Instead of the regular Saint of the Week we feature today a special feature on the Sacred Heart, to which our church is dedicated and St. John the Baptist.
Q: Why do we pray to the Sacred Heart of Jesus? Although I include this in my daily prayers, I'm unsure how to explain this to others.
A: The solemnity of the Sacred Heart of Jesus is celebrated on the Friday after Corpus Christi (June 19th in 2009).
This devotion, promoted especially by St. Margaret Mary Alacoque (d. 1690), was and is a way of softening the image of God as primarily lawgiver, judge and punisher.
The Scriptures use those images of God, but they also give ones less threatening. Devotion to the Sacred Heart says two things at the same time: Jesus is indeed fully human (people regard the heart as the seat of human emotions) and God forgives those who repent.
This devotion does not suggest that God is indifferent to good and evil. Jesus' description of the Last Judgment (Matthew 25:31-46) and the story of Lazarus and the rich man (Luke 16:19-31) remind us that God takes our choices very seriously. Heaven is full of people who cooperated with God's grace, using their freedom wisely.
Devotion to the Sacred Heart started to become popular in the late 1600s in France, perhaps as God's answer to Jansenism, which had begun there earlier in that century. In A Concise Dictionary of Theology, Gerald O'Collins, S.J., and Edward Farrugia, S.J., describe Jansenism as "a theological and spiritual movement, characterized by moral rigidity and pessimism about the human condition" (Paulist, rev. ed., 2000).
Devotion to the Sacred Heart can foster repentance and hope among people who might otherwise despair of ever pleasing God.
Like all popular devotions, this one is optional. You could be saved without ever saying a prayer to the Sacred Heart or even believing that Jesus appeared to St. Margaret Mary Alacoque.
Private devotions approved by the Church, however, can help us recall fundamental gospel messages; in this case, God's unquenchable love and willingness to forgive.
Devotion to the Sacred Heart reminds us that repentance, not despair, is the proper response to sin. No one can commit a sin exceeding God's ability to forgive.The Birth of St. John the Baptist, June 24th.
Jesus called John the greatest of all those who had preceded him: 'I tell you, among those born of women, no one is greater than John....' But John would have agreed completely with what Jesus added: '[Y]et the least in the kingdom of God is greater than he' (Luke 7:28).
John spent his time in the desert, an ascetic. He began to announce the coming of the Kingdom, and to call everyone to a fundamental reformation of life.
His purpose was to prepare the way for Jesus. His Baptism, he said, was for repentance. But One would come who would baptize with the Holy Spirit and fire. John is not worthy even to carry his sandals. His attitude toward Jesus was: 'He must increase; I must decrease' (John 3:30).
John was humbled to find among the crowd of sinners who came to be baptized the one whom he already knew to be the Messiah. 'I need to be baptized by you' (Matthew 3:14b). But Jesus insisted, 'Allow it now, for thus it is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness' (Matthew 3:15b). Jesus, true and humble human as well as eternal God, was eager to do what was required of any good Jew. John thus publicly entered the community of those awaiting the Messiah. But making himself part of that community, he made it truly messianic.
The greatness of John, his pivotal place in the history of salvation, is seen in the great emphasis Luke gives to the announcement of his birth and the event itself, both made prominently parallel to the same occurrences in the life of Jesus. John attracted countless people (all Judea) to the banks of the Jordan, and it occurred to some people that he might be the Messiah. But he constantly deferred to Jesus, even to sending away some of his followers to become the first disciples of Jesus.
Perhaps John's idea of the coming of the Kingdom of God was not being perfectly fulfilled in the public ministry of Jesus. For whatever reason, he sent his disciples (when he was in prison) to ask Jesus if he was the Messiah. Jesus' answer showed that the Messiah was to be a figure like that of the Suffering Servant in Isaiah (chapters 49 through 53). John himself would share in the pattern of messianic suffering, losing his life to the revenge of Herodias.
Comment:
Quote:"And this is not something which was only true once, long ago in the past. It is always true, because the repentance which he preached always remains the way into the kingdom which he announced. He is not a figure that we can forget now that Jesus, the true light, has appeared. John is always relevant because he calls for a preparation which all men need to make. Hence every year there are four weeks in the life of the Church in which it listens to the voice of the Baptist. These are the weeks of Advent" (A New Catechism)John challenges us Christians to the fundamental attitude of Christianity,total dependence on the Father, in Christ. Except for the Mother of God, no one had a higher function in the unfolding of salvation. Yet the least in the kingdom, Jesus said, is greater than he, for the pure gift that the Father gives. The attractiveness as well as the austerity of John, his fierce courage in denouncing evil, all stem from his fundamental and total placing of his life within the will of God.
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This time in June was very important in the Celtic Calendar as it was the time of the solstice. This is why bonfires were lit to celebrate light and life. When Ireland became Christian the feast was converted into the Feast of the Birth of St. John the Baptist, who leapt in the womb at the coming of The Light of the World.
