Today we celebrate the External Solemnity of the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus. I remember an icon of the Sacred Heart of Jesus hung in our family altar, a beautiful image of Jesus lovingly pointing to His heart as a gesture of Love and His invitation to adore and worship Him. Every time I glanced at that image, I felt joy, love, and peace. My mother had a great devotion to the Sacred Heart. She wore a scapular of the Sacred Heart, and every Friday she did the consecration to the most Sacred Heart of Jesus. Maybe because of her deep spirituality and devotion, the Lord granted her mercy and love and rewarded her with two Augustinian priest-sons.
The most Sacred Heart of Jesus was introduces to St. Margaret Mary Alacoque, a Visitation nun in France in the year 1670s with several apparitions of Jesus to her. It was an apparition that convinced St. Margaret to propagate the devotion throughout the world to express Jesus’ pure love for humanity. Jesus offered himself on the cross to show His mercy and redemption; thus, we too in return have to offer allegiance and love for God. We have countless devotions in the church, but we must always understand only one common message, that is, God emphasizes His love and mercy. This devotion to the Sacred Heart manifests joy and love. When we look at the icon, it summons us to enter into the divine source of charity. St. Margaret Mary described her experience of the Lord: “My Divine Heart is so passionately fond of the human race and of you.” It is our responsibility to reveal God’s love throughout the world by our good works, mercy, love, and kindness, for these are treasures of His heart. We must unite ourselves with Jesus’ mystical Heart that loves and makes our joy complete. It is the heart, the core of our humanity, with love, emotions, desires, and the force of the human will. The heart that is open will have that ability and the capacity to absorb Jesus’ Heart. In the Heart of Jesus, we experience His mercy and His infinite wish to be in a relationship with us.
The gospel of St. John reminds us that Jesus is the One who empties himself out for others, desiring our eternal salvation, seeking out the lost and, ultimately, offering His life on the cross. Every word, action, attitude, and ministry of Jesus manifests a perfect, pure, and selfless love for humanity. Jesus manifests His unconditional, infinite, and divine love of His Heart which is the power to heal the world of its hatred, sin, and rejection of God. This is the radical act of love and redemption.
Jesus’ death on the cross and resurrection is the gentle yet powerful absorption, refraction, and transformation of violence into love, sin into grace, hatred into forgiveness and death into life. The triumph of the Sacred Heart is the ultimate victory of love. With what is happening all over the world, our contemporary society must end violence of terrorism, mass shootings, abuse of children and the vulnerable, and defend human life and dignity so that we may find hope, healing, and peace through the Sacred Heart of Jesus Christ.
Sacred Heart devotion is not magic, but it is a sacred path for us to encounter the fullness of the Gospel which is simply God’s saving love poured out for us in Jesus Christ.
As we steadily progress in our knowledge and communion with the Lord, we will fall ever more deeply in love with Jesus and live out that transforming and redemptive relationship in every detail of our lives. This devotion unites our minds, hearts and wills in one great act of oblation — a total gift of self to the One who has first offered himself completely to and for us.
Lastly, Bishop Baron in his book on the Eucharist, wrote that Jesus is “breaking His heart in compassion.” When we receive Jesus’ Body during communion, what conscious thought does this bring to your heart? Do you accept it as a visible image of Jesus’ Sacred Heart? In the Eucharist, Jesus completely gives himself to us, literally entering into our bodies, souls, and lives. It is for us to encounter the love of the Lord.
Every First Friday, please consider consecrating your marriage, family, home, and life to the Sacred Heart in a formal way. It makes a big difference.
God bless you.
Fr. Arlon, osa
