LSM’s Monthly Prayer Guide
This resource is a guide for our movement members to use collectively or individually every month. Each month this prayer guide brings reflections and testimonies from different members of our global movement to inspire you to pray, contemplate, reflect, and act for creation. This month’s edition was prepared by Brother Benedict Ayodi from Kenya and Fr. Yannick Essengue SJ, from the Democratic Republic of Congo, with the support of Suzana Moreira, from Brazil, and the strategic work by Guada García Corigliano from Argentina, design work by Marco Vargas from Ecuador, as well as work from others of the Communications team spread across the Americas and translators spread across the world.
If you prefer, you can download this resource in PDF format by clicking here.
How to use this prayer guide for an encounter
This year we are making some changes to this guide so it can better support you and your community. Here are a few tips for you to use this guide as the structure of an encounter:
- Read the full guide to familiarize yourself with the content and plan how you will use it in the encounter.
- Hold the encounter through the three steps: Hear Creation’s Song, Creation’s Cry, and Creation’s Call, making sure to prioritize time for common prayer, contemplative silence, and personal and shared reflection.
- After the encounter, remember to thank the participants and start planning for the next one, as well as continue to pray throughout the month with the month’s intention and prayer.
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Hear Creation’s Song
For Mary, Queen of Creation, to intercede for the sufferings of the Earth and the poor
“Just as her pierced heart mourned the death of Jesus, so now she grieves for the sufferings of the crucified poor and for the creatures of this world laid waste by human power.” (LS 241)
An image of the Congo river from the Brazzaville side, in the Democratic Republic of Congo, DRC
Prayer to Mary
The Angel of the Lord announced that you would love
And creation was overjoyed
And smiled in the walnut trees and danced in the
flowers.
And you, Mary, simple woman, woman of the people
You said “yes” to the novelty of the Kingdom
And the whole earth became pregnant with verses
And dreamed of justice and distilled delicacies.
“Behold the handmaid of the Lord,” you said
and you allowed God to be God in your dwellings
and thus you pointed out the happy route of the
beatitudes.
And it was done unto you according to the Word
And God came to be in you as a furrow opening.
And the Word became flesh, became a body, became
blood
And the divine became matter, making the love of the
Father tangible.
Because of that, God dwells among us
In the genetic novelty and the infinity of the cosmos
In the waves of the sea and in all the hands willing to
learn how to love.
The incarnate, materialized God is among us:
Life project, from the ground to the sky
Life project, resilience and consolation.
The Angel of the Lord announced that you would love
And he keeps announcing that another world is possible
If the cry of the poor transforms selfishness into bread
and hugs
If the weeping desert fertilizes our wit and guides our
steps
If the abandoned animals move us to join hearts and
weave more ties.
From these human mangers that we are
We ask you, Mother, that the Kingdom
that your
Baby proclaims may come.
May the knowledge of love arise in us,
with its wonder and grace.
And may each basin be a new cradle
where ecology rhymes in harmony,
Where justice plays with smiles
and where Christmas is more
than a rite, it is pregnancy,
covenant, embrace, fraternal
communion,
cosmic Eucharist, sacred liturgy of a
better world.
(By Alirio Caceres, from the LSM Prayer Book)
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Hear Creation’s Cry
Monthly reflection to deepen our eco-conversion
Mary, new Eve in the morning of the new creation
Fr. Yannick Essengue, SJ, LSA, Brazzaville, Democratic Republic of Congo
Fr. Yannick Essengue is Jesuit from Cameroon, on a mission in the Democratic Republic of Congo. He works as an Assistant Director of CERC, a research center. He is a PhD Candidate in codirection between Jean Jaurès University of Toulouse and Marien Ngouabi University of Brazzaville. He is a Laudato Si’ Animator and a Trainer of Trainers.
All these days, we walk with the risen Christ who on Easter morning rose with the sun, and each day rises with a new day for humanity, like entering into a new creation. God’s plan is fulfilled in all its magnitude. According to the Ignatian tradition contained in the Spiritual Exercises of Saint Ignatius, Mary is the first person to whom Jesus appeared, although not mentioned in Scripture. In this sense, Saint Ignatius considers her the first disciple and the first to accept God’s plan (cf. Spiritual Exercises, 215-218). The Resurrection was not a plan to demonstrate God’s power, but the fruit of an inner illumination, an act, a profession of faith. At the foot of Jesus’ cross, Mary and John witnessed God’s suffering. On the morning of the Resurrection, they were also the first to receive the Good News, made flesh and alive again, with an illuminated gaze and an illuminating smile, as they were transported to the joy of the Resurrection, the spiritual joy.
This is particularly striking in the meditation that Saint Ignatius of Loyola proposes to those who practice the Spiritual Exercises in the fourth week (the last stage before the end of the thirty-day retreat). In the first preamble, which recalls the story: “This is how, after Christ had breathed his last on the cross and the body remained separated from the soul, the divinity still being united to him, the blessed soul descended into hell, united in the same way to the divinity; and, after having drawn from there the just souls and having come to the sepulcher, resurrected, he appeared in body and soul to his blessed mother.” (Spiritual Exercises, 219). This passage, meditated on as we contemplate the appearance of Jesus to his mother, reminds us how she is associated in such a special way with the project of new creation represented by the Paschal event. It is a new era for all those souls who were once at the bottom of the abyss, but who find new life in Jesus, who emerges victorious from death. For us, Mary Mother of Creation is also Mary Mother of the Poor. Mary is thus the extension of that ancient promise made to Abraham, the first believer: “In you will all the families of the earth be blessed” (Gen 28:14), for she is indeed the one blessed among all women (cf. Lk 1:42).
Mary, Mother of the Resurrected Christ and witness to the light of the first morning of the New Creation, through your Son, obtain for us the breath of life, obtain for us the grace of the blessed fruit of your womb to raise the new wave. The wave that will carry us on the wings of faith towards the Risen One who is ascending towards heaven, carrying with him the cries of suffering souls, bruised by injustice, exploitation, and misery, where we will finally be able to burn with the same desire for the One who is and who burns without being consumed.
The waters of Lake Tanganyika, in Burundi, have been rising. After months of relentless rainfall, people experienced “devastating effects” that have displaced nearly 100,000 people.
Questions for reflection
- The month of May in the Catholic Church is often the month that churches across the world dedicate to reflecting on our blessed mother and mother of Christ, Mary. How is your relationship with Mary? Reflect on how she is a witness to the Good News of Jesus Christ and, therefore, witness to the Good News for all of creation.
- In Laudato Si’, n. 241, Pope Francis calls Mary the Queen of all creation and offers some reflections on her maternal affection for this wounded world. When you and your community reflect on the cries of the Earth and the poor, do you consider how these pierce Mary’s heart? Think about the pain of a mother who watches the great work of her son being destroyed. How would you comfort such a mother?
- Despite all the pain and violence that Mary witnessed in her son’s life, she was able to see the glory of the resurrection and become a witness of love and new life. How may the Resurrected Christ be calling you to witness love and new life where you are right now, even amidst pain and injustices? Ask Mary to “enable us to look at this world with eyes of wisdom” (LS 241).
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Hearing Creation’s Call
This month’s call to action
Participate in a local encounter during Laudato Si’ Week
From May 19 to 26, a new edition of Laudato Si’ Week will be held under the theme Seeds of Hope, dedicated to inspiring new habits.
Convinced along with Pope Francis that “there are no lasting changes without cultural changes… and there are no cultural changes without personal changes” (LD 70), Catholics around the world will join in daily challenges that motivate changes in personal habits, and gradually transform societies.
Join us in this Laudato Si’ Week by celebrating with your community, circle or chapter members, a local encounter that will also unite us on our journey to 2025. Your active participation is crucial in shaping our common future as a decentralized Movement. Check out the last news here.
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