Immaculate Heart of Mary, I offer you my prayers, works, joys, and sufferings of this day for all the intentions of your Sacred Heart, in union with the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass throughout the world, in reparation for my sins, for the intentions of all my relatives and friends, and in particular for the intentions of our Holy Father. Amen.
The tradition of offering our day to God is an ancient practice, but Father Gaulrelet’s prayer formalized that intention in a memorable (and easily memorized) way. Through this prayer, we join our plea to the Eucharistic prayer of each Mass. The Mass is the liturgical re-presentation of the loving sacrifice of Jesus on Calvary. We, by the Morning Offering, unite our thoughts and actions to that one eternal sacrifice. This union grants rich meaning and value to every aspect of our day. In the Morning Offering, we also ask the intercession of our mother, Mary, as we pray through her Immaculate Heart. Our prayers are united with those of millions of Catholics all over the world who offer the same intention of prayer every morning.
Pope St. John Paul II said that the Morning Offering is “of fundamental importance in the life of each and every one of the faithful.” In the box on page 32 is a quote from Jesuit Father Walter Ciszek, who for years was jailed in communist prison camps. He had very little control over the outer aspects of his life. His daily sufferings often included torture and deprivation of food and water. Yet he lived by his Morning Offering and accepted everything from God’s hand, and he offered it all together with the suffering of Jesus. Communism has come and gone in Russia, but surely the holy offering of Father Ciszek still brings grace to the land.
Our Prayer United With the Vicar of Christ
The Morning Offering includes the intentions of our bishops and especially the intentions of the Holy Father as part of the prayer. The burdens carried by the Holy Father and the bishops are great. The faithful have an obligation to pray for them regularly. A good practice is to pray, each morning, specifically for the pope and the bishop of your diocese. Many people say an Our Father, Hail Mary, and Glory Be with the specific intention of the needs of the pope, and then pray another set specifically for their bishop.
Morning prayers can also be offered privately while preparing for the day (while shaving, bathing, fixing hair, and so on). Yet there is great advantage to saying at least some morning prayer, perhaps the Morning Offering, as a family. It sets the tone not only for the individual but also for the family. By so doing, we unite our corporate family life under the Lordship and merciful heart of Christ.
Get a Good Start
“The simple soul who each day makes a Morning Offering of ‘all the prayers, works, joys, and sufferings of this day’ — and who then acts upon it by accepting unquestioningly and responding lovingly to all the situations of the day as truly sent by God — has perceived with an almost childlike faith the profound truth about the will of God. The plain and simple truth is that His will is what He actually wills to send us each day, in the way of circumstances, places, people, and problems. The trick is to see that … every day.”
— from He Leadeth Me, by Father Walter J. Ciszek, S.J.
“Their work, prayers, and apostolic endeavors, their ordinary married and family life, their daily labor, their mental and physical relaxation … all these become spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. During the celebration of the Eucharist these sacrifices are most lovingly offered to the Father along with the Lord’s body. Thus as worshipers whose deed is holy, the lay faithful consecrate the world itself to God.”
— Dogmatic Constitution