Precious Blood Gems (March)
March 01, 2023
March 1 Everything that pertains to the Person of the Son of God is infinitely worthy of veneration. The least portion of His Body, the tiniest drop of His blood is deserving of the adoration of heaven and earth. St. Peter Julian Eymard
March 2 Just as the Paschal Lamb’s blood was put on the doorposts to prevent the destroyer from killing the firstborn of that house, so also does Jesus’ blood rescue us from this world and deliver us from the power and authority of the devil. Humanity’s worship of the creature rather than the creator (Rom 1:18-25) is reversed by the creator becoming a creature, the immortal taking on mortality, the impassible assuming suffering. Without ceasing to be what he always was according to his divinity, he becomes like us according to our humanity that he might undo the works of the devil (1 John 3:8). St. Melito of Sardis
March 3 Thank Our Lord for having redeemed your soul with His Most Precious Blood. St. Katharine Drexel
March 4 Despite the weight of our sins, God loves us and has redeemed us in the blood of Christ. His grace has healed our innermost being. St. John Paul II
March 5 Christian people who have been baptized in the Blood of Christ are called and summoned to the Eternal Joy of God. Bl. John Ruysbroeck
March 6 No king rules my soul except you, Christ, who without force submits me to your easy yoke, who lifts away my sinful passions with your all-powerful word, who redeems me with your blood and nourishes me with your body, who sets forth and establishes the unchanging covenant of life. St. Gregory of Narek
March 7 We should anoint the lintel of our mind with the blood of the Lamb who was sacrificed for us, and so ward off our destroyer. We should do this not only once a year, but every week, continually. St. Eusebius of Caesarea
March 8 As long as Jesus shall be Jesus— and this he will be for ever—he will also always be our advocate with the Father and all-powerful to wash away our sins in his Blood. Bl. Ildefonso Schuster
March 9 A heart ought to be made like a lamp. You see that a lamp is wide above and narrow below, and so the heart is made, to signify that we ought always to keep it wide above, through holy thoughts and holy imaginations and continual prayer; always holding in memory the blessings of God, and chiefly the blessing of the Blood by which we are bought. St. Catherine of Siena
March 10 It was indeed necessary that Christ should die for all people, so that through his cross every sin might find forgiveness and in his blood the stains of all the world be washed away. St. Ambrose of Milan
March 11 God is the most loving Father of us all, and we are all brethren in Christ, we whom he redeemed by shedding His precious Blood. Hence, as often as we fail to return God’s love or to recognize His divine fatherhood with all due reverence, the bonds of brotherly love are unfortunately shattered and — as, alas, is so often evident, — discord, strife and enmity unhappily are the result, so much so as to undermine and destroy the very foundations of human society. Pope Pius XII
March 12 God has released the old Adam in us from the death that was owing, by the grace flowing from that death which was not owing and the price paid by Christ in his own blood. Adam of Perseigne
March 13 Christ is, indeed, your true bridegroom. He is also your brother. He is likewise your friend. He is your inheritance. He is your reward. He is God and the Lord. You have in him a bridegroom to love: “For he is fair in beauty above the sons of men.” … He is a friend of whom you need not doubt, for he himself says, “You are my only lover.” You have in him the inheritance that you may embrace, for he is himself the portion of your inheritance. You have in him the reward that you may recognize, for his blood is your redemption. You have in him God by whom you may be ruled, the Lord to fear and honor. St. Leander of Seville
March 14 Our Savior counted all your sorrows, all your sufferings, and purchased, at the price of His blood, the patience and the love that were necessary for you, in order to worthily refer your pains to His glory and your own salvation. St. Francis de Sales
March 15 I wish and passionately desire to sacrifice myself as much as possible for Jesus Christ our Redeemer and for the souls who were redeemed by his most precious blood. St. Clement Mary Hofbauer
March 16. By redemption we belong to God by as many titles as His Divine Son had thoughts, words and actions, bore sufferings and shed drops of His Blood. He employed these means, of which each is infinite in value, to snatch us from the captivity of sin and Satan. St. John Eudes
March 17 O Son of God, perform a miracle for me: change my heart. You, whose crimson blood redeems humanity, whiten my heart. It is you who makes the sun bright and the ice sparkle; you who makes the river flow and the salmon leap. Your skilled hand makes the nut tree blossom, and the corn turn golden; Your spirit composes the songs of the birds and the buzz of the bees. Your creation is a million wondrous miracles, beautiful to behold. I ask of you just one more miracle: beautify my soul. A Celtic prayer
March 18 In the Mosaic law a sacrificial lamb banished the destroyer. But now it is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. Will he not free us from our sins even more? The blood of an animal, a sheep, brought salvation. Will not the blood of the only-begotten Son bring us greater salvation? St. Cyril of Jerusalem
March 19 The pool of healing, what is it but the sweet and noble person of our beloved Lord Jesus Christ Himself? And the health-giving water, is the adorable and most precious blood of the eternal Son of God, true God and true Man, Who has washed and cleansed us in that bath of love, and Who, out of His own tender love, will thus wash and cleanse all men who come to Him with real sorrow for their sinful lives, together with a sincere resolve to be better for the future. The sick who lay around this healing pool in such great numbers, waiting for the angel to come down and stir the waters, may be called the whole human race, who, before our Lord's coming, lay in captivity under the law of the Old Testament while they lived, and after death waited in limbo for the moving of the waters; that is, till our Lord's precious blood was poured out at His blessed and bitter death, giving them eternal health and salvation. And so also in these last days, which are the time of salvation, no man can ever be healed and saved except by the adorable and precious blood of our Lord Jesus Christ. Johannes Tauler
March 20 (Feast of St. Joseph) Since Christ was King, of the line of David, He made St. Joseph to be born of this same royal line. He wanted him to be noble, of an earthly nobility. In the veins of St. Joseph, therefore, flowed the blood of David and Solomon, and of all the noble kings of Judah. St. Peter Julian Eymard
March 21 The love of wisdom becomes warm and glowing through religious study. For though the color [red] may point to the mystery of the Lord’s blood, it also sets forth the warm glow of wisdom. St. Jerome
March 22. Praise be to the Good One Who descended for our sake, became like unto us and healed our sores by His all-sanctifying flesh and His all-sanctifying blood! May all sing praises to Him! St. Ephrem the Syrian
March 23 A great deposit was that, by which Our Lord lodged in the hands of the paternal Justice, all His precious blood, of which the least drop is far more valuable than all the worlds we could ever imagine. St. Francis de Sales
March 24. The eucharist makes us look back to Calvary twenty centuries ago .. . [b]ut it also looks ahead to the future, to the eternal, eschatological and definitive horizon that presents itself as a demanding ideal to all political systems, to all social struggles, to all those concerned for the earth. The church does not ignore the earth, but in the eucharist it says to all who work on earth: look beyond. Each time the Victim is lifted up at Mass, Christ’s call is heard: “Until we drink it anew in my Father’s kingdom.” And the people reply: “Come, Lord Jesus.”… Death is not the end. Death is the opening of eternity’s portal. That is why I say: all the blood, all the dead, all the mysteries of iniquity and sin, all the tortures, all those dungeons of our security forces, where unfortunately many persons slowly die, do not mean they are lost forever. St. Oscar Romero
March 25 That blood which the Word, when He became incarnate, took from our human nature, He gave back to us—every drop of it—as the price of our redemption. And He gave it back, not as if constrained by anyone, but freely, because He willed to, because He loved us. Gabriel of Mary Magdalene
March 26. His body, though dead after the manner of man, possesses in it great power of life. For streams which flow not from dead bodies flowed forth from Him, viz., blood and water; in order that we might know what power for life is held by the virtue that dwelt in His body, so as that it appears not to be dead like others, and is able to shed forth for us the springs of life. Hippolytus
March 27 Who may rightly sum up the sorrow of the mother when she saw the most precious body of her son, which she knew to be most holy and most clean of all stain, stretched out on the wood of the cross, his head that struck awe among the angels crowned with thorns, his hands and feet transfixed by nails, his side split open by a soldier's lance, and streams of blood running from every part of his body?” Stephen of Sawley
March 28. In Baptism, Jesus becomes the Lord of the soul and the soul becomes His tabernacle consecrated by His Blood. Our soul has become like an altar on which is continuously burned the sacrifice of faith, hope and love - the sacrifice of adoration and thanksgiving. As long as the altar remains in the soul, Jesus abides there together with the Father and the Holy Spirit. St. Joseph Sebastian Pelczar
March 29. What will he refuse to do for our salvation who did not refuse to shed his blood for all, and who gave us his body and blood again? St. John Chrysostom
March 30 Justice and mercy are united in You, so much so that You give Yourself, O Christ, as Food to Your redeemed; You nourish them with Your words, Your deeds, Your example, but still more with Your Precious Blood St. Mary Magdalen dei Pazzi
March 31. At the time of his Passion and Cross, even before it had gone as far as the inhuman crucifixion and the shedding of his blood, how patiently he bore reviling and reproach, insult and mockery! St. Cyprian of Carthage