Today’s Solemnity goes to the core of Christianity,
literally; the word core, comes from the latin word, cordium, which means,
heart. Christianity, the way of
following Jesus Christ which leads to heaven, is only possible because of the
love God has for us.
Love is at the core of Christianity. St. John used the word “love” eighteen times
in our second reading today.
The Sacred Heart reminds us that God has a heart which loves.
The Sacred Heart, pierced, bleeding, and set aflame reminds us that real love is much more than sentiment or emotion. True love, Christ-like love, embraces suffering for the beloved. Jesus’ love for his Father is aflame, he goes to suffer to do his Father’s will because of his infinite love for his Father. And that flame burns for us as well.
In
1677, Jesus appeared to St. Margaret Mary Alacoque, a Visitation nun in France and
revealed his Sacred Heart. She said, “I could plainly see His heart, pierced
and bleeding, yet there were flames, too, coming from it and a crown of thorns around
it. He told me to behold His heart which so loved humanity. Then He seemed to
take my very heart from me and place it there in His heart. In return He gave
me back part of His flaming heart.”
So often, Christians settle for such mediocre practice of
their faith, when all the while, Christ is longing for our hearts to burn like
his. Our Lord wants to do for each of us what he did for Margaret Mary, to replace our cold stony hearts, with his burning sacred heart.
The Lord told Margaret Mary that the ingratitude of man for
his love was worse than his physical sufferings. Today we ask the Lord to increase our love,
yet today is also a day of reparation. We
make reparation for those times when we have been ungrateful for all that God
has done for us, all that Jesus suffered for us, all those gifts of the Holy
Spirit that have gone unused. We make
reparation for all those who reject God’s love and for those who commit
blasphemy and sacrilege.
Recall the opening asking God to help us to experience the
saving wonders of the Heart of his Son: “O God, who in the Heart of your Son,
wounded by our sins, bestow on us in mercy the boundless treasures of your
love, grant, we pray, that, in paying him the homage of our devotion, we may
also offer worthy reparation.”
May our hearts be set on fire with the love of the Sacred
Heart for the glory of God and salvation of souls.
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