Devotion to our guardian angels

WE need to be more familiar with this devotion. It’s actually a very helpful one in our daily affairs, since our guardian angels are our direct link to God. They see and attend to God face to face, and serve as his agents and messengers to us. They can give us a lot of help.

Even in our material needs, we can ask them to facilitate things. It may just be a matter of looking for a parking space in a crowded place, or of asking for safety and security when we travel. We should not hesitate to ask them for help. It’s their pleasure to be of help.

Many saints have attested to the great service they give. Opus Dei founder, St. Josemaria Escriva, for example, had a deep devotion to his guardian angel, and said that one time he was attacked by someone while walking on a road. Suddenly another person, a complete stranger to him, came to defend him.

When this person put St. Josemaria back to his feet and before leaving him, he told St. Josemaria something that St. Josemaria kept only to himself. No one else knew it, except his confessor.

The person addressed St. Josemaria as “mangy donkey,” an appellation the saint sometimes called himself, I suppose, to poke some fun on himself. The saint was convinced it was his guardian angel who helped him in that episode. For how else would that person know that expression?

One time, I had this classmate of mine, a much older lady who used to work as the personal secretary of a former First Lady. She told me a very interesting anecdote about her guardian angel.

She said that one time she took a boat trip to Hong Kong. When she arrived there, there was a heavy rain such that it was difficult for her to get a taxi. There were just too many passengers competing for a taxi.

While waiting long for a taxi, she remembered that St. Josemaria Escriva would ask his guardian angel to help him out in some difficult situations. And so she prayed to her guardian angel for a taxi. Immediately, according to her, an empty taxi stopped right in front of her. She could not believe her eyes!

But our guardian angels are even more helpful to us as in our task of navigating the most tricky spiritual and supernatural realities. When there are strong temptations, or when some unknown evil spirits seem to bother us, or when we are undertaking a spiritual and supernatural project like coming up with an apostolic initiative, our guardian angels make themselves available to help us in any way.

Moreover, it is said that our final state in heaven will be like that of angels, where our bodily condition will be fully integrated to the spirit. Again many saints have attested to the veracity of this phenomenon.

We should try our best to have a closer relationship with our guardian angels. We can give them a name, and call them for any need we have. We should also greet the guardian angels of the persons we meet everywhere, so our dealings with them would be facilitated.

We have to spread this devotion more widely, and enable many people to avail of the many precious services our guardian angels give us. Things will be a lot different, will be lot better, to be sure, when this devotion is lived.