St. Joseph Catholic Church
Served by the Blessed Sacrament Congregation!
Served by the Blessed Sacrament Congregation!
Following the footsteps of our founder, St. Peter Julian Eymard, our mission is to respond to the hungers of the human family with the riches of God's love manifested in the Eucharist.
“Called to live as a eucharistic community, we seek, by our vocation and way of life, to give a more explicit witness to the life of Christ which springs from this sacrament.” - Rule of Life 21
Learn more about the Congregation of the Blessed Sacrament at their Website: https://www.blessedsacrament.com
St. Peter Julian Eymard
Pray For Us
In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen.
Gracious God of our ancestors: Awaken in us the sense of our Eucharistic mission.
Encourage and affirm future “Apostles of the Eucharist,” to be associates, sisters, brothers, deacons and ordained priests following in the footsteps of Saint Peter Julian Eymard.
May we serve you and the Risen Lord, through the communion of the Holy Spirit, to make know all the mysteries of the Eucharist.
May your Eucharistic kingdom come! Amen.
By: John Thomas Lane, SSS 2023
"Happy is the soul that knows how to find Jesus in the Eucharist, and in the Eucharist all things!"
- St. Peter Julian Eymard
In the Name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen.
Gracious God of our ancestors, you led Peter Julian Eymard, like Jacob in times past, on a journey of faith. Under the guidance of your gentle Spirit, Peter Julian discovered the gift of love in the Eucharist which your son Jesus offered for the hungers of humanity. Grant that we may celebrate this mystery worthily, adore it profoundly, and proclaim it prophetically for your greater glory. Amen.
Born in La Mure d’Isère in southeastern France, Peter Julian’s faith journey drew him from being a priest in the Diocese of Grenoble in 1834, to joining the Marists in 1839, to founding the Congregation of the Blessed Sacrament in 1856.
In addition to those changes, Peter Julian coped with poverty, his father’s initial opposition to Peter’s vocation, serious illness, a Jansenistic overemphasis on sin, and the difficulties of getting diocesan and later papal approval for his new religious community.
His years as a Marist, including service as a provincial leader, saw the deepening of his Eucharistic devotion, especially through his preaching of Forty Hours in many parishes. Inspired at first by the idea of reparation for indifference to the Eucharist, Peter Julian was eventually attracted to a more positive spirituality of Christ-centered love. Members of the men’s community which Peter founded alternated between an active apostolic life and contemplating Jesus in the Eucharist. He and Marguerite Guillot founded the women’s Congregation of the Servants of the Blessed Sacrament.
Peter Julian Eymard was beatified in 1925 and canonized in 1962, one day after Vatican II’s first session ended.
Reflection
In every century, sin has been painfully real in the life of the Church. It is easy to give in to despair, to speak so strongly of human failings that people may forget the immense and self-sacrificing love of Jesus, as his death on the cross and his gift of the Eucharist make evident. Peter Julian knew that the Eucharist was key to helping Catholics live out their baptism and preach by word and example the Good News of Jesus Christ.
Article from: Franciscan Media: Saint of the Day
https://www.franciscanmedia.org/saint-of-the-day/
