Today is an important day for all Christians, especially for Hospitaller spirituality and mission.
On the feast of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, the Catholic Church commemorates His faithful and unconditional love for all humanity, past, present, and future. On this feast, we honour the Mercy of Christ’s heart, which goes beyond all our sins.
Throughout the month of June, our hearts should resemble the Heart of Jesus, a hospitable Heart that welcomes, listens to and accompanies those who suffer and offers compassion and hope at all times.
The early Christians already meditated on the side and the open Heart of our Lord. However, in 1675, Jesus appeared to St. Margaret Mary Alacoque. He was surrounded by flames of love, crowned with thorns and had an open wound in His Heart, from which blood was flowing and a cross was coming out of it. Then he said to her:
“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; and in return, I receive from the greater part only ingratitude, by their irreverence and sacrilege, and by the coldness and contempt they have for Me in this Sacrament of Love. But what I feel most keenly is that it is hearts which are consecrated to Me, that treat Me thus. Therefore, 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. At least, you, love Me”.
Jesus wanted to set the whole world on fire with love, and He used a humble nun to manifest it. St. Margaret conveyed all that God revealed to her in her visions, and emphasised the immense love of Jesus for all humanity and devotion to the Sacred Heart as the source of grace and mercy.
This devotion is based on adoration of the Heart of Jesus, reparation for sins committed and the reception of frequent communion.
The Heart of Jesus is a pierced Heart, which also suffers and needs to be repaired. Christians are called to correspond to this great love, which gave its life to save ours and remained in the Eucharist to guide us on the road to eternal life.
That is why the Sisters Hospitallers invite you to draw closer to the primordial source of our identity: the Heart of Jesus. Let us go deeper into this solemnity through prayer, adoration and reflection on the love of Jesus for each one of us. It is an opportunity to renew our commitment to love as He did and to follow Jesus, seeking to imitate the virtues of His compassionate and generous Heart. To contemplate and let ourselves be contemplated from that Heart which taught us a new way of loving means being ready to redouble our efforts to be “Hospitallers.”
Let us also take this opportunity to ask Jesus, through our dedication and care, to seek to heal not only the bodies, but also the wounded hearts of those around us.
Let us unite today more than ever in fraternal affection and with the desire to be builders of HOSPITALITY, as people who are committed to learning, day by day, the difficult challenge of loving.
