Ave Maria Meditations
Arise, O Lord, and let Thy enemies be scattered, and let them that hate Thee flee from before Thy Face. (Ps 68:1)
Follow Jesus, who after the last supper is going to the garden of olives to prepare Himself for His passion. He prays a long time, lasting three hours. His soul is given up to sadness. From time to time, He interrupts His prayer to go to His disciples to seek a little strength and consolation but He does not find it: “I have sought for someone to console Me and I have not found anyone.”
The sorrowful condition of His holy Face reflects all the impressions of His soul: it appears sad, desolating, trembling; it sheds tears, sorrowful groans escape from His lips. See how, after having prayed on His knees, eyes humbly cast down, in order to give more intensity and forever to His prayer, the Savior prostrated Himself with His Face to the ground. Contemplate this divine Face lowered even into the dust.
At this moment the anguish of the Man-God redoubles; He feels a kind of mortal agony; a mysterious sweat, a sweat a blood bathes His Face and trickles down His forehead then drop by drop on the ground where He is prostrated. An angel appears to strengthen Him; strengthened by the heavenly aid Jesus rises and accept the chalice which His Father offers to Him. He will drink it with love and to the end.
