Prayer formulated by H.E. Mons. Claudio Gatti on 18th May 2008

Jesus the Eucharist, You are here before us, truly present. We adore You and before You we bow our heads, bend our knees, but at the same time allow us to cry out to You. This morning, you could have prevented the rain that forced us to give up a great joy, but if You didn't do it, You surely had your reasons. We had prepared a solemn procession to bring You, the Mother of the Eucharist, the Immaculate Conception and also the relic You gave us containing Your hair, Your Mother and St. Joseph’s hair. Unfortunately, because of the rain it was not possible to taste this moment, and I am reminded of a Latin say "quod differtur non aufertur", that is "what is postponed is not cancelled", it is not abolished but postponed for the future, when, dear Jesus, only joy will be present in our hearts.

You, who are God, You, who are our brother, read in our hearts and you know that if we were to take stock of our life now, suffering and sadness are more present than joy.

Allow us to tell You with much familiarity and sincerity that when our mom, your mom invites us to be smiling and joyful, we wonder about the reason. We don't want to go against this advice, but we can't understand: why smile and about what?

You see how much we struggle, day after day, night after night; today we are like Isaiah: exhausted, looking for shelter and refuge under a tree that would give us some peace, rest and tranquility. It is You, Jesus, this tree and we are Your leaves, perhaps a little yellowed, because opposing and evil winds have tried to separate us from You, have crashed against us to make us perish. Rapacious hands attempted to tear us away, thinking that we would give in to their bad intentions. Instead, here we are, yellowed, tested, tired, but assured that by staying united with You, we made the best choice.

You, Jesus, can confirm it: in spite of everything, we remained faithful to You, we made the best choice, a choice we would like to share with a greater number of brothers and sisters, not for self- exaltation, but because You, our God, may be glorified.

It is true, we believe that You are the only reason for our existence, outside of you we have no other goal, no other aim, no other target; we only want You Jesus, despite our weaknesses, our complaints and our disappointments. We believe in You only, we love You and Heaven only. The Earth instead is frightening us, the world is disgusting us, the Church is worrying us.

Lord, make yourself present as soon as possible and realize what You promised without making us wait any longer, because this waiting is stressing us, is wearing us down and is crippling us.

Jesus, only in You our praise, our love, our faith, our hope forever and ever. Amen.

+ Claudio Gatti

Bishop ordained by God

Bishop of the Eucharist