The Morning Offering Anew

Pope Pius XII recommended the daily offering of the Apostleship of Prayer to the faithful and many are in the habit of making this offering daily. But like many things, sometimes we lose site of the meaning and risk beginning to say prayers without really meaning what we say. Not only saying this prayer daily, but renewing it throughout the day and embracing all that comes to you during the day is an excellent means of uniting yourself to Jesus and growing in love for Him. Fr Killian Healy, in an attempt to stress the importance of not just saying the prayer but meaning it and actually giving our thoughts and actions to God, wrote in his book, Awakening Your Soul to the Presence of God, that "... it is insincere to make the offering and then to complain about the weather, lack of sleep, or the hundred and one other inconveniences that plague our waking hours."

If you are not in the habit of saying the Morning Offering or, if you do but feel you don't fully understand all that is being said in the prayer, you might benefit from an excellent short video  entitled "The Meaning of the Daily Offering" which can be found by clicking the following link:

Meaning of the Morning Offering

There are a variety of versions of the Morning Offering. Perhaps reading a different version of the prayer will help you to renew your offering with greater depth and meaning. Below we share a Morning Offering prayer that St Therese of Lisieux composed 'for someone in the world.' It was actually composed at the request of St Therese's sister, Sr Marie of the Sacred Heart, who requested it for her friend, Edith. May it help you to embrace anew this most admirable practice of the Morning Offering.

Morning Offering Composed by

St Therese of Lisieux

My God, I offer you all that I do today for the intentions and the glory of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. I want to sanctify every beat of my heart, my thoughts and my simplest works by uniting them to His infinite merits. I want to repair for my faults by casting them into the furnace of His merciful love.

O my God! I ask you for myself and those dear to me the grace to fulfill perfectly Your Holy Will and to accept for love of you the joys and sorrows of this passing life so that one day we may be reunited in Heaven for all eternity.

Amen

Quote of Fr Healy taken from Awakening Your Soul to the Presence of God, How to Walk with Him Daily and Dwell in Friendship with Him Forever, Fr Kilian J.Healy, Sophia Institute Press, Manchester, New Hampshire, 1999. Originally published in 1948 by the Declan X. McMullen Compay, New York, under the title Walking with God.

Blessed Virgin Mary & St Joseph Community, Secular Order of Discalced Carmelites (OCDS), Concord, NH

ConcordOCDS.org