“Could you not then watch one hour with me?”- Mt. 26:40
Now is the perfect time to return to practice Night Adoration in the home a beautiful practice to strengthen your relationship the Sacred Heart. This mighty spiritual practice links the Blessed Sacrament and Adoration with the Sacred Heart image right in our home. We worship Christ in Night Adoration “with the same spirit of love and reparation which inspires you when watching before the Blessed Sacrament…” (1). Night Adoration in the home is the perfect solution for any Catholic who is unable to make it to Adoration in the middle of the night.
We live in a culture where the internet does not turn off, and media fills our homes 24 hours a day, and yet when does our Lord receive an opportunity to speak to our hearts? As mothers and fathers, it is often in the wee hours of the night that we hear the faint sound of our Lord calling us to action and prayer and providing us insights. Could it be because society’s noise is finally turned off, and we can hear God? Consider going before your image of the Sacred Heart and begin offering up your prayers!
This devotion was once very popular, and it was believed that over a million people were consoling our Lord in this practice; now, it is time to bring this devotion back! Night Adoration is rooted in the powerful understanding of the value of acts of reparation to Jesus. Reparation is made when we make a sacrifice for the Lord. Only the Sacred Heart knows the sacrifices made to keep watch with him, and we desire to make up for those who “dethrone” our Lord in their hearts and homes.
When Jesus appeared to St. Margaret Mary, he shared that the Thursday before the First Friday was a significant night to console His Heart. “Jesus showed me His most loving and most amiable Heart. ‘I will be thy strength.’ He said to me. ‘Fear nothing, but be attentive to My voice and to what I shall require of thee… Every night between Thursday and Friday, I will make thee share in the mortal sadness which I was pleased to feel in the Garden of Olives…And in order to bear My company in the humble prayer that I then offered to My Father, in the midst of My anguish, thou shalt rise between eleven and midnight, and remain prostrated with Me for an hour, not only to appease divine anger by begging mercy for sinners, but also to mitigate in some way the bitterness which I felt at that time on finding Myself abandoned by My apostles, which obliged Me to reproach them for not being able to watch with Me…”
“No creature will ever be able to comprehend the greatness of the torment that I experienced then… I suffered more interiorly there (in the Garden of Gethsemane) than in all the rest of My Passion because I saw that I was abandoned by heaven and earth.”
(From the Revelations of St. Margaret Mary )
It was said that Fr. Mateo urged all Night Adorers to “begin their hour of adoration in the home by uniting themselves in the spirit with the priests who at that moment are offering the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass in some part of the world.” Just think, a Mass is being said on the other side of the world, and you can unite your prayers with it!
Honoring our Lord is not possible without prayer. Our Lord longs for his disciples to pray with Him for the hour before the crucifixion. Christ knew the disciples were weak, and their faith in Him would be tested. “Could you not then watch one hour with me?” Matthew 26:40. This concept is the basis for Eucharist Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament, and Night Adoration in the Home is a direct fruit of this same love. Many of us find it difficult or unable to visit our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament, especially at night, but we can always go before the Image of the Sacred Heart and offer prayers of reparation and love.
The Sacred Heart of Jesus wants you to be invited and honored in love in your home. Consider allowing this devotion to transform your life and the culture of your very family. Jesus is there for us without fail and wants to be your family’s living, breathing heart. He is the hope of the family; He is the hope of the human family!
Here are some practical suggestions for Night Adoration-
- Enthrone the Sacred Heart of Jesus in your home. Order a kit here.
- Set a time on a monthly basis when you will commit to one hour in the evening from 9 p.m.-6 a.m. Fr. Mateo encouraged followers to link their prayers with a Mass said at the same time around the world. Check out this site to find a Mass that works for you… https://mass-online.org
- Focus on prayers of reparation and making up for the sins of others. Are we willing to show Christ’s love when others are not? Consider the powerful gift of offering up your pains, trials, and troubles for others. As Catholics, we know the power in this amazing gift of offering up your sufferings for someone else’s salvation.
- Learn more by reading a small book called Night Adoration in the Home by Fr. Mateo Boevey Crowley.
The Adoring Soul
(From Fr. Mateo Night Adoration Prayer Book)
“In taking leave of Thee tonight, O King of Love, Heart of my God and God of my heart, I enter confidently through that wound caused by my sins, into the ark of divine and infinite tenderness which is Thy loving Heart. And here will I stay forever, to repeat to Thee through all time that I love Thee and long to make Thee loved- and to sing throughout Eternity the infinite mercies of Thy Sacred Heart.” Amen
Learn more about the Sacred Heart devotion here: https://welcomehisheart.com/videos-on-the-sacred-heart-of-jesus
1. (Francis, Larkin. Enthronement of the Sacred Heart. (Boston, MA: Daughters of St. Paul. 1978) p. 166
