Novena Prayer to Saint Catherine of Siena

Novena Prayer to Saint Catherine of Siena

O marvelous wonder of the Church, seraphic virgin, Saint Catharine, because of your extraordinary virtue and the immense good which you accomplished for the Church and society, you are acclaimed and blessed by all people. Oh, turn your benign countenance to me who, confident of your powerful patronage, calls upon you with all the ardor of affection and begs you to obtain, by your prayer, the favors I so ardently desire. 

You, who were a victim of charity, who in order to benefits your neighbor obtained from God the most stupendous miracles and became the joy and the hope of all, you cannot help but hear the prayers of those who fly into your heart - that heart which you received from the Divine Redeemer in a celestial ecstasy. 

Yes, O seraphic virgin, demonstrate once again proof of you power and of your flaming charity, so that your name will be ever more blessed and exalted; grant that we, having experienced your most efficacious intercession here on earth, may come one day to thank you in heaven and enjoy eternal happiness with you. Amen. 

Photo taken from Wikimedia Commons

The Litany of Saint Catherine of Siena

Lord, have mercy on us.

Christ, have mercy on us.

Lord, have mercy on us.

Christ, hear us.

Christ graciously hear us.

God the Father of heaven, have mercy on us.

God the Son, Redeemer of the world, have mercy on us.

God the Holy Ghost, have mercy on us.

Holy Trinity, one God, have mercy on us.

Holy Mary, our mother, pray for us.

R./ pray for us.

St. Dominic, glorious Patriarch,

St. Catherine of Siena,

St. Catherine benevolent mother of the poor,

St. Catherine, kind mother of the suffering,

St. Catherine, merciful mother of the sick,

St. Catherine, refuge of the sorrowful,

St. Catherine, intercessor for sinners,

St. Catherine, rose pf patience,

St. Catherine, model of humility,

St. Catherine, lily of chastity,

St. Catherine, vessel of graces,

St. Catherine, zealous promoter of the honor of God,

St. Catherine, luster of holiness,

St. Catherine, example of mildness,

St. Catherine, glory of the Order of Preachers,

St. Catherine, fruitful mother of spiritual children,

St. Catherine, promoter of peace,

St. Catherine, terror of the evil spirits,

St. Catherine, follower of Jesus,

St. Catherine, who didst give the blossoms of thy innocent youth 
to the service of thy Heavenly Spouse,

St. Catherine, who didst lead an angelic life in human flesh,

St. Catherine, who didst tear thy virginal flesh with scourges,

St. Catherine, whom Jesus, Himself, did feed with His Body and Blood,

St. Catherine, who didst exchange thy heart with the Heart of Jesus,

St. Catherine, who was blest with His Holy Wounds,

St. Catherine, who was taken to Heaven to the celestial nuptials,

St. Catherine, who didst receive a hundredfold, reward for all thy labors and merits,

Lamb of God, Who takest away the sins of the world, spare us, O Lord.

Lamb of God, Who takest away the sins of the world, graciously hear us, O Lord.

Lamb of God, Who takest away the sins of the world, have mercy on us.

Pray for us, O glorious Virgin, St. Catherine

That we may be made worthy of the promises of Christ.

Let us Pray
O God, who didst enable Blessed Catherine, graced with the special privilege of virginity, and patience, to overcome the assault of evil spirits, and to stand unshaken in the love of Thy Name, grant we beseech Thee, that after her example treading under foot the wickedness f the world, and overcoming the wiles of all enemies, we may safely pass onward to Thy glory.  Through Christ Our Lord. Amen.

Prayer to the Holy Ghost

Prayer to the Holy Ghost

Holy Spirit, come into my heart; draw it to Thee by Thy power,

O my God, and grant me charity with filial fear. 

Preserve me, O ineffable Love, from every evil thought; 

warm me, inflame me with Thy dear love, 

and every pain will seem light to me. 

My Father, my sweet Lord, help me in all my actions. 

Jesus, love, Jesus, love. Amen.

by Saint Catherine of Siena
Image Credit Waiting for the Word

Prayer for the Gifts of Saint Catherine of Siena

Prayer for the Gifts of Saint Catherine of Siena

God of Wisdom you made our sister Catherine burn with divine love in contemplating the Lord's passion and in serving your Church. With the help of her prayers may your people, united in the mystery of Christ, rejoice forever in the revelation of his glory, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, God, for ever and ever. Amen.

Photo taken from Wikimedia Commons

Prayer to Saint Catherine of Siena for Mothers

Prayer to Saint Catherine of Siena for Mothers

Humble virgin and Doctor of the Church, in thirty-three years you achieved great perfection and became the counselor of Popes. You know the temptations of mothers today as well as the dangers that await unborn infants. Intercede for me that I may avoid miscarriage and bring forth a healthy baby who will become a true child of God. Also pray for all mothers, that they may not resort to abortion but help bring a new life into the world. Amen.

Photo taken from Wikimedia Commons

Prayer to Saint Catherine of Siena

To Avoid a Miscarriage

Humble Virgin and Doctor of the Church, in thirty-three years you achieved great perfection and became the counselor of Popes.

You know the temptations of mothers today as well as the dangers that await unborn infants. Intercede for me that I may avoid miscarriage and bring forth a healthy baby who will become a true child of God. Also pray for all mothers, that they may not resort to abortion but help bring a new life into the world. Amen.

O Saint Catherine of Siena, God our Father enkindled the flame of holy love in your heart as you meditated on the Passion of Jesus His Son. Moved by His grace, you devoted your life to the poor and the sick, as well as to the peace and unity of the Church. Through your intercession, may we also come to know the love of Jesus, bring His compassion to all, and work for the unity of His Church. We ask this in Jesus' Name and for His sake. Amen.

God, You caused St. Catherine to shine with Divine love in the contemplation of the Lord's Passion and in the service of Your Church. By her help, grant that Your people, associated in the mystery of Christ, may ever exult in the revelation of His glory. Amen.

Photo taken from Wikimedia Commons

Saint Catherine of Siena Quotes

Saint Catherine of Siena Quotes

Love transforms one into what one loves.

The soul is in God and God in the soul, just as the fish is in the sea and the sea in the fish.

And the eternal Father said, 'And if anyone should ask me what this soul is, I would say: She is another me, made so by the union of love.'

Is God not more ready to forgive than we are to sin?

I have no other desire in this life save to see the honor of God, your peace, and the reformation of Holy Church, and to see the life of grace in every creature that hath reason in itself.

Do not be satisfied with little things, because God wants great things!

The soul cannot live without love. She always wants to love something because love is the stuff she is made of, and through love I created her.

Nothing great is ever achieved without much enduring.

It is not the hour to seek one's self for one's self, nor to flee pains in order to possess consolations; nay, it is the hour to lose one's self.

There will be love in proportion to faith and faith in proportion to love.

This (painful thing) happens to me with the permission of God, according to His providence, as in all things that befall me, all tribulation that He sends me He wills only one single thing: my sanctification.

[Sin is] loving what God hates, and hating what God loves.

Be who God meant you to be and you will set the world on fire.

What hast Thou taught me, O Love Uncreated? Thou hast taught me that I should bear patiently like a lamb, not only harsh words, but even blows harsh and hard, and injury and loss.

You, God, made yourself lowly and small to make us great!

You see this gentle loving Word born in a stable while Mary was on a journey, to show you pilgrims how you should be constantly born anew in the stable of self-knowledge, where by grace you will find me born in your soul.

Proclaim the truth and do not be silent through fear.

There are more tears shed over answered prayers than over unanswered prayers.

You know...that to join two things together there must be nothing between them or there cannot be a perfect fusion. Now realize that this is how God wants our soul to be, without any selfish love of ourselves or of others in between, just as God loves us without anything in between.

Love does not stay idle.

O You who are mad about Your creature! true God and true Man, You have left Yourself wholly to us, as food, so that we will not fall through weariness during our pilgrimage in this life, but will be fortified by You, celestial nourishment.

You are rewarded not according to your work or your time but according to the measure of your love.

If you are what you should be, you will set the whole world on fire!

I turn me and lean against the most Holy Cross of Christ Crucified, and there I will fasten me.

Out of darkness is born the light.

I give spiritual consolation in prayer, now in one way, now in another. But it is not my intention that the soul should receive this consolation foolishly, paying more attention to the gift than to me.

All the way to heaven is heaven, because Jesus said, "I am the way."

To the servant of God ... every place is the right place, and every time is the right time. 

O unfathomable depth! O Deity eternal! O deep ocean! What more could You give me than to give me Yourself? You are an ever-burning Fire; You consume and are not consumed. By Your fire, You consume every trace of self-love in the soul. You are a Fire which drives away all coldness and illumines minds with its light, and with this light You have made known Your truth. Truly this light is a sea which feeds the soul until it is all immersed in You, O peaceful Sea, eternal Trinity! The water of this sea is never turbid; it never causes fear, but gives knowledge of the truth. This water is transparent and discloses hidden things; and a living faith gives such abundance of light that the soul almost attains to certitude in what it believes.

The human heart is always drawn by love.

In your nature, eternal Godhead, I shall come to know my nature. And what is my nature, boundless Love? It is fire, because you are nothing but a fire of love. And you have given humankind a share in this nature for by the fire of love you created us.

Oh, sweet and true knowledge, which dost carry with thee the knife of hate, and dost stretch out the hand of holy desire, to draw forth and kill with this hate the worm of self-love -- a worm that spoils and gnaws the root of our tree so that it cannot bear any fruit of life, but dries up, and its verdure lasts not! For if a man loves himself, perverse pride, head and source of every ill, lives in him, whatever his rank may be, prelate or subject. If he is lover of himself alone -- that is, if he loves himself for his own sake and not for God -- he cannot do other than ill, and all virtue is dead in him.

Be a vase, which thou fillest at the source and at the source dost drink from.

Although thou hadst drawn thy love from God, who is the Source of living water, didst thou not drink it continually in Him thy vase would remain empty.'

Image taken from Wikimedia Commons

On the Effects of Holy Communion

On the Effects of Holy Communion

I AM sure, dear Reader, that if you would once begin the practice of frequent Communion in order to please Our Lord, you would continue it in order to please yourself. I will now proceed to make good this assertion by showing the great and admirable effects which this Bread of the Strong produces in the soul. First, it confers an increase of Sanctifying Grace. The life of the soul consists in its being in a state of acceptance or friendship with God, and that which renders it acceptable to God is Sanctifying Grace. 

This grace, which was merited for us by Our Lord Jesus Christ, is infused into the soul by the Holy Ghost through the Sacraments; but each Sacrament does not confer it in the same manner. Baptism and Penance bestow it upon those who are entirely out of the grace of God, or in other words, who are spiritually dead; Baptism being the means appointed for those who have never been in the grace of God, and Penance for those who have lost it. These Sacraments are therefore called Sacraments of the Dead, as being instituted for the benefit of those who are in mortal sin or dead to grace. When these Sacraments are received with the right dispositions, they truly reconcile the sinner with God, so that from being an enemy of God, he becomes His friend and an object of His complacency. But this acceptance, though true and real, is not in the highest degree; it admits of an increase, as the Holy Scripture says: "Let him that is just be justified still; and let him that is holy be sanctified still"; and therefore God appointed the other Sacraments, theSacraments of the Living, not only to convey special graces peculiar to each, but to impart an increase of Sanctifying Grace to those who are already in His favor.

A rich man, when he has taken possession of a field which he wishes to convert into a garden, is not content with putting a wall around it and clearing it of the most noxious weeds and setting it in good order, but he continues to cultivate it assiduously, to fill it with the most beautiful plants and to embellish it with new and choice ornaments. Thus Almighty God, in His love and goodness, has multiplied means by which the soul may be enriched with the graces and merits of Jesus Christ and become more and more agreeable and beautiful in His eyes. 

Now among all these means, there is none greater or more powerful than the Blessed Eucharist. Each time that we receive our Saviour in Holy Communion, we participate anew in all the merits of His Redemption, of His poverty, His hidden life, His scourging and His crowning with thorns. The Holy Eucharist, then, differs from the other Sacraments in this, that while the other Sacraments bestow upon us one or another of the fruits of Christ's merits, this gives us the grace and merits of our Saviour in their source. 

The soul, therefore, receives an immense increase of Sanctifying Grace at each Communion. Dear Christian, let us reflect upon this for a moment. It is no slight thing for a soul to be beautiful in the sight of God. That must needs be something great and precious which can render us-----sinful creatures as we are-----truly amiable before God. What must be the value of Sanctifying Grace, which can work such a transformation? What is it and who can declare its price? 

St. Thomas tells us that the lowest degree of Sanctifying Grace is worth more than all the riches of the world. Think, then, of all the riches of this world! The mines of gold, of precious stones, the forests of costly wood, and all the hidden stores of wealth, for the least of which treasures the children of this world are willing to toil and struggle and sin for a whole lifetime. 

Again, consider that the lowest grace which a humble Catholic Christian receives at the rails of the sanctuary at dawn of day, before the great world is astir, outweighs all those riches. But why do I draw my comparison from the things of this world? St. Teresa, after her death, appeared to one of her sisters in religion and told her that all the Saints in Heaven, without exception, would be willing to come back to this world and to remain here till the End of Time, suffering all the miseries to which our mortal state is subject, only to gain one more degree of Sanctifying Grace and the eternal glory corresponding to it. 

Nay, I even assert that all the devils in Hell would consider all the torments of their dark abode, endured for millions upon millions of ages, largely recompensed by the least degree of that grace which they had once rejected. These thoughts give us a grand and sublime idea of the value of grace; but there is another consideration that ought to raise our estimate of it still higher, namely, that God Himself, the Eternal Son of the Father, came down upon earth, was made man, suffered and died the death of the cross in order to purchase it for us. His life is in some way the measure of its value. 

Now in Holy Communion, this Sanctifying Grace is poured upon us in floods! The King of Heaven is then present in our souls, scattering profusely His benedictions and making us taste of the powers of the world to come. Oh, if anyone of us were to see his own soul immediately after Communion, how amazed and confounded would he not be at the sight of it. He would take it for an Angel. 

St. Catherine of Siena having been asked by her confessor to describe to him the beauty of a soul in the state of grace-----as it had been revealed to her-----replied: "The beauty and lustre of such a soul is so great that if you were to behold it, you would be willing to endure all possible pains and sufferings for its sake." Need we wonder, then, that the Angels loved to keep company with those Saints on earth who every day with great devotion received Holy Communion, and that even the faces of those who have been ardent lovers of the Blessed Sacrament have sometimes shone with the glory with which they were filled? Does not Christ say of such a soul: "How beautiful art thou, My beloved! How beautiful art thou." 

Excerpt taken from The Blessed Eucharist: Our Greatest Treasure
By Fr. Michael Muller, C.S.S.R.
Photo Credit Lawrence OP

The Bonds of Love

The Bonds of Love

My sweet Lord, look with mercy upon your people and especially upon the mystical body of your Church. Greater glory is given to your name for pardoning a multitude of your creatures than if I alone were pardoned for my great sins against your majesty. It would be no consolation for me to enjoy your life if your holy people stood in death. For I see that sin darkens the life of your bride the Church – my sin and the sins of others.

It is a special grace I ask for, this pardon for the creatures you have made in your image and likeness. When you created man, you were moved by love to make him in your own image. Surely only love could so dignify your creatures. But I know very well that man lost the dignity you gave him; he deserved to lose it, since he had committed sin.

Moved by love and wishing to reconcile the human race to yourself, you gave us your only-begotten Son. He became our mediator and our justice by taking on all our injustice and sin out of obedience to your will, eternal nature. What an immeasurably profound love! Your Son went down from the heights of his divinity to the depths of our humanity. Can anyone’s heart remain closed and hardened after this?

We image your divinity, but you image our humanity in that union of the two which you have worked in a man. You have veiled the Godhead in a cloud, in the clay of our humanity. Only your love could so dignify the flesh of Adam. And so by reason of this immeasurable love I beg, with all the strength of my soul, that you freely extend your mercy to all your lowly creatures.

Source: The Liturgy of the Hours – Office of Readings

From a dialogue On Divine Providence by Saint Catherine of Siena (1347-1380)
Photo Credit Lawrence OP

Constant Prayer of Saint Catherine

Constant Prayer of Saint Catherine

Precious Blood, Ocean of Divine Mercy: Flow upon us!

Precious Blood, Most pure offering: Procure us every grace!

Precious Blood, Hope and refuge of sinners: Atone for us!

Precious Blood, Delight of Holy souls, Draw us!  Amen

Photo Credit Waiting for the Word