What does it mean to me that the last message left by Jesus after His death is a heart pierced by a spear?
We are almost at the end of Lent. Before we run to the joyful morning of the Resurrection, we must sit at the cross for a while. We cannot jump over Golgotha or run away from it. There is no other way to eternal happiness than by being close to the cross and the pierced Heart of God – emphasizes Fr. Robert Więcek, Jesuit, director of the National Secretariat of the Apostolate of Prayer.
Worship of the Heart of Jesus
The image of the Lord Jesus pointing with his hand at his pierced Heart is present in almost every church today. Their prototype – the painting of the Sacred Heart of Jesus by Pompeo Batoni, was painted on the basis of the apparitions of 1674 to Sister Margaret Maria Alacoque, a French showpiece that saw the Savior several times. He was to command her to spread the cult of God’s Heart. Devotion to the Heart of Jesus was already celebrated in the Middle Ages, but at that time it was limited to closed monastic environments. The nun’s mystical experiences contributed to the spread of the devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus among lay people in France and other European countries.
This cult focused largely on the need to compensate for the offenses against God’s heart. In later mystical encounters, incl. with Sr. Józefa Menendez from the Congregation of the Sacred Heart of Jesus (Sacré Coeur) in 1920, the Lord Jesus first of all assured about God’s Mercy. He emphasized that he was a sensitive God, waiting for people with open arms, eager to cleanse a person of every guilt. The Savior spoke to a Spanish nun, „Now I want something more … I want them to believe in my mercy, that they would expect everything from my goodness, that they would never doubt my forgiveness.”
Meditating on God’s suffering
An encounter with the Heart of God, pierced for us out of love, should arouse contrition, but it must not lead to despair. – In contemplating the torn, drained to the last drop of the Heart of Jesus, the point is not to concentrate on your sin, but rather on God’s love – says Fr. Więcek and emphasizes: – The fruit of this meeting is total trust in the goodness of Christ. Jesus takes us whole, does not divide us into nice and less useful parts. And since we are completely immersed in this Heart, on the one hand, mercy cleans us: from the fear of suffering, death, and sin, and on the other, it strengthens us, stimulates and comforts us. It is God’s comprehensive action.
An encounter with the Heart of God, pierced for us out of love, should arouse contrition, but it must not lead to despair.
For our part, we have only one thing to do: to be. The Jesuit emphasizes, however, that such staying with God is not a simple task: – What is easier to do? To get up late in the evening for the Holy Hour, adore the Lord until midnight, and then cold and tired to come home, do something, do something: go to Caritas, help in the hospice …? We want to work for him, but we want to stay with him too little!
There is no other way to eternal happiness than by being close to the cross and the pierced Heart of God.
A good solution may be to set aside time to pray in front of the image of the Heart of Jesus. Christ himself addressed Sr. Józefa Menendez with the words: „Contemplate my heart, learn from it and you will understand what it means to love …” and: „I want the whole world to know that I am a God of love, forgiveness, mercy. for the whole world to read my ardent desire to forgive and save ”. This is the basic message left by Jesus to a Spanish nun.
There is no evil that God cannot forgive. Everyone, without exception, whether zealous or lukewarm, pious or lost, believing or doubting, can actively participate in their own salvation and is invited to do so. Man’s littleness is irrelevant, because Jesus will complete whatever is missing. The Lord only asks for one thing:
“Don’t let the people get discouraged. Let them come! Let them fall into my arms! Let them not be afraid of anything – I am their Father! ”.