Precious Blood Gems (May)
May 25, 2023
May 1. He who is glorious in heaven has redeemed us with his precious blood, taking our poverty upon himself to enrich us with his own wealth. Dhouda
May 2. We, eating of the Word of the Father, and having the lintels of our hearts sealed with the blood of the New Testament, acknowledge the grace given us from the Saviour. St. Athanasius of Alexandria
May 3 Christ continues His office of Savior, for He is the Apostle of the Apostles, and it is He. alone who, in the Apostles, redeems souls by grace and by the power of His Blood. St. Peter Julian Eymard
May 4. Christ calls upon us lovingly, begging us to accept the benefit of His meritorious and most Precious Blood. And those who trust Him He takes under His special protection. He marks out their whole life for them; He appoints all that happens to them; He guides them in such way as to secure their salvation St. John Henry Newman
May 5. We have a strange illusion that mere time cancels sin. I have heard others, and I have heard myself, recounting cruelties and falsehoods committed in boyhood as if they were no concern of the present speaker’s, and even with laughter. But mere time does nothing either to the fact or to the guilt of a sin. The guilt is washed out not by time but by repentance and the blood of Christ: if we have repented these early sins we should remember the price of our forgiveness and be humble. C.S. Lewis
May 6. I hope, in the blood Thou hast shed for me, that Thou wilt never allow me to separate myself from Thy love, and to lose Thy grace, which I prize more than every other good. St. Alphonsus Liguori
May 7. My Well-beloved, chosen from all, behold how that I am yours without reserve. I have lived for you, taught you, trained you, and died for your sake. I have offered you to My Father with My Death, and I have paid your debt with My own Sacred Blood. Bl. John Ruysbroeck
May 8. The precious plenty of his dearworthy blood ascends up into heaven in the blessed body of our lord Jesus Christ, and there is in him, bleeding, praying for us to the father, and is and shall be as long as we need. Bl. Julian of Norwich
May 9. Countless times I offered the Immaculate Lamb of God and the Precious Blood of Jesus, the most powerful offerings, to our heavenly Father. I find no greater treasure, nothing more precious, to offer to God in atonement. Bl. Maria Teresa Gerhardinger
May 10 In that cross, you both sought and found me, cured and made me free, and, loving me gave your Life-Blood for me, by the hand of so cruel wretches! St. John of Avila
May 11
We think that Paradise and Calvary,
Christ's cross, and Adam's tree, stood in one place;
Look, Lord, and find both Adams met in me;
As the first Adam's sweat surrounds my face,
May the last Adam's blood my soul embrace. John Donne
May 12. Because God’s glory shines through most brightly in the salvation of the souls that Christ redeemed with his own blood, let it be the chief concern of the apostolic life to bring salvation and an increase in holiness to as many souls as possible. St. Maximilian Kolbe
May 13. I worship the image of Christ as the Incarnate God; that of the God-Bearer, the Mother of us all, as the Mother of God’s Son; that of the saints as the friends of God. They have withstood sin unto blood, and followed Christ in shedding their blood for Him, who shed His blood for them. St. John Damascene
May 14
Mathias, a saint through being chosen,
a champion in his victory,
did not know himself chosen before the Lamb’s
blood was shed:
he was tardy in knowledge,
like a man who is not perfectly awake.
God’s gift aroused him,
so that for joy he rose like a giant
in his strength:
God foresaw him
as he had foreseen the man
whom he formed of clay
when the first angel,
who denied God, fell. St. Hildegard of Bingen
a champion in his victory,
did not know himself chosen before the Lamb’s
blood was shed:
he was tardy in knowledge,
like a man who is not perfectly awake.
God’s gift aroused him,
so that for joy he rose like a giant
in his strength:
God foresaw him
as he had foreseen the man
whom he formed of clay
when the first angel,
who denied God, fell. St. Hildegard of Bingen
May 15 The religious soul finds in the heart of Jesus a secure refuge against the wiles and attacks of Satan, and a delightful retreat. But we must not rest merely at the entrance to the hole in the rock, we must penetrate its depths. At the mouth of the deep hollow, at the mouth of the wound in his side we shall, indeed, find the precious blood which has redeemed us. This blood pleads for us and demands mercy for us. But the religious soul must not stay at the entrance. When she has heard, and understood, the voice of the divine blood, she must hasten to the very source from which it springs, into the very innermost sanctuary of the heart of Jesus. There she will find light, peace, and ineffable consolations. St. Anthony of Padua
May 16 This is he who washed you in his blood; who through his death , set you free. How long will he wait for you to love him in return? St Gertrude the Great
May 17. To turn our affections constantly back toward God, despising the world with all its joys, and loving virtue, bearing with true patience what the divine goodness permits us; considering that whatever He gives is given for our good that we may be sanctified in Him. We shall find in the Blood that the truth is thus. So we ought to fill our memory with this glorious Blood, which shows us so sweet a truth, that we may never be without the recollection of it. St. Catherine of Siena
May 18. The Church comes from the flank of Christ, asleep in death; He gives it strength like bone and joins its blood to His own. He becomes weak in order to toughen his tender one. St. Odo of Cluny
May 19
I praise the wounds of the Lamb
that heal the weakness of my body,
I praise the wounds of the Lamb
that heal the weakness of my soul,
I praise the wounds of the Lamb
that heal the weakness of my spirit!
Praise be to the blood of the Lamb
in his forgiving power.
Praise be to the blood of the Lamb
in his cleansing power.
Praise be to the blood of the Lamb
in his saving power.
Praise be to the blood of the Lamb
in his releasing power.
Praise be to the blood of the Lamb
in his victorious power.
Praise be to the blood of the Lamb
in his renewing power.
Praise be to the blood of the Lamb
in his protecting power.
For whoever believes
in the power of the blood of Jesus,
nothing is impossible.
I praise the blood of the Lamb
that covers all my sins
so that they can no longer be seen,
I praise the blood of the Lamb
that cleanses me from all my sins
and makes me white as snow,
I praise the blood of the Lamb
that has power to free me
from all my bondages and chains of sin.
I praise the blood of the Lamb
that is stronger
than my own sin-infested blood
and remoulds me into the image of God,
I praise the blood of the Lamb
that is victorious over all powers
that seek to oppress me,
over every power of the enemy.
I praise the blood of the Lamb
that protects me
from all the devious attacks of the enemy.
I praise the blood of the Lamb
that prepares for me the bridal garment.
I praise the blood of the Lamb
that makes all things new.
Alleluia! Amen. Mother Basilea Schlink
May 20 We owe Christ blood for blood; and moreover our blood in return for his blood which he shed for us, was a very unequal exchange. We accept from a bad debtor oats instead of wheat; and our Lord accepteth from us our tears instead of his blood, and is well satisfied. Ancren Rule
May 21 (Ascension). Christ lives in His humankind, being enthroned in and through it in His royal ministry. In proportion to this enthronement, the Ascension is overcome in the sense of the removal of Christ from the world; instead, in accordance with His promise, He is present in the world "always, now and forever." It is overcome, on the one hand, by the presence of Christ in the world in the blood and water that flowed out of His side: This is the Holy Grail. Sergei Bulkakov
May 22. What sacrifice could we bring to reconcile ourselves with Thee? We have nothing to give to Thee. Thus we ask Thee to reconcile us by Thy blood, O All-merciful One. St. Ephrem the Syrian
May 23. If you really grasped a great truth, that souls ransomed by the Man-God's blood are so precious that, even if every human being, past, present, and to come, were to spend, to save just one single one, every thing they have by way of talents, wealth and life, it would still be time well, nay admirably well spent. St. Eugene de Mazenod
May 24. Why did Christ shed his blood? To purchase those sheep which he had entrusted to Peter and to his successors. St. John Chrysostom
May 25. O charity! How beautiful and pleasing to God you are! Like the pelican, you give your own blood, not only for your children, but even for your enemies. St. Mary Magdalene de’ Pazzi
May 26 O Precious Blood of Jesus, infinite price of sinful humanity's redemption, both drink and laver of our souls, you who plead continually the cause of humanity before the throne of infinite mercy, from the depths of my heart I adore you, and so far as I am able I would recompense you for the insults and outrages that you continually receive from human beings, and especially from those who so rashly dare to blaspheme you. Who would not bless this Blood of infinite value? Who does not feel within themselves the fire of the love of Jesus who shed it all for us? What would be my fate had I not been redeemed by this divine Blood? Who has drawn it from the veins of my Savior, even to the last drop? This was surely the work of love. O infinite love, which has given us this saving balm! O balm beyond all price welling up from the fountain of infinite love! Grant that every heart and every tongue may be enabled to praise you, magnify you, and give you thanks forevermore. Amen. St. Philip Neri
May 27. Children, this high priest [Christ] may be taken as a figure to show forth the interior person. He enters the sanctuary of his soul, bearing with him the precious and thrice glorious blood of our Lord Jesus Christ; and he bears fire with him, too; namely ardent love. And he sprinkles all the golden vessels there with that sacred blood; namely all souls of men and women in the state of grace, or who shall ever be in that state. Johannes Tauler
May 28 (Pentecost). The Holy Spirit “comes” by virtue of Christ's “departure” in the Paschal Mystery: he comes in each concrete case of conversion-forgiveness, by virtue of the sacrifice of the Cross. For in this sacrifice “the blood of Christ...purifies your conscience from dead works to serve the living God.” (Heb 9:14) St. John Paul II
May 29 (Mother of the Church) The Blessed Virgin is a Mother who clothes us with grace and takes our supernatural life under her protection, in order to bring it to its full flowering in eternal life. She, the Immaculate, full of grace from the first moment of her conception, takes our souls stained by sin, and with a maternal gesture, cleanses them in the Blood of Christ and clothes them with grace, which, together with Him, she has merited for us. Gabriel of St. Mary Magdalene
May 30 If you had the privilege of standing on Calvary when drops of Our Redeemer’s Blood dripped from His wounds, it would have been with ardent devotion and tender love that you would have caught them in your own hands. With the same devotion and love, you should receive the divine graces that fall from His Most Sacred Wounds, since they are the fruits of the passion and death of Christ. St. Joseph Sebastian Pelczar
May 31 The greatest joy that we can afford the Admirable Heart of Mary, all aflame with love for souls which cost the Precious Blood of her son, is to work zealously and devotedly for their salvation. If the hearts of the angels and saints in Heaven rejoice for each conversion of a sinner on earth, the Queen of Angels and saints derives infinitely more joy from it than that of all the denizens of Heaven combined because her heart possesses more love and charity. St. John Eudes