“Dear children! With joy, also today I call you to open your hearts and to listen to my call. Anew, I desire to draw you closer to my Immaculate Heart, where you will find refuge and peace. Open yourselves to prayer, until it becomes a joy for you. Through prayer, the Most High will give you an abundance of grace and you will become my extended hands in this restless world which longs for peace. Little children, with your lives witness faith and pray that faith may grow day by day in your hearts. I am with you. Thank you for having responded to my call.”

OPEN YOUR HEARTS AND LISTEN TO MY CALL

In this month’s message the Immaculate Heart of Mary is for each one of her children a place of refuge and peace.

Mary desires intimacy with all of her children, and draws us closer to her Immaculate Heart, so as, to be for each one of her children a place of refuge and peace amidst this restless world.

When we persevere in prayer and become more constant in daily prayer, then prayer becomes ‘a joy for you’ and we never regret the time when we immersed ourselves in prayer so as to be in God’s presence and live out of His presence drawing down upon ourselves and others an abundance of grace.

We must begin anew each day, forget what lies behind, and begin ‘today’ to love God anew, to open our hearts and listen to the call of our Mother anew, who desires to lift us up on high, to the ‘Most High’  from whom comes every good and perfect gift.

As Mary’s extended hands we become workers of peace and builders of true peace for a world which longs for peace. Praying and working for peace with Mary and her Son, Jesus, means we will never labour in vain.

At times we may be sorely afflicted, tested, misunderstood or even attacked and oppressed, but all of these trials and ordeals will only serve to make us stronger in faith and witness to faith.

Our faith will not die but rather grow strong in the Lord, and as we grow strong in the Lord we will witness more and more to the abundance of God’s grace in ourselves and in others so as to give more thanks and praise to God.

Mary knows the importance of a life that gives witness to our faith and grows in faith, because without faith, without a living and active faith we will not be able to recognise the signs of the times.

Did not our Blessed Lord complain about the generation to which he spoke? He told us how blind they were, how incapable they were of perceiving the signs of the times, incapable of recognising the great love of God in their midst through various signs and wonders and above all His compassionate heart for the poor and suffering of out world.

Mary concludes this month’s message by reminding us that she is with us. Mary is with us in our battle, our daily struggle against sin, against evil and against the evil one.

Soon we will be approaching another season of Lent and maybe you might like to think about gaining more ground, more space for God in your life.

Just as an army try’s to gain more and more ground in battle, we too in our spiritual battle for good and against evil should decide for God, for the good so as to create more and more space for God and so for peace. A world without God will always be restless and lack peace.

Let us build anew our spiritual lives with God at the heart of all our family life and give a place in our homes to the Immaculate Heart of Mary next to the Sacred Heart of Jesus her Son.

I wish you all Grace and Peace.

Fr Ciaran