Praying the Lauds - Your Daily Christian Morning Prayer

LISTEN | Morning Prayer - June 8, 2023 | Thursday of the Ninth Week in Ordinary Time "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength. The second is this: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. There is no other commandment greater than these." - Mark 12:30-31 Love is God's greatest command to the human heart...

LISTEN | Morning Prayer - June 7, 2023 | Wednesday of the Ninth Week in Ordinary Time "I am the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. He is the God of the living, not of the dead." - Mark 12:26-27 When we physically die in this life part of us lives on forever. For those who trust in the Lord, Christ promises eternal life. Let us seek to nurture that which no moth on th...

LISTEN | Morning Prayer - June 6, 2023 | Tuesday of the Ninth Week in Ordinary Time "Pay to Caesar what belongs to Caesar and to God what belongs to God." - Mark 12:17 God is the source of everything, and we owe him our gratitude and appreciation for everything he has given us. Since He is the Lord of Creation, He deserves to be truly praised and acknowledged always, even when circumstan...

LISTEN | Morning Prayer - June 5, 2023 | Memorial of St. Boniface, Bishop and Martyr For the first forty years of his life Boniface was known as Wynfrith. He was born in Devon and educated at the monastery at Exeter, and then joined the Benedictine abbey at Nursling, near Southampton. He was a teacher and preacher, but he desired to preach the gospel in a foreign land. In 718, Pope Gregory II comm...

LISTEN | Morning Prayer - June 4, 2023 | Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity The fundamental dogma, on which everything in Christianity is based, is that of the Blessed Trinity in whose name all Christians are baptized. The feast of the Blessed Trinity needs to be understood and celebrated as a prolongation of the mysteries of Christ and as the solemn expression of our faith in this triune life of...

LISTEN | Morning Prayer - June 3, 2023 | Memorial of St. Charles Lwanga and Companions, Martyrs Today is the Memorial of St. Charles Lwanga and Companions (d. 1886), the companions numbering twenty-one other Ugandan martyrs. They are the first martyrs of Sub-Saharan Africa and true witnesses of the Christian faith. Charles Lwanga, a catechist and a young leader, was martyred in 1886 with a group o...

LISTEN | Morning Prayer - June 2, 2023 | Memorial of Saints Marcellinus and Peter, Martyrs Pope St Damasus I dedicated his life to establishing and strengthening the Church after the great persecutions, and took much care over the restoration of the Roman catacombs and the proper burial of the martyrs there, including Marcellinus and Peter. As a boy, Pope Damasus had heard the story of these marty...

LISTEN | Morning Prayer - June 1, 2023 | Feast of Our Lord Jesus Christ, the Eternal High Priest On the first Thursday after Pentecost, the Feast of Our Lord Jesus Christ, the Eternal High Priest is observed on the particular calendars in Spain, Poland, Netherlands, Czech Republic and England and Wales. Approval for this feast was first granted by the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discip...

LISTEN | Morning Prayer - May 31, 2023 | Feast of the Visitation of the Blessed Virgin Mary "The moment your greeting sounded in my ears, the baby within me suddenly leapt for joy.'" - Luke 1:44 Is your presence a cause of joy for others? God's presence in us is life-giving. Joy accompanies those whose feet walk in the ways of God. Like Mary's and Elizabeth's, this joy is not easy and pain-free. A...

LISTEN | Morning Prayer - May 30, 2023 | Tuesday of the Eighth Week in Ordinary Time "Peter spoke up and said, 'We have given up everything to follow you.'" - Mark 10:28 Everything we have is a gift from God. He sees our acts of generosity and He promises to reward us in abundant measure. God doesn't match our generosity. He surpasses it a hundredfold so that our joy may be full. Join the universa...

LISTEN | Morning Prayer - May 29, 2023 | Memorial of the Blessed Virgin Mary, Mother of the Church "Go, sell what you have and give the money to the poor and you will have riches in heaven. Then come and follow me." - Mark 10:21 We can be obedient to God when we follow His commandments. But He calls us beyond obedience. As disciples of Christ, we are called to give Him all that we have and are in...

LISTEN | Morning Prayer - May 28, 2023 | Pentecost Sunday "Receive the Holy Spirit." - John 20:22 God cannot be outdone in generosity. By sending us the Holy Spirit, He too invites us to live a life of generous service to our brothers and sisters by sharing our giftedness to build His Body, the Church. How do you glorify God in and through the Holy Spirit? Join the universal Church in praying the...

LISTEN | Morning Prayer - May 27, 2023 | Saturday of the Seventh Week of Easter "Follow me." - John 21:22 It is a very human reaction to compare ourselves to others even when it comes to our spiritual life. But Jesus reminds us today to keep our eyes fixed on Him and not on others. Instead of spending time if others are kinder than us or serving the Lord better than us, let us focus our time givin...

LISTEN | Morning Prayer - May 26, 2023 | Memorial of St. Philip Neri, priest "Simon, son of John, do you love me more than these do?" - John 21:15 To love as Jesus loves is nearly impossible. But in our striving to be like Him, we allow our Risen Lord to purify our way of loving and let it grow in perfection. While we are in this journey, God does not wait for us to be perfect but accepts whatever...

LISTEN | Morning Prayer - May 25, 2023 | Thursday of the Seventh Week of Easter "I pray not only for these, but also for those who through their word will also believe in me." - John 17:20 God sees you and the efforts you make to remain in Him. At times you fail, but with hope, humility and courage, you get up again trusting in God's loving mercy and forgiveness. Keep walking and you will find oth...

LISTEN | Morning Prayer - May 24, 2023 | Wednesday of the Seventh Week of Easter "I do not ask you to remove them from the world, but to keep them from the evil one." - John 17:11-19 Jesus did not pray that His disciples would be protected from the struggles of this world but that God may strengthen them as they pass through it. It is easy to be faithful when all is going well. But it is in the tr...

LISTEN | Morning Prayer - May 23, 2023 | Tuesday in the Seventh Week of Easter "Holy Father, keep those you have given me in your name, so that they may be one, as we also are." - John 17:11 How blessed we are to have our Lord as our King, Prophet and Priest! God desires nothing more than to have us united in Him, to share in His eternal loving. Whenever we feel that our sin is drifting us away fr...

LISTEN | Morning Prayer - May 22, 2023 | Monday in the Seventh Week of Easter "I have told you all this, so that in me you may have peace. You will have trouble in the world, but courage! I have overcome the world." - John 16 Our peace lies in the Lord. When we are rooted in Christ, nothing can shake us despite the darkness and confusion in the world. Let us continuously renew our faith in the hol...

LISTEN | Morning Prayer - May 21, 2023 | Solemnity of the Ascension of the Lord "I am with you always even to the end of the world..." - Mt 18:20 How comforting Jesus' words are to us who struggle to follow Him. No matter the circumstance we may find ourselves in, Jesus assures us of His most loving presence within and among us. Just as we encounter Him in prayer and in our relationship with other...

LISTEN | Morning Prayer - May 20, 2023 | Saturday of the Sixth Week of Easter "...that they may all be one; just as You, Father, are in Me and I in You, that they also may be in Us, so that the world may believe that You sent Me." - John 17:21 God's love is extravagant! He desires us to share in their Trinitarian unity so that we may be with Him wherever He is. This means the joy of...

LISTEN | Morning Prayer - May 19, 2023 | Friday of the Sixth Week of Easter "But I will see you again, and your heart shall rejoice; and your joy no man shall take from you." - John 16:22 Goodbyes generally cause sorrow and fear. The disciples were mournful of Jesus' goodbye, but knowing their hearts, Christ assures his followers that their sorrow at his departure will only be tempor...

LISTEN | Morning Prayer - May 18, 2023 | Thursday of the Sixth Week of Easter "A little while and you will no longer see me, and again a little while later and you will se me." - John 16:16 God has destined us for eternal life. Everything we experience in our earthly life will come to pass. All things are small compared to the greater reality that awaits those who believe. The disciples...

LISTEN | Morning Prayer - May 17, 2023 | Wednesday of the Sixth Week of Easter "When he comes, the Spirit of truth, he will guide you to all truth." - John 16:13 Aside from the Holy Spirit being our Advocate, it is also the role of the Spirit to guide us into all truth -- that is, in all that is necessary to be known, in all that is useful and profitable for our life with God, in all doc...

LISTEN | Morning Prayer - May 16, 2023 | Tuesday of the Sixth Week of Easter "It is better for you that I go. For if I do not go, the Advocate will not come to you." - John 16:7 The earthly life of Jesus, the Word Incarnate, would come to an end. In a few days, we will be celebrating His ascension to heaven where He will sit at the right hand of the Father. He had spent the last years of...

LISTEN | Morning Prayer - May 15, 2023 | Memorial of St. Isidore the Farmer "How wonderful is God among his saints: come, let us adore him." - antiphon St. Isidore was born near Madrid to very poor parents. He was a Spanish laborer who worked most of his life as a ploughman for a nobleman who lived near Madrid, Spain. Although working many hours a day, he never failed to attend daily Mas...