Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament for Priests and Vocations

July 18, 2019

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Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament for Priests and Vocations to the Priesthood

Friends,
As you know besides serving as Parochial Administrator here at St. Nicholas Tavelich parish the Archbishop asked me to serve as the Director of Vocations for the Archdiocese. I’d like to ask you for help with this ministry.
Our Lord left us only one “vocations program” and that is prayer. In the Gospels Jesus said to His disciples: “The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few; pray therefore the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest” (cf. Lk 10:2; Mt 9:38). What I’m asking you is to pray for us priests and for vocations to the priesthood.
Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament is a privileged way of praying for vocations because Jesus is present in a substantial way in the Eucharist – body, blood, soul and divinity. Moreover there seems to be a correlation between the parishes/Archdioceses where vocations flourish and Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament.
In our Archdiocese we have a group of women whose mission is to pray for priests and vocations to the priesthood called Daughters of Mercy. As the Director of Vocations I was assigned to guide them. They meet on a regular basis for an hour of Adoration each month. For the month of July and August we welcome them to our parish. I’d like to invite you to join them on July 22 at 7:00PM for an evening of Adoration with Vespers (official evening prayer of the Church that clergy and religious pray daily).

In Christ,
Fr. Peter

P.S.:
1. See below for contact and more information on Daughters of Mercy apostolate.
2. True story on the power of prayer

Daughters of Mercy

“Let us live for souls, let us be apostles, let us save especially the souls of priests…Let us pray, let us suffer for them and, on the last day, Jesus will be grateful.”
– St. Therese of Lisieux

Daughters of Mercy is an apostolate for women whose mission is prayer. We are answering a call to holiness and bind ourselves by making a promise to Jesus Christ, our Eternal High Priest through the Blessed Virgin Mary, Mother of God and Mother of the Church to pray and make sacrifices for priests and vocations to the priesthood in our Archdiocese. We undertake this task willingly and seriously as an act of love for Almighty God and for the good of our neighbor.

We call ourselves Daughters of Mercy because prayer is weapon of mercy given to all of us by God to combat Satan and because those whom we serve, priests, are God’s administrators of mercy through His sacraments.

In our service to priests we undertake to commit ourselves to daily duties of prayer and sacrifice.

These include the following:
• Morning Offering;
• Prayer for Priests written by St. Therese of Lisieux (or any other prayer for priests);
• Holy Hour (in front of the Blessed Sacrament or Spiritual);
• Holy Communion at least once a week but daily is encouraged (Spiritual Communion is acceptable if not able to receive daily Holy Communion);
• Rosary;
• Divine Mercy Chaplet;
• Angelus (Regina Caeli from Easter Vigil to Pentecost);
• Memorare;
• Divine Office (at least one daily office – morning prayer, daytime prayer, midday prayer, midafternoon prayer, evening prayer or night prayer);
• Examination of Conscience;
• Frequent confession (at least once a month);
• Once a month we will get together as a group to pray one of the daily offices from the Divine Office and for Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament for vocations to the priesthood in our Archdiocese.
We are encouraged as Daughters of Mercy to adopt priests as spiritual sons and to pray for our own parish priests and our Archbishop. This is the vocation of Spiritual Motherhood. Every woman has a vocation to be a mother whether biological or spiritual. Women have a unique grace of love because of their maternity. As women our very bodies and souls are made for nurturing. By embracing the vocation of Spiritual Motherhood we imitate the Blessed Virgin Mary, Mother of Priests.

As part of our apostolate we host prayer meetings each month that consist of a Holy Hour with Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament and evening prayer from the Liturgy of the Hours. All women are invited to join us on Monday, July 22 at 7:00 p.m. at St. Nicholas Tavelich Croatian Parish, 2688 Main Street, Winnipeg, MB. If you are interested learning more about our apostolate, you can contact A. Bowman at (204) 804-8155 or daughtersofmercy1@gmail.com.

“The vocation to be a spiritual mother for priests is largely unknown scarcely understood and, consequently, rarely lived, notwithstanding its fundamental importance. It is a vocation that is frequently hidden, invisible to the naked eye, but meant to transmit spiritual life.”
– Quote from the Vatican’s Congregation for the Clergy

“I see more and more each day how different the world would be if we had more really holy priests. With this object I have started a crusade of prayer.”
– Fr. William Doyle S.J.