Archbishop Sheen preached and practised for more than sixty years as a priest that the Holy Hour is a most powerful means of combating evil. He writes of this daily practice in his autobiography Treasure in Clay, when he explains:
"First, the Holy Hour is not a devotion, it is a sharing in the work of redemption. Our Blessed Lord used the words "hour" and "day" in two totally different connotations in the Gospel of John. "Day" belongs to God; the "hour" belongs to evil.
Seven times in the Gospel of John, the word "hour" is used, and in each instance it refers to the demonic, and to the moments when Christ is no longer in the Father's Hands, but in the hands of men. In the Garden, Our Lord contrasted two "hours" - one was the evil hour "this is your hour" - with which Judas could turn out the lights of the world.
In contrast Our Lord asked: "Could you not watch one hour with Me?" In other words He asked for an hour of reparation to combat the hour of evil; an hour of victimal union with the Cross to overcome the anti-love of sin. "
