St. Catherine of Siena

Prodigy of love

Prayers

PRAYER of Pius XII
Oh holy Catherine, lily of virginity and rose of charity that adorned the Dominican garden, heroine of Christian zeal that you were elected like a singular Patron Saint of Italy, we trust you, invoking your powerful protection above us and above the whole Church of Christ, your beloved, in whose heart you drank inexhaustible the source of every grace and peace for yourself and for the world.

From that divine heart you derived the living water of virtue and harmony in families, of an honest trait in youth, of a reunion between the discordant peoples, of renewal of the public custom and of fraternal love, compassionate and beneficial towards the unhappy and the suffering. You taught by your example to join the union of Christ with the love of country. If you love Italy and the people entrusted to you, if the compassion towards us moves you, if the tomb in which Rome venerates and honors your virginal spoils is dear to you, then, turn your look and your favor favorably upon our pain is on our prayer and our vows are made.

Defend, succor and comfort your homeland and the world. Under your protection are the sons and daughters of Italy, our hearts and our souls, our travails and our hopes, our faith and our love: that love and faith that were yours in life and made you an image of Christ crucified in fearless zeal for his bride, the holy church.

Oh heroic and holy messenger of union and peace for the Church of Christ, who returns to the Roman apostolic seat in its splendor of authority and magisterium the Successor of Peter, protect and console him in his fatherly universal solicitude, in his troubles and in his advices for the salvation and peace of peoples; and revives, preserves and increases in us and in all the Christian faithful, or heavenly Patron, the affection and submission that you nourished for him and for the fold of Christ, in the tranquility of the world. Amen.

PRAYER

Oh bride of Christ, flower of our homeland. Angel of the Church be blessed. You loved the souls redeemed by your Divine Spouse: how He shed tears on the beloved Country; for the Church and for the Pope you consumed the flame of your life. When the plague reaped victims and raging discord, you passed like an angel, good of Charity and of peace. Against the moral disorder, which everywhere reigned, you called manfully the good will of all the faithful. Dying, you invoked the souls above the Church, above Italy and Europe, over the Church the precious Blood of the Lamb.

Oh Saint Catherine, sweet sister our Patron, you win the error, keep the faith, inflame, gather the souls around the Shepherd. Our Patron, blessed by God, chosen by Christ, be for your intercession true image of the Celestial in charity in prosperity, in peace.

For you the Church extends where the Savior desired, for you the Pontiff is loved and sought as the Father the counselor of all. And our souls may be enlightened for you, faithful to duty towards Italy, Europe and towards the Church, always aimed at heaven, in the Kingdom of God where the Father, the Word, the Divine love radiate above every eternal spirit light , perfect joy. Amen.

PRAYER

Oh irresistible Saint, at your word, could not resist the hearts of sinners, nor even Heaven to your burning faith and your insistent prayers. How then, even today make us feel the power of your intercession, confirm peace among men, free the oppressed from injustice or adversity of any kind, comfort and heal the sick of the soul and body. Pray for the peace of the whole world for the unity and fidelity of the People of God to the supreme Pastor and for the good of our country. And remember me, that I invoke you with confidence knowing that you do not abandon those who consider you as Mother and Teacher in difficulty.

PRAYER

Oh glorious Saint Catherine of Siena, you, who as a child, deserve to be called the little Saint, for your recollection, your spirit of prayer and your love for the purity that led you to a vow of virginity at the age of 8, get me to love prayer and recollection, very effective means to keep us good and chaste. Glorious Saint, for the exalted and heroic love that you brought to your Divine Spouse Jesus, and who made you worthy to suffer infirmities and slanders, for the supernatural light of which you were miraculously endowed, so as to be able to advise the same Supreme Pontiffs in matters concerning the greater good of the Church, obtain us, we pray to you a great love for Jesus Christ, which is that divine book on which we learn the true science that forms the Saints.

Pater, Ave, Gloria.

NOVENA

First day
For that spirit of prayer that you had as a child, so that you put all your delights in it, and with the angelic salutation repeated so many times by you as you were the steps of the stairs that you ascended constantly obsessed with the holy Virgin Mary obtain for us, we pray you, the grace of loving us as your example the exercise of prayer, and of always doing it with those conditions that make it worthy of fulfillment.

Glory be to the Father to the Son and to the Holy Spirit as it was in the beginning now and always for ever and ever.

Second day
For that particular affection which you brought, Oh great saint, to the virtue of purity, by which you consecrated yourselves to the Lord for eight years by an irrevocable vote, and by shaking your head, by groaning, by sighing, rejecting progress the most honorable offerings of very advantageous placement, obtain us, we beg you, the grace to always be firm in mind, heart and custom, or abhor with supreme hatred all that offends even slightly such a sublime virtue that lifts men to the sphere of the Angels and makes them the most expensive object of divine complacency.

Glory be to the Father to the Son and to the Holy Spirit as it was in the beginning now and always for ever and ever.

Third day
For that spirit of retreat that you had, or great Saint, for whom you never desired to be seen by others than by your Jesus, and distracted by constant occupations in your family, you knew how to make such solitude in your heart that you always had the mountain occupied by thoughts of paradise, get us, we pray, the grace to love us too loneliness and retreat, despite all the invitations that will make the world to participate in his shows, at his pumps, and to have always turned to God the thoughts of our mind in the midst of all the even more distracting occupations of our state.

Glory be to the Father to the Son and to the Holy Spirit as it was in the beginning now and always for ever and ever.

Fourth day
For that spirit of penance that you had, oh great Saint, since the years of your childhood, when you punish with the most ingenious or afflictive mortifications your condescension of only once to those who advised the delicacy or clothing, then associated with the Terz 'Dominican Order, you built the whole world with the perpetual abstinence from wine and meat, and almost from sleep, feeding on nothing but raw herbs, not sleeping very little and on bare planks, to spend all hours in prayer, always carrying around your body a painful hair shirt, with the maceration of your flesh with three disciplines every day, get us, we pray, the grace to always observe faithfully those abstinences and those fasts that commands the Church, to tolerate with patience all that afflictive God will deign to ordain for our own sake, or to spontaneously mortify all the perverse inclinations of our heart and the desires of our senses, similar also to have the necessary resemblance to your crucified example.

Glory be to the Father to the Son and to the Holy Spirit as it was in the beginning now and always for ever and ever.

Fifth day
For that heroic charity that moved you, Oh great saint, to spontaneously serve and to meddle on your own hand the poor infirmity abandoned by everyone for the disgust and then stench of the gangrenous sores, and from which you were not reassembled but with insults, calumnies the most dishonorable, obtain from the Lord the grace to be always also ready to succor our neighbor in all his needs and to generously forgive, indeed reciprocate with benefits, all the outrages that were made to us, so that we merit in this life and in the other the blessedness promoted to true meek and true merciful.

Glory be to the Father to the Son and to the Holy Spirit as it was in the beginning now and always for ever and ever.

Sixth day
For that admirable fortress that, with the doubling of prayers, austerities and fervor. you proved, Oh great saint, against all the powers of the interior which were unleashed against you, persecuted you for so long with the images that were most unworthy of the most violent temptations, and for which you were rewarded by your divine Spouse, beyond familiarity to speak and deal with his saints and with his own mother Mary, the rapture, the ecstasies, the revelations and the more intimate communications with him, to be with the sensitive gift of a rich ring declared her bride, get us, there let us pray, the grace of being also equally strong against the assaults of our spiritual enemies, so that it may be the reward of our fidelity to always grow in divine love, until we merit confidently the inseparable union with the supreme Good.

Glory be to the Father to the Son and to the Holy Spirit as it was in the beginning now and always for ever and ever.

Seventh day
For that supernatural light, which you were miraculously endowed with, oh great saint, for which you could serve with many letters of councilor to the same Roman Pontiffs, so that you were personally consulted by them, and discovered what they had resolved in their heart, and obtained from them the long-awaited restoration of the Holy See in Rome, of which it had been deprived for seventy years, obtain from the Lord the grace to know always in our doubts what is more in conformity with the will of God and more convenient to the health of our soul, so that from our resolutions we derive the growth of our fervor before God, as well as of our edification concerning our neighbor.

Glory be to the Father to the Son and to the Holy Spirit as it was in the beginning now and always for ever and ever.

Eighth day
For that singular devotion that you had, oh great saint, to Jesus Christ sacramented, for which you were repeatedly communicated by his hand and quenched with his divine Blood, then lost the taste of food, lasted for eight years from the principle of Lent until the day of the Ascension without any more than the most holy Eucharist, obtain, we pray, the grace to bring to the Blessed Sacrament a love similar to yours, so we make it our delight to hold us long in his presence, frequently receive it in our chest, and procure him in every circumstance the greatest possible glorification.

Glory be to the Father to the Son and to the Holy Spirit as it was in the beginning now and always for ever and ever.

Ninth day
For that extraordinary love that you had for the sufferings for which you ascribable to great ventura the suffering in the invisible stigmata all the pains of a crucified body, and surprised by the last infirmity, you made yourself show of admiration to the whole world for the serenity and for the glory with which you suffer the most frightful torments, obtain from the Lord the grace to receive with Christian resignation, indeed with holy joy all the crosses with which God is pleased to visit us, so that, after having brought the mortification of Christ into our members, we can with you participate in the fullness of his blessedness in the house of eternity.

Glory be to the Father to the Son and to the Holy Spirit as it was in the beginning now and always for ever and ever.