Monday, January 31, 2011

A Prayer for Anyone Inclined to Despair

Lord, I am in this world to show Your mercy to others.
Other people will glorify You
by making visible the power of Your grace
by their fidelity and constancy to You.
For my part I will glorify You
by making known how good You are to sinners,
that Your mercy is boundless
and that no sinner no matter how great his offences
should have reason to despair of pardon.
If I have grievously offended You, My Redeemer,
let me not offend You even more
by thinking that You are not kind enough to pardon Me.

Amen.

-- Saint Claude de la Colombière (from my friend Theresa Bonopartis's post-abortion website)

5 comments:

Enbrethiliel said...

+JMJ+

Wonderful ending!

otepoti said...

This prayer hits it out of the park.

Thanks.

Pentimento said...

Yeah, sort of a trick ending that sums up all of Christian theology.

Pentimento said...

As Heinrich Heine said on his deathbed, "I know that God will forgive me my sins; c'est son métier."

Melanie Bettinelli said...

Beautiful. I've got a growing devotion to Saint Claude de la Colombière after he was chosen for me as my patron saint last year.