Praying for Vocations
Our priests, deacons, and religious need our prayers! Below are some resources that will help you to keep them in your prayers. Mary Mother of Vocations pray for us!
Click to view the Serran Rosary for Vocations Directors
Click to view the Serran Rosary for Priests
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Serran Prayer for Vocations
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O God, Who wills not the death of a sinner, but rather that he be converted and live, grant we beseech You through the intercession of the Blessed Mary, ever Virgin, Saint Joseph, her spouse, Saint Junipero Serra, and all the saints, an increase of labourers for your Church, fellow labourers with Christ to spend and consume themselves for souls, through the same Jesus Christ, Your Son, Who lives and reigns with You, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, God forever and ever. Amen.
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Prayer of St. Teresa of Calcutta for Priests
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Mary, Mother of Jesus throw your mantle of purity over our priests. Protect them, guide them and keep them in your heart. Be a mother to them especially in times of discouragement and loneliness. Love them and let them belong completely to Jesus. Like Jesus, they too are your sons, so keep their hearts pure and virginal. Keep their minds filled with Jesus, and put Jesus always on their lips, so that He is the one they offer to sinners and to all they meet. Mary, Mother of Jesus, be their Mother, loving them and bringing them joy. Take special care of sick and dying priests and the ones most tempted. Remember how they spent their youth and old age, their entire lives serving and giving all to Jesus. Mary, bless them and keep a special place for them in your heart. Give them a piece of your heart, so beautiful and pure and immaculate, so full of love and humility so that they, too, may grow in the likeness of Christ. Dear Mary, make them humble like you and holy like Jesus. Amen.
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Prayer for Priests by St. Therese of Lisieux
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O Jesus, eternal Priest,
keep your priests within the shelter of Your Sacred Heart,
where none may touch them.
Keep unstained their anointed hands,
which daily touch Your Sacred Body.
Keep unsullied their lips,
daily purpled with your Precious Blood.
Keep pure and unearthly their hearts,
sealed with the sublime mark of the priesthood.
Let Your holy love surround them and
shield them from the world's contagion.
Bless their labors with abundant fruit and
may the souls to whom they minister be their joy and consolation here
and in heaven their beautiful and everlasting crown. Amen.
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Prayer of St. Faustina Kowalska for Priests
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O my Jesus, I beg You on behalf of the whole Church: Grant it love and the light of Your Spirit, and give power to the words of priests so hardened hearts may be brought to repentance and return to You, O Lord. Lord, give us holy priests; you yourself maintain them in holiness. O Divine and Great High Priest, may the power of Your mercy accompany them everywhere and protect them from the devil's traps and snares which are continually being set for the souls of priests. May the power of Your mercy, O Lord, shatter and bring to naught all that might tarnish the sanctity of priests, for You can do all things.
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A Prayer for Priests by John Cardinal O'Connor
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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.
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Prayer by Dom Mark Kirby, Benedictine monk
O my beloved Jesus,
I bring Thee the poverty of Thy priests, that Thou wouldst enrich them.
I bring Thee the emptiness of Thy priests, that Thou wouldst fill them.
I bring Thee the coldness of Thy priests, that Thou wouldst warm them.
I bring Thee the loneliness of Thy priests, that Thou wouldst embrace them.
I bring Thee the sorrows of Thy priests, that Thou wouldst console them.
I bring Thee the illnesses of Thy priests, that Thou wouldst heal them.
I bring Thee the impurities of Thy priests, that Thou wouldst wash them clean.
I bring Thee the nakedness of Thy priests, that Thou wouldst clothe them.
I bring Thee the silence of Thy priests, that Thou wouldst speak to them.
I bring Thee the brokenness of Thy priests, that Thou wouldst repair them.
I bring Thee the infirmities of Thy priests, that Thou wouldst heal them.
I bring Thee the nothingness of Thy priests that Thou wouldst be their all.
I bring Thee the darkness of Thy priests, that Thou wouldst illuminate them,
I bring Thee the bitterness of Thy priests,
that Thou wouldst give them to taste of Thy sweetness.
I bring Thee the struggles of Thy priests, that Thou wouldst be victorious in them.
I give Thee the blindness of Thy priests that Thou wouldst give them clear vision.
I bring Thee the weariness of Thy priests that Thou wouldst be their rest.
I bring Thee the thirst of Thy priests that Thou wouldst quench it.
I bring Thee the fears of Thy priests that Thou wouldst give them confidence.
I give thee Thee the doubts of Thy priests that Thou wouldst strengthen their faith.
I bring Thee the despondency of Thy priests that Thou wouldst infuse them with hope.
I bring Thee the sadness of Thy priests that Thou wouldst be their joy.
I bring Thee all Thy priests, especially those in their last agony, those who are locked in spiritual combat, and those being tempted to sin against faith and against hope.
I bring Thee the death of Thy priests that Thou wouldst be their life eternal.
I bring Thee all those priest of Thine for whom Thy presence in the Most Holy Sacrament
has become a matter of indifference, of routine, and of neglect.
Beloved Lord Jesus, have mercy on those priests of Thine whose minds have grown dark,
whose hearts have grown cold, and who have succumbed to the enticements of the world,
the weariness of the flesh, and the deceits of the devil.
Deliver them all, O Jesus, for they are Thine, and Thou wilt not deny Thine own.
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