Today is the First Thursday of the Month when the Church (all Catholics) traditionally prays for priests world wide. How appropriate that he is leaving today as the world holds all priests in prayer. Remembering that bishops and cardinals are priests!
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Prayer for Priests by Cardinal O'Connor
Lord Jesus, we your people pray to You for our priests. You have
given them to us for OUR needs. We pray for them in THEIR needs.
We know that You have made them priests in the likeness of your
own priesthood. You have consecrated them, set them aside, annointed them,
filled them with the Holy Spirit, appointed them to teach, to preach, to
minister, to console, to forgive, and to feed us with Your Body and Blood.
Yet we know, too, that they are one with us and share our human
weaknesses. We know too that they are tempted to sin and discouragement as are
we, needing to be ministered to, as do we, to be consoled and forgiven, as do
we. Indeed, we thank You for choosing them from among us, so that they
understand us as we understand them, suffer with us and rejoice with us, worry
with us and trust with us, share our beings, our lives, our faith.
We ask that You give them this day the gift You gave Your chosen
ones on the way to Emmaus: Your presence in their hearts, Your holiness in their
souls, Your joy in their spirits. And let them see You face to face in the
breaking of the Eucharistic bread.
We pray to You, O Lord, through Mary the mother of all priests,
for Your priests and for ours. Amen.
March, 1995
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