Today’s Solemnity celebrates a core truth of the Christian
faith, literally; the word core, comes from the latin word, cordium, which
means, heart. Christianity, the way leading
to heaven, is only possible because of the love God has for us.
Love is the core of Christianity. St. Paul said so in our second reading today:
that faith enables us to be grounded in love, and enables us to know the love
which fills us with the fullness of God.
The Sacred Heart reminds us that God has a heart which loves.
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.”
The Sacred Heart, pierced, bleeding, and set aflame reminds
us that real love is much more than sentiment or emotion. Which is why Holy Church presents us with the
Gospel reading from the crucifixion. From
the cross his heart was opened to show us that through Christ the human heart
is made capable of loving God as it was made to. Christ also shows us what true love looks
like. Christ-like love, embraces suffering for the beloved. His heart burns with an infinite love for his
Father, and embraces all suffering to do his Father’s Will, to save our souls.
Today we ask the Lord to increase our love, yet today is
also a day of reparation.
The Lord told Margaret Mary that the ingratitude of man for
his love was worse than his physical sufferings. 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.
So, 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 prayer 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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