Appointed to be Missionaries

This was taken from the Meditation of the Day (October 1, 2009) in the Magnificat. The Magnificat is essentially a smaller version of the Liturgy of the Hours/Office of Readings (The Official Prayer of the Church). It contains Morning and Evening Prayers, the Readings for Mass, Meditations of the Day, Saint of the Day, and the Eucharistic Prayers.

Today's Meditation of the Day was written by Saint Therese of Lisieux, whose feast day is today. St. Therese was a Carmelite Nun who died at the age of 24. She is considered one of the great modern saints of the Church, a patron saint of Missionaries - although she never left her convent, she was declared a Doctor of the Church in 1997 by Pope John Paul II, and she is one of my favorite saints. She is known as the "Little Flower" and often the smell of roses accompanies her prayerful intercession for you. After reading this meditation, you will see what she is 1 of the 33 Doctors of the Catholic Church.

Ah! my Jesus, pardon me if I am unreasonable in wishing to express my desires and longings which reach even into infinity. Pardon me and heal my soul by giving her what she longs for so much!

To be your spouse, to be a Carmelite, and by my union with you to be the Mother of souls, should not this suffice me? And yet it is not so. No doubt, these three privileges sum up my true vocation: Carmelite, Spouse, Mother, and yet I feel within me other vocations. I feel the vocation of the WARRIOR, THE PRIEST, THE APOSTLE, THE DOCTOR, THE MARTYR. Finally, I feel the need and the desire of carrying out the most heroic deeds for you, O Jesus. I feel within my soul the courage of the Crusader, the Papal Guard, and I would want to die on the field of battle in defense of the Church.

I feel in me the vocation of the Priest. With that love, O Jesus, I would carry you in my hands when at my voice, you would come down from heaven. And with what love would I give you to souls! But alas! while desiring to be a Priest, I admire and envy the humility of St. Francis of Assisi and I feel the vocation of imitating him in refusing the sublime dignity of the Priesthood.

O Jesus, my love, my Life, how can I combine these contrasts? How can I realize the desires of my poor little soul?

Ah! in my spite of my littleness, I would like to enlighten souls as did the Prophets and the Doctors. I have the vocation of the Apostle, I would like to travel over the whole earth to preach your name and to plant your glorious cross on infidel soil. But O my Beloved, one mission alone would be sufficient for me, I would want to preach the Gospel on all the five continents simultaneously and even to the the most remote isles. I would be a missionary, not for a few years only but from the beginning of creation until the consummation of the ages. But above all, O my Beloved Savior, I would shed my blood for you even to the very last drop.