説教
A MEDITATION ON THE MOST SACRED HEART OF JESUS
Friday after the Solemnity of the Most Holy Body and Blood of Christ
(Corpus Christi)
According to St. John’s Gospel 19:31-37
The Catholic Parish of St. Ludovico Ibaragi’s, Kamifukuoka
Fr. John S. Satoru Kato
“One of the soldiers pierced his side with a lance;
and immediately there came out Blood and Water.” (John 19: 34)
Grant, we, pray, almighty God,
that, we, who glory in the Heart of your beloved Son
and recall the wonders of his love for us,
may be made worthy to receive
an overflowing measure of grace
from that fount of heavenly gifts.
Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son,
who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, for ever and ever. Amen.
(The Collect for the Solemnity of the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus)
June is the month of the “Most Sacred Heart of Jesus”. It was in 1856 when the then Pope Pius IX promulgated the Feast of the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus and ordered the whole Church to celebrate this Feast on Friday after the Solemnity of the Most Holy Body and Blood of Christ every year. This year, we celebrate this Feast on Friday, June 11.
On the Solemnity of the Most Holy Body and Blood of Christ, we honour and adore his Most Holy Body and Blood. The Most Sacred Heart of Jesus is within His Most Holy Body as being the most important organ for his Most Holy Blood! It was exactly the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus which was pierced with a lance of a Roman solder while Jesus was on the Cross. And it was also his Most Sacred Heart from which his Most Holy Blood poured out at that very moment!
His Most Sacred Heart of Jesus is never a heart which cannot be wounded. On the contrary, it is very the heart of his which can be most seriously wounded, especially, with the sharpest lance of our sins. His Heart is never a heart which cannot be hurt, but is the heart which can be most seriously hurt by our love-less-ness as the Gospel tells us:
“One of the soldiers pierced his side with a lance; and immediately there came out Blood and Water.” (John 19: 34)
Indeed, his Most Sacred Heart of Jesus is the heart which is most compassionate and is full of love, as Saint Paul tells us as follows:
“Can anything cut us off from the love of Christ -- can hardships or distress, or persecution or, lack of food and clothing, or threats or violence; as scripture says:
‘For your sake we are being massacred all day long, treated as sheep to be slaughtered?’
No; we come through all these things triumphantly victorious, by the power of him who loved us. For I am certain of this; neither death nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nothing already in existence and nothing still to come, nor any power, nor the heights nor the depths, nor any created thing whatever, will be able to come between us and the love of God, known to us in Christ Jesus our Lord.” (Roman 8:35-39)
It was this most sacred and compassionate Heart of Jesus which was clearly seen by Saint Margaret Mary Alacoque in France in the 17th Century. It was indeed this Most Sacred Heart of Jesus which was burning in the most sacred Love and Compassion to her.
The same Heart of Jesus is still and more strongly burning to each of us and each of you.
You will never be left alone from his Love in his Most Sacred Heart of Jesus and you will always be found yourself within his Heart of Devine Love as St. Paul reminds us, “Nothing can cut off from the love of Christ” as his Heart is for you burning still and always and forever.
In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
