My daughter and I were searching for a ball cap for her recently. She didn’t want a rainbow on it because she likes to have her own style, and she was baffled that every piece of children’s clothing seemed to have rainbows on it. The LGBTQ Pride movement has certainly succeeded in seducing major retailers, library and community programming and even many churches into participating in their displays and educational initiatives this month.
Unfortunately, I don’t think the quality of “Pride” is the antidote to shame, violence and exclusion that we need. Any attempt at cultural unity that is centered on the comfort of one’s self to act without limits will fail because it will only increase one person’s autonomy at the expense of another’s.
However, in our home and in our Church, there is a different theme established for the month of June. The Solemnity of the Sacred Heart marks the capstone of a series of feast days celebrating the love of God during this month. June is the month of the Sacred Heart, and I can’t think of a theme more relevant for our divided world.
Many factions in our world cry out, “See me! Hear me! Affirm me!” To them, and to every soul with hidden sufferings, the Sacred Heart affirms: I see you. I know you. I love you. I have felt your joys and your sorrows and entered into the depths of your brokenness and offered you healing. Let me teach you how to love.
The antidote to a world full of shame and shaming is not pride, it is humility. True humility, as made manifest in the Sacred Heart, is the prerequisite both for giving and for receiving authentic love. Humility knows and loves the other in a holistic way, supporting them through their struggles and temptations but never stooping to identify the beloved by those failings.
In order to respect the true rights of every individual, we must engage in a campaign of humility. I believe Christ, under the particular image of His Sacred Heart, has already launched this initiative and invites us to spread His message of hope.
In Jewish thought, the heart represented the entire interior life of man. Building upon this, early Christians devoted themselves to contemplation of the Person of Christ – particularly to His wounded side during His Passion. This figure of speech of the Heart of Christ as a symbol for His full identity took more definite form in the second millennia A.D. For instance, St. Albert the Great beautifully connected the image of the Sacred Heart with the entirely selfless gift of the Eucharist in the 13th century. Several visionaries solidified the devotion to the Sacred Heart as a particular wish of Our Lord for His beloved children. Mechthild of Medeburg (13th century), St. Gertrude the Great (13th century), St. Catherine of Siena (14th century) and, famously, St. Margaret Mary Alacoque (17th century) all received visions that were essential to further a blossoming devotion to the Heart of Christ. More recently, in 1966, Pope Paul VI affirmed that devotion to the Sacred Heart is “the most efficacious means to contribute to that spiritual and moral renewal of the world called for by the Second Vatican Council.”
Devotion to the Sacred Heart helps us to re-consecrate ourselves and our families to Christ at this time of year. Family life exposes the depths of our woundedness and the capacity of our love. Christ is the only one who can heal those wounds, purify our love and give us the strength to understand and serve each other in truth and selfless charity. Dedicating yourself and your family to His Heart is a concrete act of receptivity to those graces, which He longs to pour into our daily lives.
A brief internet search will familiarize families with a devotion that can be easily woven into the month of June, no matter how many swim meets and vacations are already planned. Celebrate the Solemnity of the Sacred Heart (meat permitted, even though it is on a Friday) on June 28 and pray a personal consecration to the Sacred Heart. You can use the “Prayer of Consecration to the Sacred Heart” composed by Pope Leo XIII or the poignant “Act of Consecration to the Sacred Heart of Jesus,” composed by St. Margaret Mary Alacoque. Our Lord promised “peace in the family” and abundant graces for families who place an image of His Sacred Heart prominently in their homes and consecrate themselves to Him. The “Consecration of the Family to the Sacred Heart of Jesus” prayer throws open the door to God’s blessings. Or, you can invite your parish priest to your home to perform a traditional house blessing and ask that a consecration to the Sacred Heart be included in the devotions.
The devil is utterly defeated by selfless love because it is a reality he cannot comprehend. In 1986, Pope John Paul II encouraged families, “Welcome the presence of the Heart of Jesus, we seek to draw from Him the true love that our families need. The family unit has a fundamental role in the construction of the civilization of love.”
In uniting ourselves with the Sacred Heart, we take a side with the source of love, life and healing.
Kelly Henson is a Catholic writer and speaker who explores the art of integrating faith into daily life. She, her husband and their four children are parishioners of Our Lady of Grace Parish in Greensboro, and she has worked for more than 15 years with teens, children and families as a missionary, youth minister and teacher. She blogs at www.kellyjhenson.com.