Dear Parishioners,

As we continue to reflect on Pope Francis’ encyclical letter Dilexit Nos (“He Loved Us”), on the human and divine love of the heart of Jesus Christ, we have the opportunity to deepen our understanding of this time-honored Catholic devotion. While devotion to the heart of Christ has strong biblical roots, especially in the Passion narrative of John’s Gospel, it emerged more explicitly in the 13th century, due in part, to the mystical writings of the Benedictine nun, St. Gertrude (1256-1302). Gertrude lived in the monastery of Helfta in Saxony and is said to have received the stigmata (the physical wounds of Christ crucified) along with a divine light that pierced her own heart. Besides St. Gertrude, there were a number of other religious women during this period who nurtured a deep spiritual affection for Jesus as the Sacred Heart.

Carthusian monks in Cologne, Germany, began to enshrine an image of the Sacred Heart in their monastic cells, and from Germany, this devotion spread throughout Europe. It was promoted by notable figures such as the priest St. John Eudes (1601–80) and St. Margaret Mary Alacoque (1648–90), a nun of the Visitation Order who was privileged to have visions of Jesus with his exposed heart. In these visions, Jesus is said to have requested that a liturgical feast in honor of his Sacred Heart be celebrated on the Friday after the octave of Corpus Christi. Its focus was to be penitential, intended to make reparation for blasphemies committed against the Blessed Sacrament.

Members of the Society of Jesus (Jesuits) also became great promoters of the Sacred Heart devotion, especially after one of their priests, Fr. Druzbicki (1590–1662), composed the first text for the Divine Office for the Sacred Heart. In the 1800s, after the Napoleonic War, this devotion became even more widespread and in 1875, Pope Pius IX exhorted all Catholics to consecrate themselves to the Sacred Heart of Jesus. Shortly thereafter in 1899, Pope Leo XIII encouraged all Catholics to dedicate the entire world to Jesus under this title, a consecration he wished to be renewed annually. Eventually, the first Friday of each month became a day of special prayer to the Sacred Heart because of some specific promises that were attributed to Jesus.

Growing up in the 60s, devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus was a basic staple in most Catholic households, including my own. Nearly every Catholic Church, classroom, and home honored an image of the Sacred Heart, many of which, unfortunately, lacked artistic merit and could best be described as sentimental kitsch. Jesus was often portrayed effeminately in white and red garments with, what was sometimes, a gruesome heart encircled with thorns and crowned with a burning flame. The thorns represented Christ’s suffering and the flame his love. In church devotions, such as Benediction of the Blessed Sacrament, we sang hymns to the Sacred Heart of Jesus that were saccharine and individualistically pious. For Catholics of different ethnic persuasions, these hymns were appealing because they could be sung in the vernacular rather than in Latin, the official liturgical language of the church. And when we were not singing to the Sacred Heart, we were encouraged to pray to him, uttering (as often as possible) the invocation, “Sweet Heart of Jesus, make me love thee more and more.”

In addition to much of the distasteful art that sprang from the cult of the Sacred Heart, there were theological aspects that were questionable. Jansenism, a French movement from the 17th/18th centuries that emphasized human sinfulness and moral depravity, colored some of the prayers and writings connected with this devotion along with the heresy of Pelagianism that claimed it was possible for human beings to earn God’s forgiveness and grace by saying prescribed prayers and performing various penitential acts. In its most extreme expressions, devotion to the Sacred Heart could even appear to be superstitious. It was not surprising, therefore, that once the liturgical and theological reforms of the Second Vatican Council began to make their impact, devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus became much less popular among Catholics who were now being encouraged to read the Bible and recognize the Mass as a communal act of worship.

As so often happens in the church (and in life) one extreme usually begets another. If private devotions, like that of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, were at times excessive before the Second Vatican Council, after this Council they became woefully absent. As we know, there are times when some realities must die so that they might be reborn and re-claimed with new understandings and fresh perspectives. This seems to be the case with devotion to the Sacred Heart. This may be one reason that prompted Pope Francis to issue Dilexit Nos at this moment in the history of the Church.

To be continued

Blessings, Fr. Gabriel, OSB

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