THE BLOOD OF CHRIST AND THE SUFFERING
Jesus did not give his Blood just to redeem us. If instead of a few drops, which would have been enough for redemption, he wanted to pour it all out, enduring a sea of pains, he did it to help us, teach us and comfort us in our pains. Pain is a sad legacy of sin and no one goes immune from it. Jesus, precisely because covered with our sins, suffered. On the way to Emmaus he told the two disciples that it was necessary for the Son of Man to suffer in order to enter glory. He therefore wanted to know all the pains and miseries of life. Poverty, work, hunger, cold, detachment from the holiest affections, infirmity, ingratitude, betrayal, persecution, martyrdom, death! So what is our suffering with regard to the pains of Christ? In our pains we look at Jesus bloodied and reflect what sense before God calamities and sufferings have. All suffering is permitted by God for the salvation of our soul; it is a trait of divine mercy. How many have been called back to the way of salvation, through the way of pain! How many already far from God, struck by misfortune, have felt the need to pray, to go back to church, to kneel at the foot of the Crucifix to find in him strength and hope! But even if we suffer unjustly, we thank the Lord, because the crosses that God sends us, says St. Peter, are the crown of glory that never fades.
EXAMPLE: In a Paris hospital a man suffering from a repugnant disease suffers unspeakably. Everyone abandoned him, even his closest relatives and friends. Only the Sister of Charity is at his bedside. In a moment of more atrocious suffering and despair, the sick man shouts: «A revolver! It will be the only effective remedy against my illness! ». Instead the nun hands him the crucifix and softly murmurs: "No, brother, this is the only remedy for your suffering and for those of all the sick!" The sick man kissed him and his eyes were wet with tears. What meaning would pain have without faith? Why suffer? Those who have faith find strength and resignation in pain: those who have faith find a source of merit in pain; whoever has faith sees in every suffering Christ who suffers.
PURPOSE: I will accept every tribulation from the hands of the Lord; I will comfort those who suffer and visit some sick people.
JACULATORY: Eternal Father I offer you the Precious Blood of Jesus Christ for the consecration of work and pain, for the poor, the sick and the troubled.