MY
"Behold the Heart which has so loved men that it has spared nothing, even to exhausting and consuming Itself, in order to testify Its love… I ask of you that the Friday after the Octave of Corpus Christi be set apart for a special Feast to honor My Heart, by communicating on that day, and making reparation to It by a solemn act, in order to make amends for the indignities which It has received during the time It has been exposed on the altars. I promise you that My Heart shall expand Itself to shed in abundance the influence of Its Divine Love upon those who shall thus honor It, and cause It to be honored." (Jesus to St. Margaret Mary Alacoque) The Sacred Heart has been on my mind lately. Sure, June is a month traditionally devoted to the Sacred Heart, but it's been more real to me this month than in Junes past. Maybe it's all the Sacred Heart themed images, prayers, and devotions floating around. Maybe it's the research I've done - I'm making a scapular, so I'm slowly teaching myself to embroider. Maybe it's just the ministry I'm doing that's influencing my reflection. I'm shadowing the Priest for communion calls to nursing homes, funerals, house blessings, and visits to the homebound. Maybe it's the Holy Spirit inspiring and directing my prayer. When God selected David to be king of Israel, he proclaimed through the prophet Samuel, "the Lord has sought out a man after his own heart" (1 Samuel 13:14). The longer I spend in seminary, and the more I strive to be a man after God's own heart (only by His grace), the more I see pain in the world. I don't know many of the folks that I'm ministering to this summer... not yet, at least. I don't know the people who died and whose funerals I serve, or their families who are visibly grieving. I don't know what the elderly and the infirmed were like when they were healthy - I've only seen them in pain and as shells of their former selves. All I know is "we have not a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sinning. " (Hebrews 4:15). I know we have a God who loves us and who is with us in the midst of our suffering. Although I've never met these people, I recognize Christ in them. The month of the Sacred Heart is a sad month, in many ways. It always hurts to see someone we love suffer. It's painful to witness the suffering of Christ in his faithful, and to witness the many ways that He is grieved by the sins of the world... and by my sins and failings. "Compassion," literally translated, means "suffering with." It is painful to look at the Heart of Christ with compassion and to share in His immeasurable suffering. But I love Him too much to not keep company with Him, and with His faithful.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
Author
Catholic. Archives
July 2023
Categories |