O holy angel Raphael, faithful minister of the Lord, sure and zealous guide of the poor pilgrims from time to eternity, we have recourse to you and we humbly ask for your heavenly protection. Life for us, you know, is a journey filled with perils and dangers. The demon, like a monster always bent on our destruction, strives to devour us; he sows traps and pitfalls under our feet; it causes our souls deep and too often fatal wounds; he throws the veil of sin over her eyes, which obscures in her the light of faith and deprives her of the gentle and beneficent rays of the Sun of righteousness. So come to our aid, O blessed Archangel! See our
weakness, the dangers that threaten us, and deign to be our guide. Direct our uncertain steps in the ways of God; let the soft light of the sky shine in our eyes; teach us the proper remedies to cure our souls so weak, so languid; remove the devil from them; teach us to conquer him, to thwart the tricks of his malice, to fight him with prayer and mortification. Do not leave us, we beg you, during the whole course of our perilous journey; support us if we falter, if our courage falters with fatigue and the length of the road. You know that our Heavenly Father, who is also yours, awaits us with anxious solicitude; he fears for our weakness the dangers of the journey. Therefore, redouble your zeal, O charitable spirit, and leave us only by placing ourselves in his arms, so that we may praise him and bless him eternally with you. So be it.
(Meditations on the holy angels, 1867, Josserand editor)
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