Angel of God, my holy guardian, given to me from God from heaven for my protection. I diligently pray to you: enlighten me today, save me from all evil, guide me to good deeds and direct me on the path of salvation.
Have you, children, noticed in yourselves that when you don’t fulfill some of your direct duties, for example, on Sunday you don’t go to church to pray to God, and when you’re not going to school, or when you don’t help people close to you in any way you can, or when you offend someone, then it’s as if someone reproaches you for this, reminding you that you didn’t do what you should have done, that you did a bad thing and by doing so you angered God, who can He will deprive you of His mercy for this and may punish you!..
Who do you think, children, warns and protects you from bad deeds with this suggestion? This is the Guardian Angel, that good invisible spirit that is given by God to man to protect him from troubles. Angels are incorporeal spirits and are much higher than humans in their powers: God sends them into the world so that they help people in the difficult task of salvation.
But a virtuous life on earth, which alone can save a person from eternal death, is a very difficult matter. After all, a person is weak and can make mistakes in everything; instead of something good and useful for himself, he can very easily choose and do something harmful; Instead of a good person, make friends with a bad one and become attached to him. And it is all the easier for each of us to do all this because there is an invisible spirit of evil, the devil, who only knows what to deceive a person, plant sinful thoughts in his soul, seduce him into all sorts of bad deeds and thus drown out the good suggestions of the Guardian Angel. And in order not to succumb to the temptations of the spirit of evil, we need to pray diligently to the Guardian Angel both morning and evening, asking him to enlighten us, teach us to recognize what is good and what is bad in the world, who is a good person and who is evil, and from bad deeds, as well as from bad people, especially from the temptations of the spirit of evil, to keep and preserve us.
This is why the Heavenly Father gave each of us a Guardian Angel, this purest and kindest spirit, so that with his inspiration he would instruct us in good deeds, in difficult cases he would help and keep us from falling, he would lead us during earthly life, so to speak, by the hand along the road of salvation, not allowing us to wander into various dangerous places where the spirit of malice lures people, so that it would be easier to destroy them. We, children, express all this in a short prayer to the Guardian Angel, with which we must certainly turn to him every day, morning and evening. This is the prayer; cross yourself and say it with me in a colloquial dialect that we understand: Angel of God, my holy guardian, given by God from heaven to preserve me, I diligently pray to you, teach me on this day to distinguish between good and bad and at the same time keep me from doing bad, and help me in a good deed and thus put me on the path of salvation. Truly so.
In a church way, this prayer does not sound like colloquial speech. Angel of God, my holy guardian, in the church way it reads: Angel of God, my holy guardian. Given by God from heaven for my preservation - in church terms: given from God from heaven for my preservation. I diligently pray to You - in the church way: I diligently pray to You. Teach me on this day to distinguish between what is good and what is harmful, and at the same time, keep me from doing what is bad, and help me in a good deed in a churchly manner: You enlighten me today, and save me from all evil, and guide me to good deeds. And thus, put me on the road of salvation in the church way: and direct me on the path of salvation. You can also say a short prayer to the Guardian Angel: My holy Guardian Angel, save me from all evil.
What did you children notice about yourself when you did something bad? Who reproached you and at the same time protected you from bad deeds? Why is a Guardian Angel given to a person? What can a person do wrong? How and how does the spirit of evil harm a person? How and what should you ask the Guardian Angel for? How does the Guardian Angel enlighten us? How does it save? How does he instruct on the path of salvation? How is a prayer to the Guardian Angel read? What does it say in the church way that is different from colloquial speech? Which words change only at the end? Which ones sound completely different from their spoken counterparts? What other prayer can you say to the Guardian Angel?