Prayers of Reparation
Fátima Prayer of Reparation
O Most Holy Trinity, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, I adore Thee profoundly. I offer Thee the most precious Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of Jesus Christ present in all the tabernacles of the world, in reparation for the outrages, sacrileges and indifferences by which He is offended. By the infinite merits of the Sacred Heart of Jesus and the Immaculate Heart of Mary, I beg the conversion of poor sinners.
(The children of Fátima witnessed this prayer coming directly from the Guardian Angel of Portugal, who, in the fall of 1917, appeared to them and fell prostrate before a Eucharistic host that had appeared and was suspended in the air.)
The Divine Mercy Chaplet
In 1935, Jesus Himself gave the first of a series of prayers of reparation to St. Faustina. These prayers, which can be prayed on rosary beads, make up the Chaplet of Divine Mercy.
Learn more about the Chaplet of Divine Mercy, including how to pray it, here.
Scriptural Rosary of Reparation: The Sorrowful Mysteries
Kathleen Beckman, L.H.S.
First Sorrowful Mystery: The Agony in the Garden
For Victims of Priest Abuse
Matthew 26:36-39
“Then Jesus went with them to a place called Gethsemane, and he said to his disciples, ‘Sit here, while I go yonder and pray.’ And taking with him Peter and the two sons of Zebedee, he began to be sorrowful and troubled. Then he said to them, ‘My soul is very sorrowful, even to death; remain here, and watch with me.’ And going a little farther he fell on his face and prayed, ‘My Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me; nevertheless, not as I will, but as thou wilt.’ ”
Reflection from Salvifici Dolores, no. 9
“Within each form of suffering endured by man, and at the same time at the basis of the whole world of suffering, there inevitably arises the question: why? . . . But only the suffering human being knows what he is suffering and wonders why; and he suffers in a humanly speaking still deeper way if he does not find a satisfactory answer. This is a difficult question, just as is a question closely akin to it, the question of evil. Why does evil exist? Why is there evil in the world? When we put the question this way, we are always, at least to a certain extent, asking a question about suffering too. . . . Man can put this question to God with all the emotion of his heart and with his mind full of dismay and anxiety; and God expects the question and listens to it, as we see in. . . the Book of Job.”
Petition
Eternal Father, Your Son was sorrowful unto death during His agony in the Garden of Gethsemane, when the sin of the world pressed upon His innocent being until His sweat became blood. He endured the terror of human suffering, the tyranny of injustice and the horror of sin to redeem sinners. He revealed His mercy by suffering His Passion.
We beg You to heal and bless the victims of priestly abuse who have shared a portion of the Passion of Jesus. You, O God, make all things new! We ask You to restore what was unjustly taken from the victims. We implore You to open the floodgates of mercy upon all victims for a renewal of their scarred memory, broken hearts, dishonored bodies, and inconsolable spirits. By Your loving grace, restore their lives. We entrust all victims to our Sorrowful Mother, who held her suffering Son in her maternal arms and cleansed His wounds.
Second Sorrowful Mystery: The Scourging at the Pillar
For Priests Who Hurt Others
Matthew 27:24-26
“So when Pilate saw that he was gaining nothing, but rather that a riot was beginning, he took water and washed his hands before the crowd, saying, ‘I am innocent of this righteous man’s blood; see to it yourselves.’ And all the people answered, ‘His blood be on us and on our children!’ Then he released for them Barabbas, and having scourged Jesus, delivered him to be crucified.”
Reflection from Salvifici Dolores, nos. 12-13
“According to [the personal dimension of punishment], punishment has a meaning not only because it serves to repay the objective evil of the transgression with another evil, but first and foremost because it creates the possibility of rebuilding goodness in the subject who suffers. . . . Suffering must serve for conversion, that is, for the rebuilding of goodness in the subject, who can recognize the divine mercy in this call to repentance. The purpose of penance is to overcome evil, which under different forms lies dormant in man. Its purpose is also to strengthen goodness both in man himself and in his relationships with others and especially with God. But in order to perceive the true answer to the ‘why' of suffering, we must look to the revelation of divine love, the ultimate source of the meaning of everything that exists. Love is also the richest source of the meaning of suffering, which always remains a mystery; we are conscious of the insufficiency and inadequacy of our explanations. Christ causes us to enter into the mystery and to discover the ‘why’ of suffering, as far as we are capable of grasping the sublimity of divine love.”
Petition
Eternal Father, the righteous blood of Your Son was not spared. For sinners He suffered unto death. We bring before You the priests who have hurt others by some form of abuse. All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God (Rom. 3:23), but when a beloved priest falls into sin and hurts a person entrusted to him, some goodness dies within the entire Body of Christ. Although the transgressions of some priests may be horrific and people may cry out for vengeance, we entrust them to Your fatherly providence.
In Your mercy, minister to wayward priests who may be suffering deeply from the interior agony caused by their sins. We entrust fallen priests to the heart of our Sorrowful Mother.
Third Sorrowful Mystery: The Crowning with Thorns
For Victims of Priest Abuse
Matthew 27:27-30
“Then the soldiers of the governor took Jesus into the praetorium, and they gathered the whole battalion before him. And they stripped him and put a scarlet robe upon him, and plaiting a crown of thorns they put it on his head, and put a reed in his right hand. And kneeling before him they mocked him saying, ‘Hail, King of the Jews!’ And they spat upon him, and took the reed and struck him on the head.”
Reflection from Salvifici Dolores, no. 16
“Christ drew close above all to the world of human suffering through the fact of having taken this suffering upon his very self. During his public activity, he experienced not only fatigue, homelessness, misunderstanding even on the part of those closest to him, but, more than anything, he became progressively more and more isolated and encircled by hostility and the preparations for putting him to death. Christ is aware of this, and often speaks to his disciples of the sufferings and death that await him: ‘Behold, we are going up to Jerusalem; and the Son of man will be delivered to the chief priests and the scribes, and they will condemn him to death and deliver him to the Gentiles; and they will mock him, and spit upon him, and scourge him, and kill him; and after three days he will rise.’ Christ goes towards his Passion and death with full awareness of the mission that he has to fulfill precisely in this way. Precisely by means of this suffering he must bring it about ‘that man should not perish, but have eternal life.’ Precisely by means of his Cross he must strike at the roots of evil, planted in the history of man and in human souls.”
Petition
Eternal Father, we bring before Your throne of mercy the priests who have been wrongly accused and who,
although innocent, are treated like outcasts and forsaken by many. When You look upon the priests who suffer false accusations, You see their resemblance to Jesus in His Passion. Your Son was wrongly accused and was stripped of everything until He hung naked on a cross as a victim of love.
We ask You to console with paternal solicitude those priests who have been stripped of everything and are
set apart like lepers, even though they are innocent of the charges against them. In Your mercy, graciously heal any wounds stemming from the experience of unfounded accusations — especially anger, depression, anxiety, loneliness, rejection, and fear. Help those priests to learn the value of coredemptive suffering so they may unite themselves to the perfect sacrifice of Jesus, the Lamb, and let them know the consolation of Your loving presence.
In Your justice, restore the good names of those who are innocent, and bring justice where it is needed. We entrust all these priests to Mary, our Sorrowful Mother.
Fourth Sorrowful Mystery: Jesus Carries His Cross
For Healing
Matthew 27:31-32
“And when they [the Roman soldiers] had mocked him, they stripped him of the robe, and put his own clothes on him, and led him away to crucify him. As they were marching out, they came upon a man of Cyrene, Simon by name; this man they compelled to carry his cross.”
Reflection from Salvifici Dolores, no. 16
“Christ severely reproves Peter when the latter wants to make him abandon the thoughts of suffering and of death on the Cross. And when, during his arrest in Gethsemane, the same Peter tries to defend him with the sword, Christ says, ‘Put your sword back into its place. . . . But how then should the scriptures be fulfilled, that it must be so?’ And he also says, ‘Shall I not drink the cup which the Father has given me?’ This response, like others that appear in different points of the Gospel, shows how profoundly Christ was imbued by the thought that he had already expressed in the conversation with Nicodemus: ‘For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.’ Christ goes toward his own suffering, aware of its saving power; he goes forward in obedience to the Father, but primarily he is united to the Father in this love with which he has loved the world and man in the world. And for this reason St. Paul will write of Christ, ‘He loved me and gave himself for me.’ ”
Petition
Eternal Father, as Your beloved Son carried His Cross to Calvary to be crucified at the hands of sinners, He was covered with wounds, which became the means of our healing. The Church today suffers from the wounds of many scandals. The Body of Christ experiences the weight of scandal and persecution. We have corporately sinned against the greatest commandment of divine love. The Church is in great need of the salve of divine mercy in order to be healed. Graciously bring about a movement of medicinal reparation.
Enkindle the hearts of the faithful to seek the healing balm of sacramental life. We trust that You will bring good out of the immense suffering of the Church as we humble ourselves before You. By the blood of the Lamb, cure our sin-sickness; take away our darkness, blindness, deafness, stubbornness, divisions, depression, sloth, vice, and pride. Restore our baptismal innocence that we may glorify You. Through the Eucharist, may the Divine Physician manifest His healing power!
We entrust this petition to the heart of Mary, our Sorrowful Mother.
Fifth Sorrowful Mystery: The Crucifixion of Our Lord
Forgiveness
Matthew 27:33-37
“And when they came to a place called Golgotha (which means the place of the skull), they offered him wine to drink, mingled with gall; but when he tasted it, he would not drink it. And when they had crucified him, they divided his garments among them by casting lots; then they sat down and kept watch over him there. And over his head they put the charge against him, which read, ‘This is Jesus the King of the Jews.’ ”
Reflection from Salvifici Dolores, no. 30
“One could certainly extend the list of the forms of suffering that have encountered human sensitivity, compassion and help, or that have failed to do so. The first and second parts of Christ’s words about the Final Judgment unambiguously show how essential it is, for the eternal life of every individual, to ‘stop,’ as the Good Samaritan did, at the suffering of one’s neighbor, to have ‘compassion’ for that suffering, and to give some help. In the messianic program of Christ, which is at the same time the program of the Kingdom of God, suffering is present in the world in order to release love, in order to give birth to works of love towards neighbor, in order to transform the whole of human civilization into a ‘civilization of love.’ . . . At one and the same time Christ has taught man to do good by his suffering and to do good to those who suffer. In this double aspect he has completely revealed the meaning of suffering.”
Petition
Eternal Father, before Your Son Jesus expired on the Cross, He offered the greatest gift of divine mercy, saying, “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.”
Help the faithful to offer the generous gift of forgiveness from the heart. Aid the Church in applying the healing salve of mercy to the deep wounds inflicted by scandal and persecution. Heal the anger and frustration of Your people who are mystified by what has happened in the Church. Only by Your grace can we be reconciled to each another and forgive as Jesus does. Thank You for the many good servants who are working to heal those who suffer the scars of abuse.
We implore You, O God, to transform the wounded and healed Church into a “civilization of love.” Cleanse Your house of prayer of all that is defiled and dead. Through the grace of forgiveness, make us healthy and holy.
We entrust this petition to the heart of Mary, our Sorrowful Mother. Amen.
This Scriptural Rosary originally appeared in Praying for Priests: A Mission for the New Evangelization (Sophia Institue Press, 2014) by Kathleen Beckman, L.H.S.