from 4 to 5 in the morning
TWELFTH HOUR
Jesus at the mercy of soldiers
Preparation for each HOUR
And for those hours that I cannot reflect on, I offer you my willingness to remember them, and I intend to consciously reflect on them whenever I have to devote time to pfulfilling their duties or sleeping.
Accept, O merciful Lord, my loving intention and make it beneficial for me and for all, as if I had effectively and sanctimoniously accomplished what I wish to do.Meanwhile, I thank You, my Jesus, that through prayer You call me to unite myself with You. And to please You even more, I take Your thoughts, Your language, Your Heart, and I intend to pray with them, merging my whole self into Your Will and Your Love. I stretch out my arms to embrace You, I lay my head on Your Heart, and I begin...
My sweetest life, Jesus, when I slept cuddled up to Your Heart, I felt the frequent pricks of thorns that wound Your Most Sacred Heart. Wanting to wake up with You, so that You would have at least one person who would see all Your sufferings and sympathize with You, I hug Your Heart more tightly. Feeling Your pricks more vividly, I wake up... But what do I see? What do I hear? I would like to hide You in my heart, to expose myself instead of You and take upon myself such painful sufferings, such enormous insults and humiliations. But only Your Love can bear such insults... My patient Jesus, what could You expect from such cruel people?
I see how they mock you. They cover your face with thick saliva. The light of your beautiful eyes is covered by it, but you, shedding streams of tears for our salvation, remove it from your eyes. Your enemies cover them again, spitting on you, because their hearts cannot bear the light of your eyes... Others, more daring in doing evil, open your sweetest mouth and fill it with foul saliva, so that they themselves feel disgusted. And because some of this saliva flows down and reveals the majesty of Your Face and Your superhuman sweetness, they tremble and are ashamed of themselves. And wanting to be more at ease, they blindfold You with a miserable rag so that they can completely vent their anger on Your adorable Person... So they beat You mercilessly, drag You and trample You underfoot. They strike You again and again in the Face and head, scratch You and pull Your hair. They drag You from one place to another...
Jesus, my Love, my heart breaks when I see You in such pain. You want me to watch everything, but I feel like I want to cover my eyes so I don't have to see such painful scenes that are capable of tearing the heart out of every chest. But my love for You compels me to watch what is happening to You. I see that You do not open Your mouth or say a word in Your defense. You remain like a rag in the hands of the soldiers, and they can do whatever they want with You. Seeing them jumping on You, I fear that You may die under their feet.
My Goodness and my Everything, the pain I feel because of your suffering is so great that I would like to scream loudly to be heard up there in Heaven and call upon the Father, the Holy Spirit, and all the angels. And here on earth, from one end to the other, I would like to call first of all our beloved Mother and all the souls who love You, so that, forming a circle around You, we may prevent these arrogant soldiers from approaching You and continuing to insult and torment You. Together with you, we make reparation for all kinds of sins committed at night, especially those committed by sectarians against your Sacramental Person, and for all the insults of souls who are not faithful to you during the night of trial.
But I see, my insulted Goodness, that the soldiers, tired and drunk, would like to rest. My poor heart, tormented and torn by so many of Your sufferings, does not want to remain alone with You, but needs someone else for company. Oh, my beloved Mother, be my inseparable companion. Let us embrace Jesus together to comfort Him! Oh Jesus, I kiss You together with Mother, and together with Her I will fall asleep in the sleep of love on Your glorified Heart.
Thanksgiving after every HOUR
My beloved Jesus, You called me in this HOUR of Your Passion to keep You company, and I came. It seemed to me that I could hear You praying in agony and pain, making reparation, suffering, and you ask for the salvation of souls with the most moving and convincing voice. I have tried to accompany you in everything. And since I must now leave you to attend to my work, I feel obliged to to say thank you and bless you.
Yes, Jesus, I thank You a thousand times over and bless You for everything You have done and suffered for me and for everyone. I thank You and bless You for every drop of blood You shed, for every breath, for every heartbeat, for every step, word, glance, bitterness, and insult You suffered. Everything, O my Jesus, I intend to mark with my thank You and bless You. O my Jesus, make a continuous stream of thanksgiving and blessings flow to You from my whole being, so that I may draw upon myself and upon everyone the stream of Your blessings and Your graces. Oh, Jesus, hold me close to Your Heart and mark every part of my being with Your most holy hands with Your blessing, so that nothing but a constant hymn of praise to You may flow from me.