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The Power of Daily Mass: How Frequent Participation in the Eucharist Can Transform Your Life
The Power of Daily Mass: How Frequent Participation in the Eucharist Can Transform Your Life
The Power of Daily Mass: How Frequent Participation in the Eucharist Can Transform Your Life
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The Power of Daily Mass: How Frequent Participation in the Eucharist Can Transform Your Life

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Bestselling author, speaker, editor, and media personality Bert Ghezzi has been a leading figure in American Catholic life for more than forty years. In The Power of Daily Mass, he reveals how the Eucharist is the center of his daily life and calls him to witness the Real Presence of Christ to others in his work and relationships. Ghezzi shows how frequent participation in the Mass offers participants courage and hope to face everyday challenges, provides direction and encouragement through the scriptures, allows time to reflect and talk to the Lord, and is an opportunity to intercede for family and friends.

Using quotations from saints and testimonies from fellow daily Mass attendees, Ghezzi encourages Catholics to grow closer to Jesus and receive Christ’s power for daily Christian living through the Eucharist. Ghezzi highlights how more frequent participation in weekday Mass is a wonderful way to grow in love for the Lord and receive the guidance for living that can only come from scripture and the Eucharist.
LanguageEnglish
Release dateJan 26, 2015
ISBN9781594715631
The Power of Daily Mass: How Frequent Participation in the Eucharist Can Transform Your Life
Author

Bert Ghezzi

A popular Catholic author and speaker, Bert Ghezzi has written twenty-six books, including The Heart of Catholicism,Voices of the Saints, Mystics and Miracles, and Prayers to the Holy Spirit. Hundreds of his articles have appeared in the religious press. Ghezzi has been involved in religious education for more than forty years. He has served as a leader and teacher in several Catholic renewal movements and has spoken at numerous educational and renewal conferences throughout the United States and Canada. He appears frequently as a guest on EWTN, which also features his television series Signs of Our Times. Ghezzi is often interviewed on Catholic radio and his two-minute spots on saints play regularly on EWTN radio. After receiving his Ph.D. from the University of Notre Dame, Ghezzi worked for seven years as a professor at Grand Valley State University in Michigan. He has served as a senior editor for five publishing companies since 1975 and now works as an acquisitions editor for Our Sunday Visitor’s book division. Bert and Mary Lou, his wife of fifty years, have seven children and sixteen grandchildren. The Ghezzis live in Winter Park, Florida. You can read Ghezzi’s blog at www.bertghezzi.com.

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    The Power of Daily Mass - Bert Ghezzi

    This book is not just for those who don’t yet go to daily Mass, but also for those who do. It reveals how powerful and relevant each Mass is for our lives, and will inspire and challenge you to really make the Eucharist your ‘daily bread.’

    Vinny Flynn

    Author of 7 Secrets of the Eucharist

    Bert Ghezzi invites us to celebrate the blessings of daily Mass. He shows how the various parts of the Mass, culminating in the reception of the Eucharist, contain a rainbow of reasons why daily Mass is so valuable. Ample use of quotations from Church fathers, theologians, saints, and daily Mass attendees add vibrancy to his words. I highly recommend this book to Catholics looking for a guide to live a holy life.

    Rev. Robert J. Hater

    Author of Common Sense Catechetics

    "Bert Ghezzi does a masterful job of telling Catholics about The Power of Daily Mass. He is thorough, helping readers to remember the power of the Eucharist and the need to take time after Mass to contemplate the goodness of God. This book will help anyone who wants to understand both the Mass and the Catholic Church. Don’t overlook the appendices."

    Deacon Henry Libersat

    Author of Catholic and Confident

    Unless otherwise noted, scripture texts in this work are taken from the New American Bible, revised edition © 2010, 1991, 1986, 1970 Confraternity of Christian Doctrine, Washington, DC, and are used by permission of the copyright owner. All Rights Reserved. No part of the New American Bible may be reproduced in any form without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

    Scripture quotations marked NJB are taken from the New Jerusalem Bible, copyright © 1985 by Darton, Longman & Todd, Ltd., and Doubleday, a division of Bantam Doubleday Dell Publishing Group, Inc. Used with permission of the publisher.

    ____________________________________

    © 2015 by Bert Ghezzi

    All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever, except in the case of reprints in the context of reviews, without written permission from Ave Maria Press®, Inc., P.O. Box 428, Notre Dame, IN 46556, 1-800-282-1865.

    Founded in 1865, Ave Maria Press is a ministry of the United States Province of Holy Cross.

    www.avemariapress.com

    Paperback: ISBN-13 978-1-59471-562-4

    E-book: ISBN-13 978-1-59471-563-1

    Cover image © Agnus Images.

    Cover and text design by Katherine Robinson.

    Printed and bound in the United States of America.

    Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

    Ghezzi, Bert.

    The power of daily mass : how frequent participation in the Eucharist can transform your spiritual life / Bert Ghezzi.

    pages cm

    Includes bibliographical references and index.

    ISBN 978-1-59471-562-4 -- ISBN 1-59471-562-9

    1. Lord’s Supper--Frequency of communion 2. Mass--Frequency of celebration. 3. Lord’s Supper--Catholic Church. I. Title.

    BX2236.6.G44 2015

    264’.36--dc23

    2014037306

    For the Daily Mass Community

    at

    St. Mary Magdalen Catholic Church,

    Altamonte Springs, Florida

    Also by Bert Ghezzi

    The Heart of Catholicism

    Voices of the Saints

    The Saints Devotional Bible (compiler/editor)

    Prayers to the Holy Spirit

    Discover Christ (coauthor)

    Saints at Heart

    Everyday Encounters with God (coauthor)

    The Sign of the Cross

    Mystics and Miracles

    Living the Sacraments

    Getting Free

    Contents

    Preface

    Acknowledgments

    1. Every Day with Jesus

    2. Honoring the Saints

    3. Daily Repentance

    4. Taking the Word to Heart

    5. Frequent Intercession

    6. Offering Ourselves to God

    7. Offering the Eternal Sacrifice

    8. Our Daily Bread

    9. Equipped for the Day’s Service

    Afterword

    Appendix I: Prayers before Mass

    Appendix II: Prayers after Mass

    Appendix III: The General Roman Calendar Adapted for the United States of America

    Appendix IV: Holy Days of Obligation in the United States of America

    Appendix V: Liturgical Feasts of Mary

    Resources

    Notes

    Preface

    For the past eight years, I have attended daily Mass at my parish. I gather at 7 a.m. with a community of men and women who have become my close friends. When I decided to write this book, I asked many of them to tell me about the effect daily Mass has had on their lives. They reported a variety of benefits:

    Daily Mass . . .

    gives me courage and hope to face daily challenges and problems;

    lets me participate in the greatest of miracles—the Eucharistic presence of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ;

    makes me aware of how much God loves me;

    realigns me to God’s plan for my life;

    allows me to feel free to talk to the Lord;

    gives me an opportunity to intercede for family and friends.

    You will read more of their observations in the following pages. Once I asked a young visitor to our 7 a.m. liturgy why he came to Mass. He said, Because I love Jesus. His heartfelt response undergirds all the other beneficial effects my friends reported.

    I experience many of the same benefits. I especially take away from the readings a word that encourages me or gives me direction. Today, for example, I heard the Lord speak to me about calming my irritability with these words from James: Be . . . slow to anger, for anger does not accomplish the righteousness of God (Jas 1:19–20). I need to do that because I don’t want to be a hearer only.

    The highlight for me is receiving the Lord’s Body and Blood in Communion. That the God who fashioned the universe of 300 billion trillion stars comes to me fills me with awe. As I kneel in reflection, I often remember Curtis Martin’s profound observation that we are living monstrances, bearing the Real Presence into our lives and relationships.¹

    Worshiping at daily Mass offers you all these benefits and more. I designed this little book to describe them and show how to receive them. Each chapter presents one aspect of our participation in the Lord’s eternal sacrifice, and each chapter gives you a chance to reflect on the graces we receive as we celebrate the re-presentation of the death and resurrection of Jesus. As you read this book, you will review with me the way daily Mass forgives little sins; allows you to hear God speaking to you in scripture; gives you the opportunity both to offer yourself to God and also to offer Christ’s sacrifice with him; provides spiritual nourishment from eating Christ’s Body and drinking his Blood; and strengthens you for your day’s activities and challenges.

    The Power of Daily Mass is a book for all Catholics. Those who already attend daily Mass will it inspires them by broadening their understanding and reinforcing their experience. It will encourage those who attend once in a while to get to daily Mass more regularly, and I hope the book will persuade many others to consider building Mass into their daily routine.

    Acknowledgments

    The faithful commitment of my sisters and brothers at my parish’s daily Mass community convinced me to write this book and they

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