The Heart of the World

Dear Friends, 

This week we celebrate two feasts that are intimately connected to each other: the solemnity of the Body and Blood of the Lord, and the feast of the Sacred Heart of Jesus next Friday, June 12th. Really, the two feasts are one feast, one feast that reminds us of the tender love of the incarnate Son who gave us his body and blood as our food and medicine, and whose pierced heart served then and now as the fountain of the sacramental life of the church. 

Devotion to the Sacred Heart is a particularly Jesuit practice. Grounded in the lived encounters between retreatant and the Lord in the Spiritual Exercises, and underscored by the visions of St. Margaret Mary Alacoque, that Jesuit saint Claude de la Columbière promoted in late 17th century, the devotion provided a much-needed and ardent counterbalance to the frosty and rigid Jansenism—a kind of Catholic Calvinism—that dominated much of religious practice at that time. 

While many olden images of the Sacred Heart can feel curious, or even cloying to us today, the reality behind the devotion remains powerful and true. Jesus opened his heart to us, and continues to nourish us with his love in the sacraments.

The Jesuits gave rise to the Apostleship of Prayer movement, which unites us with and in the work of Christ through the Church. I’m sharing with you a revised, somewhat updated version of the traditional “morning offering” many of us learned as children. I find it still a meaningful devotion, and hope it resonates with you as well. 

A renewed take on the familiar “Morning Offering” of our childhood

Dear Jesus, I come to you

at the beginning of this day.

I gaze upon your face;

I look upon your side.

pierced with the lance.

Your wounded heart speaks to me

of God’s love poured out for me.

Take, Lord, receive my heart;

my memory, understanding and will,

the words of faith I speak,

the works of mercy I do,

my joys and sorrows.

When I come to the Table of the Eucharist

gather my offerings to your own

for the life of the world.

At the the end of the day,

at the end of my life

place me with Mary your mother,

the mother of the poor,

and for her sake take me to your heart.

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Give me strength

as I go out from here

to do Your will. 

Give me what I need today,

Your love and your grace are enough for me.

Photo: The Sacred Heart of Jesus, Fr. Tom Lucas, S.J., Seattle University

Created from found objects

Blessings,