The name of Jesus is the shortest and most powerful prayer the tongue of man can utter. Follow along with Fr. Paul O’Sullivan, O.P. as he guides you to deeper devotion to the Holy Name of Jesus.
Our Sweet Lord is present in millions of consecrated Hosts in the countless Catholic churches of the world. During many hours of the busy day and during the long nights, He is forgotten and left alone.
We can do much to console and comfort Him by saying, “My Jesus, I love and adore Thee in all the Consecrated Hosts of the world, and I thank Thee with all my heart for remaining on all the altars of the world for love of us.” Then say twenty, fifty or more times the Name of Jesus with this intention.
We may do most perfect penance for our sins by offering the Passion and Blood of Jesus many times each day for this intention.
The Precious Blood purifies our souls and raises us to a high degree of holiness. It is all so easy! We have only to repeat lovingly, joyfully, reverently, “Jesus, Jesus, Jesus.”
If we are sad or cast down, if we are worried with fears and doubts, this Divine Name will give us a delightful peace. If we are weak and wavering, it will give us a new strength and energy. Did not Jesus, when on Earth, go about consoling and comforting all those who were unhappy? He is still doing it every day for those who ask Him.
If we are suffering from weak health, if we are in pain, if some disease is taking hold of our poor bodies, He can cure us. Did He not cure the sick, the lame, the blind, the lepers? Does He not say to us, “Come to Me, all you who labor, and are heavily burdened, and I will refresh you.” Many could have good health if they only asked Jesus for it. By all means consult doctors, use remedies, but above all call on Jesus!
The Name of Jesus is the shortest, the easiest, the most powerful of all prayers. Our Lord tells us that anything we ask the Father in His Name, viz., in the Name of Jesus, we shall receive. Every time we say, “Jesus,” we are saying a fervent prayer for all, all that we need.
The Souls in Purgatory. It is very lamentable that so many Christians forget and neglect the souls in Purgatory. It is possible that some of our dear friends are suffering in these dreadful fires, waiting, waiting for our prayers and help—which we could so easily give them and do not give them.
We have pity for the poor whom we see in the streets, for the hungry and for all those who suffer. None suffer so terribly as the souls in Purgatory, for the fire of Purgatory, as St. Thomas tells us, is the same as the fire of Hell!
How often, Dear Reader, do you pray for the Holy Souls? Days and weeks and perhaps months pass and you do little, perhaps nothing, for them!
You can easily help them if you will say frequently the Name of Jesus, because a) you thus offer for them the Precious Blood and suffering of Jesus Christ, as we have explained) you gain 300 days indulgence* every time you say “Jesus.”
Having the custom of repeating often the Holy Name, you can, like St. Mechtilde, relieve thousands of souls, who will thereafter never cease praying for you with incredible fervor.
The Awful Crime of Ingratitude
We thank our friends most effusively for any little favor they do us, but we forget or neglect to thank God for His immense love of us, for becoming man for us, for dying for us, for all the Masses we can hear and the Holy Communions we can receive—and do not receive. What black ingratitude!
By repeating often the Name of Jesus, we correct this grave fault and thank God and give Him great joy and glory.
Do you not wish to give joy to God? You do? Then, Dear Friend, thank, thank God! He is waiting for your thanks.
God Loves Each One
We have said that Our Lord in the dreadful sufferings of His Passion, in the Agony in the Garden, when He was hanging on the Cross, saw us all and offered for each one of us every pang of pain, every drop of His Precious Blood.
Can it be possible that God is so good that He thinks of each one of us, that He loves each of us so much?
Our poor hearts and minds are small and mean and find it hard to believe that God can be so good, that He troubles Himself about us.
But God, as He is Omnipotent, as He is infinitely wise, is also infinitely good and generous and loving. To understand how God thought of each one of us during the Passion, when He was hanging on the Cross, we have only to remember what happens in the millions of Holy Communions received every day.
God comes to each one of us, with all the plenitude of the Divinity. He enters into each one as fully and entirely as He is in Heaven. He comes into each one of us as if that one person were the only one who received Him that day. He comes with infinite, personal love! That we all believe.
And how does He enter into us? He does not merely come into our mouths, our hearts—He comes into our souls, He unites Himself to our souls so intimately that He becomes in a marvelous way one with us.
Let us think for a moment of how the Great, Almighty, Eternal God is in our very soul in the most intimate possible way, that He is there with all His infinite love, that He remains there, not for a moment but for five, ten or more minutes—and this not once, but every day, if we so wish.
If we think about and understand this, it will be easy to see how He offered all His merits and all His sufferings for each one of us.
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This article is taken from a chapter in The Wonders of the Holy Name by Fr. Paul O’Sullivan, O.P which is available from TAN Books.
