Forty Hours Devotion at Church of Holy Innocents This Weekend

The Church of the Holy Innocents will start its annual Forty Hours Devotion this coming Friday, October 25, 2019.    

 First Day: The opening Mass will be on Friday, October 25 at 6PM, and it will be a Votive Mass of the Most Blessed Sacrament.  At the end of the opening Mass, the Blessed Sacrament will be solemnly exposed, there will be a Eucharistic procession inside the church, and the Pange lingua, the Litany of the Saints, and some other special psalms, versicles, and prayers will be chanted.       

Second Day: On the second day, Saturday, October 26at 1PM, we will have the traditional Votive Mass Pro Pace.   

Third Day: The closing Mass will be on Sunday, October 27 at 10:30AM, which will also be the 1st class Feast of Christ the King. This closing Mass will be celebrated coram Sanctissimo (in the presence of the Blessed Sacrament exposed throughout the entire Mass).  At the end of the closing Mass, the Litany of the Saints and other special psalms and prayers will be chanted and we will have another Procession of the Blessed Sacrament inside the church. This Procession will end with Benediction of the Most Blessed Sacrament, the Divine Praises, and the recitation of the Act of Consecration of the Human Race to the Sacred Heart of Jesus. 

While in the Roman Catholic Church there are many Feasts and devotions throughout the year, the Forty Hours Devotion is always awaited and received with extreme joy. “Devotion to the Blessed Sacrament is the queen of all devotions. It is the central devotion of the Church. All others gather round it and group themselves there as satellites; for others celebrate His Mysteries; this is Himself” (~Father Faber). 

The Forty Hours Devotion is surrounded with 3 special dimensions: 1) The protection from evil and temptation; 2) Reparation for our own sins and for the poor souls in purgatory; and 3) Deliverance from political, material and spiritual calamities. All these three things are very much needed in the Church and in society these days!   These petitions (for ourselves, for our neighbors, and for the entire Church) are also expressed in detail in the beautiful Litanies of the Saints that are chanted as part of the opening and the closing Masses for the Forty Hours.  

This beautiful devotion was permanently established by Pope Clement VIII “in order that day and night the faithful might appease their Lord by prayer before the Blessed Sacrament solemnly exposed, imploring there His divine mercy.”  

**The Church of the Holy Innocents (NYC) is still the only parish in the entire Archdiocese of NY that has the Forty Hours Devotion in its traditional form.