Day 22: Lead Souls to Heaven

I'm Fr. Mark Mayer with Franciscan Friars of the Renewal, and this is the Rosary in a Year podcast, where through prayer and meditation, the rosary brings us deeper into relationship with Jesus and Mary and becomes a source of grace for the whole world.
The Rosary in a Year is brought to you by Ascension. This is day 22.
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Oh my Jesus, forgive us our sins, save us from the fires of hell. Lead all souls to heaven, especially those in most need of thy mercy.
this prayer is what's often referred to as the Fatima prayer. It's attributed to Our Lady of Fatima and an apparition where she gave this prayer to the visionaries, Lucia, Francisco, and Jacinta.
Our Lady of Fatima said a number of times to the visionaries, like, you need to be praying the rosary and you need to get everybody to be praying the rosary. And part of that was for the conversion of sinners and salvation of souls.
And she asked, our leader Fatima asked that this prayer be included at the end of each decade. These days, that's probably where most of us are familiar with the prayer is we're familiar with it from the rosary and that we say it is the last prayer of each decade.
The approach that I'd like to invite us to take to reflecting on the Fatima prayer is it's going to be another application, another exercise in keeping in harmony two principles, two values, which can at times be felt to go into some sort of tension. And these are going to be authentic Christian hope and authentic Christian gravitas, sense of the stakes of things.
The hope that comes from God, but also right relationship and sobriety before the four last things, death, judgment, heaven, and hell. Let's start with hope.
My brothers and sisters, Christians are people of hope. It is a work of grace within us.
It is the hope that comes from God himself. It is a hope for our salvation.
It is a hope for the salvation of our brothers and sisters. And it's the hope of, that comes from like Romans 8, 28, for God is at work for the good in all things, for those who love him.
That God is a work in all things. And if we stay in relationship with him, he will bring about good.
Let's take a look at Matthew chapter 18. This is the context of the parable of the good shepherd and lost sheep.
Jesus says this, verse 14, so it is not the will of my father who is in heaven that one of these little ones should perish.

We have hope that God who is God does not desire anyone to be lost.

And so when we're praying the Fatima prayer, like we're praying with hope and we're bringing to God

those we love, knowing that no matter how much we love them, he who is God loves them even more. And that no matter what we think we can do to help them, God is already pursuing them, is already at work for their salvation with an efficacy far beyond our own.
And so it's our participation in his salvation of ourselves and other people. Like we bring our own need for conversion and we bring all of our brothers and sisters, all of our loved ones to him.
And we do so with hope, with confidence that to entrust them to God is efficacious, is real, is powerful. But hope, Christian hope, authentic, true Christian hope does not bear fruit in a type

of levitas, a levity, a flippancy that nothing matters and everything's just going to be okay

because really like it makes me feel better about myself in the world when I just think everything's

going to be okay. Like there is a right gravitas.
There is a right seriousness and sobriety before life.

Which again, I think I'm not going to be a good one.

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I'm not going to be a good one. I'm not going to be a good one.
I'm not going to be a good one. I'm not going to be a good one.
I'm not going to be okay. Like there is a right gravitas.
There is a right seriousness and sobriety before life, which again, I think we can experience in a particular way when we keep before us the last things traditionally known as the fact that we are going to die, that there will be a judgment, that there is a heaven and there is a hell. Jesus who reveals to us that he, that the father does not want anything to be lost.
He also reveals to us the reality of hell. And a number of times Jesus talks about judgment.
He talks about people being judged by what they did or did not do. And he talks about the reality of hell.
And so we want to have a right relationship to this as well.

The right relationship is going to be a certain increased but hopeful seriousness about working for the salvation of souls.

Starting with our own, we need to repent.

And one of the graces, a grace of repentance can come from keeping before us

the fact that we will die, we will be judged, and we're going to either end up in heaven or hell. But also that we have a call to evangelize.
We have a call to work with God for the salvation of our brothers and sisters. And how often we can kind of get caught up spending so much time and energy and emotion, worrying about little things, passing things.

And how often we don't give enough time, enough place in our heart,

a concern about heavenly things, about eternal things, such as salvation.

But also the gravitas and the seriousness and right relationship to judgment, all of these things has to be anchored in hope. There can be a disordered and an unhelpful fear or focus on hell.
Particularly like those of us who are following the Lord in a state of grace, if we're constantly worried about going to hell, about God not forgiving us, okay, we need to work through that with the Lord. And when we're in right relationship with the Lord, when His life is alive in us, we do look at these things with hope, with a certain confidence, and a certain surrender and entrustment of all of these things to Him.
So my brothers and sisters, as we pray the Fatima prayer, in obedience to Our Lady and her request at Fatima,

we bring ourselves, sinners that we are,

we bring all of our brothers and sisters,

especially those most in need of God's mercy,

we bring them with a hope to Him.

And we ask that this also bears fruit in our own sanctification,

but also in an increased zeal for our work in God's kingdom for the salvation of souls. So in communion with Our Lady, let us pray.
In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.

Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses,

as we forgive those who trespass against us.

And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.

Amen.

Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee.

Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus. Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death.
Amen. Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee.
Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus. Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death.
Amen. Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee.
Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus. Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death.
Amen. Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit, as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end.
Amen. O my Jesus, forgive us our sins.

Save us from the fires of hell.

Lead all souls to heaven,

especially those in most need of thy mercy.

In the name of the Father, and of the Son,

and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

All right, everybody, thank you again for praying with me today. I look forward to continuing the journey with you again tomorrow.

Poco a poco.

All right.

God bless y'all.