Devotion of the day: love for the Catholic Church, our mother and teacher

1. She is our Mother: we must love her. The tendernesses of our earthly mother are so great that they cannot be compensated other than with a lively love. But, to save your soul, what care does the Church use! From your birth to the sepulcher, what it does for you with the Sacraments, with sermons, with catechism, with prohibitions, with advice!… The Church acts as a mother to your soul; and you will not love it: or worse, will you despise it?

2. She is our teacher: we must obey her. Consider that Jesus not only preached the Gospel as a law to be observed by Christians, but also said to the Church, then represented by the Apostles: Whoever listens to you, listens to me; whoever rejects you rejects me (Luc. x, 16). The Church, therefore, commands, in the name of Jesus, the observance of feasts, fasts, vigils; forbids, in the name of Jesus, certain books; defines what is to be believed. Who does not obey her, disobeys Jesus. Are you obedient to her? Do you observe its laws and wishes?

3. She is our sovereign: we must defend her. Isn't it proper to the soldier to defend his sovereign in danger? We are soldiers of Jesus Christ, through confirmation; and will it not be up to us to defend Jesus, his Gospel, the Church, founded by him to govern our souls? The Church is defended, 1 ° by respecting it; 2 ° by supporting the reasons against the detractors; 3 ° by praying for his triumph. Do you think you are doing it?

PRACTICE. - Three Pater and Ave for the persecutors of the Church.