St. Alphonsus Liguori taught that prayer is necessary for salvation in adults. According to Sacred Scripture, we “ought always to pray and not lose heart.” (Lk 18:1) Our Lord said, “Ask, and it will be given to you” (Mt 7:7). “Watch and pray that you may not enter into temptation.” (Mt 26:41)
St. Alphonsus pointed out the reason of the necessity of prayer is that without the assistance of God’s grace we can no good thing. St. Leo the Great said, “Man does no good thing, except that which God, by his grace, enables him to do.”
St. Augustine said, “God gives us some things, as the beginning of faith, even when we do not pray. Other things, such as perseverance, he has only provided for those who pray.” St. Thomas Aquinas said, “After baptism, continual prayer is necessary to man, in order that he may enter heaven; for though by baptism our sins are remitted, there still remain concupiscence to assail us from within, and the world and the devil to assail us from without.”
St. Alphonsus explained: “From these two premises, on the one hand, that we can do nothing without the assistance of grace; and on the other, that this assistance is only given ordinarily by God to the man that prays, who does not see that the consequence follows, that prayer is absolutely necessary to us for salvation?”
St. Gregory said, “Man by prayer merits to receive that which God had from all eternity determined to give him.” St. Alphonsus explained: “Not, says St. Thomas, that prayer is necessary in order that God may know our necessities, but in order that we may know the necessity of having recourse to God to obtain the help necessary for our salvation, and may thus acknowledge him to be the author of all our good. As, therefore, it is God’s law that we should provide ourselves with bread by sowing corn, and with wine by planting vines; so has he ordained that we should receive the graces necessary to salvation by means of prayer: Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and you shall find.”
St. John Chrysostom said, “As the body without the soul cannot live, so the soul without prayer is dead and emits an offensive odour.” St. Augustine said, “As the flesh is nourished by food, so is man supported by prayers.” Since prayer is so crucial, St. Vincent de Paul said, “There is certainly nothing more useful than prayer. Therefore, we ought to entertain great esteem and love for it and employ every effort to make it well.”
The greatest grace we should pray for is the grace of final perseverance. Our Lord made this promise to St. Margaret Mary Alacoque: “I promise you in the excessive mercy of my Heart that my all-powerful love will grant to all those who receive Holy Communion on the First Fridays in nine consecutive months the grace of final perseverance; they shall not die in my disgrace, nor without receiving their sacraments. My divine Heart shall be their safe refuge in this last moment.”
On Dec. 10, 1925, Our Lady told Sister Lucia Santos: “Look, my daughter, at my Heart surrounded with thorns with which ungrateful men pierce me every moment by their blasphemies and ingratitude. You at least try to console me and say that I promise to assist at the hour of death, with all the graces necessary for salvation, all those who on the first Saturday of five consecutive months, shall confess, receive Holy Communion, recite five decades of the Rosary, and keep me company for fifteen minutes while meditating on the mysteries of the Rosary, with the intention of making reparation to me.”
May true devotion to the Hearts of Jesus and Mary helps us to be faithful in daily prayer and obtain for us the grace of final perseverance.
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天主降福祈禱的信徒
聖亞爾豐索教導，為成人的救恩，祈禱是需要的。根據聖經所載『人應當時常祈禱，不要灰心。』（路18：1）我主說：『你們求，必要給你們。』（瑪7：7）『醒寤祈禱吧! 免陷於誘惑。』（瑪26：41）
聖亞爾豐索指出需要祈禱的理由，就是沒有天主的聖寵我們做不了好事。聖良一世說：『人做不到好事，除非天主以祂的聖寵使他去做』。
聖奧斯定說：『天主在我們沒有祈求下給我們一些東西，例如信仰的開端。其他的，例如堅持到底，天主只給與作祈禱的人。』聖多馬斯、阿奎那說：『領洗後，為能進入天國，持續的祈禱是需要的；因為藉著聖洗，我們的罪得以赦免，可是尚存的私慾偏情，在內裡攻擊我們，世俗和魔鬼在外面攻擊我們。』
聖亞爾豐索解釋道：『在這兩前提上，其一是，沒有聖寵的扶助，我們做不了什麼；其二是，這種扶助，天主一般只給與作祈禱的人，他看不見祈禱的後果，祈禱為救恩卻是絕對需要的。』
聖額我略說：『人藉祈禱得蒙天主從永恆就決定要賜給的恩惠。』聖亞爾豐索解釋說：『聖多馬斯說，祈禱是必要的不是要讓天主知道我們的需要，而是要我們知道為得到為救恩所需的幫助，我們必需投靠天主，由此我們宣認祂是一切美好的創造者。所以這是天主的律法，我們做飽要播種玉米，做酒要種植葡萄；因此祂授命我們要作祈禱去接受救恩所需的聖寵：你們求，必要給你們；你們找，必要找著。』
聖金口若望說：『正如肉身沒有靈魂不能生存，沒有祈禱的靈魂是死的並發出厭惡的氣味。』聖奧斯定說：『就如肉體為食物所滋養，所以人是為祈禱所支持。』因為祈禱是如此重要，聖雲先保祿說：『肯定地沒有什麼東西比祈禱有用。所以我們要處以重大的敬重和愛它，並盡全力去善作它。』
我們所要祈求的最大聖寵是堅持到底。我主向聖女瑪加利大承諾：『我以我心滿溢的慈悲承諾，我全能的力量容許所有連續九個月的第一個星期五領聖體的信徒恆心至死的恩寵；他們不會在失去我的聖寵中，或在沒有領受臨終聖事死去。我至聖聖心會是他們臨終時的避難所。』
在1925年，12月10日，聖母告訴路濟亞修女：『看，我的女兒，我的心纏繞著荊棘，是被那些不領情人的褻瀆和不知恩所刺傷。你至少要能安慰我，我承諾那些連續五個月的第一個星期六，懷著向我賠補的意向去辦告解，領聖體，誦念五端玫瑰經，並時與我相伴十五分鐘默想玫瑰經奧跡的信徒，在臨終時我會以為救恩所需要的一切恩寵來幫助。』
願向耶穌聖心和聖母聖心的真正敬禮能夠幫助我們忠於每日的祈禱並為我們得獲恆心至死的聖寵。
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