Praying with the Foyers de Charité

Text by Marthe Robin on prayer

“Who can describe the gifts of truth, peace, strength, consolation and hope that prayer can place and let loose within a soul.
It is not only light, but also warmth and life.

Prayer is the perfume that allures,
the freshness that captivates,
the lover that draws you near,
the grace that intoxicates and the sweetness that delights.

If the soul is sad, it raises it up.
If it is sleeping, it wakes it.
If it is joyful, it moderates it.
If it is in darkness, it is the divine ray of light that gently descends upon it to carry it off in God.”

Marthe Robin

Every day, the members of the community and retreatants give themselves to Jesus through Mary. That is why they say the “I choose you today, O Mary” prayer. It is also through this prayer that the members of the community make their permanent consecration to the work of the Foyers de Charité.

I choose you today, O Mary

I choose you today,
O Mary,
in the presence of the angels and saints in heaven
for my Mother and my Queen. I give and consecrate to you,
in obedience and love,
my body and my soul,
all I am and all I have
and all the good I may do,
past, present and future,
putting
myself
and all that belongs to me
entirely at your service
for the greater glory of God
in time and in eternity.

Saint Louis-Marie Grignion of Montfort

Other prayer times give a certain structure to the day of each Foyer de Charité: The Eucharist, eucharistic adoration and the rosary in particular. You may join us in this prayer life if you wish by contacting the nearest Foyer to where you live.

O beloved Mother
This prayer that Marthe Robin wrote on the day of All Saints and is said every day in the Foyers de Charité.

O beloved Mother, you know the ways of holiness and love so well, teach us to often raise our minds and hearts to the Trinity, fixing our respectful and affectionate attention on the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.

And since you guide us along the path to eternal life, stay close to us poor pilgrims, open your arms to us, turn your merciful eyes towards us, bring your clarity to us, cover us with your sweetness, take us into light and love, and always help us go a step further and higher into the splendours of heaven.

May our peace remain undisturbed and may the thought of God be always on our minds. May every new minute take us deeper into the depths of your venerable mystery until the day that our fully blossomed souls, illuminated by divine union, will see all things in the eternal Love and Unity.

Marthe Robin