EUCHARISTIC ADORATION

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EUCHARISTIC ADORATION

• Sign and Ministry
• Guillermo Rosas ss.cc.

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From the origins of the Sacred Hearts family
adoration has been bothan attitude and a form
of prayer which is constitutive of its
spirituality.
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Attitude
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and a form of prayer.
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Adoration in our beginnings
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The SSCC Constitutions of 1817 say

• Through perpetual adoration of the Most Blessed
  Sacrament, we strive to retrace the hidden life
  of Jesus Christ by making reparation for the
  injuries done to the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and
  Mary by the enormous crimes of sinners.

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For the founders

• The Good Father and the Good Mother, were
  assiduous and faithful adorers,
• and they included adoration as a principal
  practice in the institute.

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They understood it as perpetual

• In the style of religious life of the time,
  with large communities, it was possible that day
  and night , there was always a sister or a
  brother in adoration. Perpetual
• adoration was kept in each community.

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for Pierre Coudrin, the Good Father

• From childhood, Pierre was made aware of the
  presence of Christ in the Eucharist. Particularly
  in the granary of
• La Motte a sense of contemplation developed
  within him.
• After leaving his hiding place , for almost two
  years he carried the Blessed Sacrament with him
  in a pix hanging around his neck.
• He was in permanent Adoration. To accompany
  Christ in his Adoration, became an imperative
  for him .

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• That Adoration was apostolic contemplation full
  of concern for the Church and for his community,
  as the moment demanded.
• Sustained in the Adoration of Jesus, present
  in his community that wanted to be able to carry
  the Gospel everywhere.

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for Henriette Aymer, the Good Mother

• The Foundress began her life of adoration when
  she joined the Association of the Sacred Heart
  in Poitiers.
• She stated that when the Good Father established
  adoration and set an hour for her , without
  knowing it, he
• fixed her destiny.
• Until her death she was faithful to adoration.

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for the founding community

• Adoration was an essential part of the call and
  mission of all the brothers and sisters.
• The incipient Congregation had in its title
• and of the perpetual adoration of the Blessed
  Sacrament of the Altar.

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• In the historical situation in which the founders
  lived, a time of much violence and confusion,
  the reparative character of adoration was
  especially emphasized,
• Understood as reparation for the sins, within
  and through the practice of the adoration.

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• This is why the adoration has been also called
• reparative adoration.
• (Later on we will see how the reparative
  character is understood today in a different way
  as in that time)

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In short For the community of the founders, the
Eucharistic adoration was a sign and a
ministry Sign of the interior disposition of
the adoration of each brother and sister, and
Ministry of intercession for the world, the
Church and the community. And so we want to
continue living today our adoration
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The adoration today
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After a period during which adoration was
questioned and even abandoned by some members of
the Congregation, today we see it as having
lasting value, something essential to the call
of the Spirit to this religious family, part of
being Sacred Hearts.
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How do we understand adoration today?

• To adore is to pray in continuity and in the
  presence
• of the Eucharist,
• Submerging ourselves in the paschal mystery
• of Jesus Christ dead, resurrected and glorious,
  interceding for the world,
• for the poor and suffering.
• Adoration is, therefore, a
• specific form of prayer

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A prayer

• Eucharistic
• Reparative
• Contemplative
• Perpetual

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It is, above all, Eucharistic adoration.

• Its essential point
• of reference is the
• celebration of the Eucharist
• we adore
• from it
• and towards it

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As our Founders, we find in the Eucharist the
source and the summit of our apostolic and
communal life. (Const.I.5)The Eucharist, as in
fact the Council Vatican II says, is the source
of which flows the strength of the Church, and
the summit towards which all her life tends

• Adoration fills the way between the source
• and the summit.

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• Without the Eucharist adoration has no meaning,
  or to put it positively, adoration only has
  meaning in reference to the celebration. This is
  why we say adoration is the
• prolongation of the Eucharist.

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It is reparative adoration

• but understood in a different way that in the
  past.
• The reparative character of adoration is not
  seen now as only at the moment of adoration but
  as an essential aspect of the following of Jesus.

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• We are repairers because we live our faith
  within the dynamism of the saving love of
  Christ , which liberates
• and transforms.
• Our commitment and
• apostolate make present the kingdom of God,
  overcoming of sin and bringing new life for all,
  particularly for the poor and suffering.

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• To repair is to restore and transform the
  world wounded by personal sin and the
  structures of sin, entering into the suffering of
  Christ who continues suffering in many brothers
  and sisters. We repair by our whole life, and
  therefore also in adoration.

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• If our adoration is not inserted in that
  dynamism of the saving love (Const.I.2), it is
  risked to be a mere formal practice, a
  individualist rite or, at best, a prayer without
  proper identity performed before the Tabernacle.

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It is contemplative adoration it demands
silence within and without.

• More than in other types of prayer, at adoration
  music, song, readings and symbols are only means
  to help us enter into that silence in which we
  can touch and savour the mystery.

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• Adoration is the favourable time and space to
  make our own the attitudes, options and tasks
  that led Jesus to the point of having his heart
  transpierced on the Cross.
• (Const.I,3).
• It is the moment whenaware of the power of evil
  that opposes the Father's love and disfigures
  his design for the world, we can identify
  ourselves with the attitude of Jesus and with his
  reparative work.(Const.I,4).

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It is perpetual adoration it involves each
moment of our life.

• The movement of the Holy Spirit in religious life
  opens us to a different understanding of
  perpetuity. It is not just about time, but
  something more spiritual. It is an attitude,
  not just a mere activity.

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Whether it is reserved in the Tabernacle .
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exposed in a monstrance
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or simply onthe paten,
the host, the consecrated bread, is like Jesus
in the manger
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In the extreme simplicity of the apparent there
is revealed to the one who believes the
immensity of God, the paschal mystery, made real
in the Eucharistic celebration and present in the
world.

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Our adoration isan Attitude
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Interior attitude

• The attitude of adoration, an interior
  attitude, an attitude of life or disposition of
  the heart, is an aspect of our charism that is
  experienced beyond the limits of our practice of
  the adoration. As anything of value, it fills the
  totality of our existence and our vocation. To
  adore is to submit the heart to God.

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of spiritual docility

• Submit the heart to God
• as the attitude of Mary in the Annunciation,
  as that of Jesus in the garden of Gethsemane, as
  that of Damien when he decided to stay for ever
  in Molokai.
• to recognise that God is the Lord of our life
  and of our history

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of contemplation

• The attitude of adoration is a contemplative
  attitude towards the world, history, and the
  liberating presence of God in ones life and in
  the world. It is seeing with faith, with trust in
  the power of the Gospel.
• Contemplative is not passive or indifferent. Like
  Mary when she kept all within her

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of adoration of the Father

• Besides adoration of the glorious Jesus, light
  that illumines the darkness ,
• we adore the Father
• Merciful Father.
• Provident Father.
• Father close to us in his Son. Father of all.

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with the feelings of Christ

• Adoration makes us, more than anything else in
  our life, enter in the feelings of Christ,
• as our Constitutions say.
• We adore the Father with Jesus,
• that means, from his merciful and compassionate
  Heart, as the Father is , sensitive to the
  suffering of the world, attentive to the poor and
  suffering, open and generous.

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performed as a ministry

• The Constitutions of the sisters say that we
  recognize ourselves as delegates of the Church.
  This is part of the attitude of adoration. It is
  a mission entrusted by the Church, a true
  ministry for which we consider ourselves
  responsible in a free and joyful way our
  adoration is the Churchs adoration, for the
  world.

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And our adoration is also a form of prayer
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Is prayer

• Adoration is prayer. It is prayer as the
  prayer of Jesus, who loves the Father and
  intercedes for the poor and those who suffer.
• It is prayer as the prayer of Mary, who kept in
  her heart the mysterious designs of God for her
  life and for history, who persevered silently at
  the foot of the cross, full of hope, Mary who is
  with the community on Pentecost.

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is sign

• A personal and communal sign. Sign of a Church
  that believes in the presence of the Resurrected
  Lord in the heart of the world and history.
  Exterior sign of our interior disposition.

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is practice

• Adoration, as an act or a practice of prayer,
  is not spontaneous, but requires that we create a
  habit and seek exterior forms adequate to
  express the interior attitude that motivates it.

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• It can take very diverse forms. The most
  characteristic is that it is that of prayer,
  personal or communitarian, in the presence of the
  Blessed Sacrament in many traditions kneeling (at
  least part of the time of the adoration), and in
  silence.
• Communal adoration usually integrates elements
  such as reflection, readings, songs, prayers and
  benediction with the Blessed Sacrament.

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What documents and people say about adoration .
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SS.CC., Constitutions I.5(Common chapter for
brothers and sisters)

• The Eucharistic celebration and contemplative
  adoration make us participate in the attitudes
  and sentiments of Jesus before the Father and
  before the world

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SS.CC., Constitutions I.4(Common chapterfor
brothers and sisters)

• Aware of the power of evil that opposes the
  Fathers love and disfigures his design for the
  world, we wish to identify with the attitude of
  Jesus and with His reparative work. Our
  reparation is communion with Him, whose food is
  to do the Fathers will and whose work is to
  reunite by his blood the dispersed children of
  God..

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• Our reparation makes us participate in the
  mission of the Risen Christ, who sends us to
  announce the Good News of salvation. At the same
  time, we recognize our sinfulness, and we feel
  ourselves to be in solidarity with the men and
  women who are victims of injustice, hatred, and
  sin in the world.
• Finally, our reparative vocation encourages us to
  collaborate with all those who, led by the
  Spirit, work to build a world of justice and
  love, sign of the Kingdom.

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Sisters Constitutions , 43

• Eucharistic adoration has been since our origins
  one of our main duties and a true ministry that
  involves a personal and communal commitment.
• At adoration we are delegated by the Church,
  associated with the reparative work of Christ,
  united to his contemplation, to his listening to
  his Father's will and to his prayer of
  intercession.

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Brothers Constitutions, 53.3

• a) We unite ourselves to His incessant
  intercession before the Father, to His cry in
  solidarity with a humanity wounded by sin.
• b) We are urged to commit ourselves more fully
  to the mission, so that by Him, with Him, and in
  Him our lives and the world liberated from
  evil and sin may give glory to the Father..

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Rule of Life, 66

• Your physical presence before the tabernacle
  stands for something. To be real, it must express
  an inner attitude which is not restricted to your
  time before the Blessed Sacrament, one which
  carries you back to the Lord whenever you are not
  taken up with your work..

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From the Way of Life of the SS.CC. Secular
Branch (Sector Chilli), n.8

• You will take on assiduously and
  fervently Adoration of Jesus in the sacrament. It
  is a beautiful tradition of our Congregation,
  that is meant to place Jesus at the centre of
  our vocation and mission. To adore is to pray in
  continuity with the Eucharist. It is to submerge
  oneself over and over again in Jesus, crucified
  and resurrected, present with us all days, until
  the end of this world.

In adoration, you praise him, thank him,
remember, listen and welcome his Love you take
on the suffering of others to intercede, console,
repair and liberate. You commit yourself to Jesus
and to the work of the Kingdom of God.
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Fr. Jean-Yves Kerrien ss.cc. (1992)

• In the community of the founders, perpetual
  adoration was always a sign and a ministry. A
  sign of the interior disposition of adoration of
  all and a way of remembering the hidden life of
  Christ,
• in other word, his continuous adoration to the
  Father.
• It is also a ministry. The main goal of perpetual
  adoration is to intercede for the world, for the
  Church, and for the Community itself, with
  Christ, before the Father.

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Fr. Patrick Bradley ss.cc., en Communion in
Mission

• Adoration is a gift, a time for contemplation
  alone or in group of Christ, Servant of Yahweh,
  who holds in his heart the destiny of his people.
  To adore is to contemplate the totality of
  Christ at once the Son of God in plenitude, and
  the man committed to the happiness of his
  brothers and sisters, compassionate, just and
  liberating.

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Fr. Mario Illanes ss.cc., (days before his
Passage to the Father, 1995)

• Let us give attention to adoration, that it
  is what the Congregation can give the Church that
  is most its own.

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Karl Rahner s.j., writing about the Heart of
Jesus.

• The reparation of the sins of the world (ours
  or those of others), must consist primarily and
  essentially in loyal, loving and obedient
  participation, of all that was the life of the
  Lord, in the acceptance of the sings of his
  presence as well the consequences of sin in the
  world sorrow, darkness, persecution, distance
  from God and death.

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Charles de Foucauld (1916)

• When someone loves, he wants to talk all the
  time with the one he loves, or at least to look
  at him. This is prayer nothing other than
  familiar interchange with our very Beloved. You
  look at him, you tell him that you love him, we
  are happy at his feet and we say that there we
  want to live and die.

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Saint Teresa of Jesus (of Avila), Discalced
Carmelite of the XVI century

• Prayer
• is
• to be
• with
• God,
• loving him

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Guillermo Rosas ss.cc. February 2006