First Saturday
Feast of The Presentation (Candlemas)
GROUND
HOG DAY
Deuteronomy, Chapter 3, Verse 22
Do not fear them, for it is the LORD, your God,
who will fight for you.
What are the demons in your life? Do not fear them, for it is the
Lord who fights for you! The Lord will send His angels around those who fear Him. These heavenly spirits shield
us from danger and assist us in both our spiritual and temporal needs. Angels
instruct us and mentor us in the virtues. Ask your guardian angel to be your
spiritual director and be open to change.
The
elements of this devotion, therefore, consist in the following four points, all
of which must be offered in reparation to the Immaculate Heart of Mary.
1.
Confession: This confession can be made before the First Saturday or afterward,
provided that Holy Communion be received in the state of grace. In 1926, Christ
in a vision explained to Lucia (Fatima) that this confession could be made a
week before or even more, and that it should be offered in reparation.
2.
Holy Communion: Before receiving Holy Communion, it is likewise necessary to offer
it in reparation to Our Lady. Our Lord told Lucia in 1930, “This
Communion will be accepted on the following Sunday for just reasons, if my
priests allow it so.” So
if work or school, sickness, or another just reason prevents the Communion on a
First Saturday, with this permission it may be received the following Sunday.
If Communion is transferred, any or all of the other acts of the devotion may
also be performed on Sunday if the person so desires.
3.
Rosary: The Rosary is a vocal prayer said while meditating upon the
mysteries of Our Lord’s life and Passion and Our Lady’s life. To
comply with the request of our Blessed Mother, it must be offered in reparation
and said properly while meditating.
4.
15-minute meditation: Also offered in reparation, the meditation may embrace one or more
mysteries; it may include all, taken together or separately. This meditation
should be the richest of any meditation, because Our Lady promised to be
present when she said “...those who keep me company....”
ON this
day the Church solemnly celebrates the presentation of Jesus in the temple, and
the obedience and humility both of Mary and her divine Son, who, though not
subject to the law in regard to purification and presentation yet subjected
themselves to it. Hence this feast is called the Purification of the Virgin
Mary. In common speech we call it also Candlemas, because on this day the
candles required for the divine service are blessed and carried in procession.
What is
the design of this custom?
- It is to remind us that Jesus, the
light of the world, was offered up to His heavenly Father, by Mary, in the
temple at Jerusalem, where He was called by Simeon; a light for the
revelation of the gentiles, and the glory of the people of Israel.
- To remind us, also, of several
important truths, to which the priest refers in the prayers at the
blessings. Thus he prays that as the earthly light dispels the darkness of
night, so Jesus, with the light of His divine doctrine, may clear away our
spiritual blindness and ignorance, and lead us in the way of virtue; that
as the Holy Ghost enlightened Simeon, so He may also enlighten us to
acknowledge Jesus as the true light, to love Him and follow Him, to keep
our hearts from the way of sin, and to guide them in the way of virtue,
and to kindle them with the fire of holy love; finally, that God may
preserve, in soul and body, those who use blessed candles with devotion,
may hear their prayers, and grant them entrance into the kingdom of the
eternal and ever-blessed light.
Things to Do[3]
- Ask your parish priest to
bless the candles that you will be using on your home altar this year.
- Read Luke 2:22-35, the
account of the presentation including the Canticle of Simeon.
- Meditate on the constant fiat
of Our Lady of Sorrows, who embraced the will of God even as Simeon
predicted that a sword would pierce her heart.
Since the children share in
blood and flesh, Jesus likewise shared in them, that through death he might
destroy the one who has the power of death, that is, the Devil, and free those
who through fear of death had been subject to slavery all their life.
One of the grandest feasts of the
Middle Ages and one of only three feasts in the English language verbally
denoted by a Mass (Christmas and Michaelmas being the other two), Candlemas, or the Feast of the Purification
of the Blessed Virgin Mary, commemorates Our Lady's visit to the Temple in
humble obedience to that clause of the Old Law which requires a woman to be
ritually purified forty days after bearing a son. On the assumption that Our
Lord was born on December 25, the date of Mary's visit to the Temple would be
February 2. It was on this day that Simeon the aged prophet, upon seeing the
infant Jesus, proclaimed him to be "a Light to the gentiles" (Lk.
2.32). Hence the day has always involved a celebration of light. The most
famous of these customs -- and the one from which the feast takes its common
name -- is the blessing of, and
procession with, candles. The day begins with five beautiful blessings of candles that invoke God's
aid in living out allegorically what the light and fire of a candle symbolize:
wisdom and illumination, purification and charity, and so on. A solemn and
penitential procession (in which the
celebrant wears purple) exits and then re-enters the church, at which point the
purple is cast aside for the jubilance of white and a joyful Mass is offered.
One of the more distinctive features of this Mass is that the candles are held lighted in the hand during the
Gospel and from the Sanctus to the Communion. Candles used in the
procession are not the only ones blessed on this day. Many families
traditionally had most or all of their special candles -- for Advent, St.
Lucy's Day, Christmas, or the family shrine -- blessed on this day.
The Feast's association with light
also made it a great day for predicting the weather. According to an old
legend, if the sun shines bright for the better part of the day, it means forty
more days of winter. Subsequently this quaint superstition became Groundhog Day. Finally, Candlemas is the
absolute last day for ending the
Christmas season. Any Christmas items that had not been taken down on
Epiphany or its Octave were now carefully put away.
In 1997, Pope Saint John Paul II
instituted a day of prayer for women and men in consecrated life. This
celebration is attached to the Feast of the Presentation of the Lord on
February 2nd. This Feast is also known as Candlemas Day; the day on which
candles are blessed symbolizing Christ who is the light of the world. So too,
those in consecrated life are called to reflect the light of Jesus Christ to
all peoples.
I ask Christ if he has seen the movie, “Ground Hog day”. He laughs
and says playfully, “No, but I inspired it”. I continue, well today is Ground
Hog day and tradition say that if the ground hog sees his shadow there will be
six more weeks of winter. Christ asks,
“So what happens in the movie?” I state it is a story of a cranky young man who
keeps magically repeating his ground hog day until he has a life changing
attitude toward people and life in general. Christ says that is the reason for
His coming to these coffee clutches with me and that He wants to give me a
whole new view of life. This is what I referred to when I told Nicodemus that a
person must be born again to enter the kingdom. That is, you must awaken or
give birth to the Spirit of the Father that is in you-the spirit of love and
you must also live in the truth. Your action and behavior must be true to the
spirit the Father reveals to you.
"Read
these counsels slowly. Pause to meditate on these thoughts. They are things
that I whisper in your ear-confiding them-as a friend, as a brother, as a
father. And they are being heard by God. I won't tell you anything new. I will
only stir your memory, so that some thought will arise and strike you; and so
you will better your life and set out along ways of prayer and of Love. And in
the end you will be a more worthy soul."
Jesus suffers to carry out the
will of the Father. And you, who also want to carry out the most holy Will of
God, following the steps of the Master, can you complain if you meet suffering
on your way?
Daily Devotions
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