The heart of Jesus was wounded for love of us: come, let us adore him.
Year: B(II). Liturgical Colour: White.
The Most Sacred Heart of Jesus
Devotion to the Sacred Heart, encouraged by mediaeval mystics and promoted by St Gertrude, St Margaret Mary Alacoque, St John Eudes and others, represents a devotion to Jesus in his human nature, in particular referring to the heart as the seat of the emotions.
An Act of Consecration to the Sacred Heart
O Sacred Heart of Jesus, to thee I consecrate and offer up my person and my life, my actions, trials, and sufferings, that my entire being may henceforth only be employed in loving, honouring and glorifying thee. This is my irrevocable will, to belong entirely to thee, and to do all for thy love, renouncing with my whole heart all that can displease thee.
I take thee, O Sacred Heart, for the sole object of my love, the protection of my life, the pledge of my salvation, the remedy of my frailty and inconstancy, the reparation for all the defects of my life, and my secure refuge at the hour of my death.
Be thou, O Most Merciful Heart, my justification before God thy Father, and screen me from his anger which I have so justly merited. I fear all from my own weakness and malice, but placing my entire confidence in thee, O Heart of Love, I hope all from thine infinite goodness. Annihilate in me all that can displease or resist thee. Imprint thy pure love so deeply in my heart that I may never forget thee or be separated from thee.
I beseech thee, through thine infinite goodness, grant that my name be engraved upon thy Heart, for in this I place all my happiness and all my glory, to live and to die as one of thy devoted servants. Amen.
| St. Margaret Mary Alacoque |
Other saints: Saint Colman of Dromore
Ireland
He was active in the late fifth and early sixth centuries. He spent most of his life in the Dromore area of County Down. He was persuaded by Saint Mac Nissi to settle at Dromore in around 514, where he became the first bishop of the See of Dromore. See the article in
Wikipedia.
Other saints: St Robert of Newminster (c.1100 - 1159)
Hexham & Newcastle
He was born at Gargrave, in Yorkshire. He spent the early years of his priesthood as rector of his home town, but later joined the Benedictine community at Whitby. In 1132 he helped to establish Fountains Abbey, which followed the Cistercian rule of St Bernard of Clairvaux. Fountains was to have a daughter abbey at Newminster, near Morpeth, and Robert became the first abbot in 1138/39. Little else is known of him. He died on 7 June 1159.
Other saints: Bl Anne of St Bartholomew (1549-1626)
7 Jun (where celebrated)
Ana Garcia was born at Almendral, Castille, in 1549. In 1572 she made her profession as a Carmelite in the hands of St Teresa, at Saint Joseph’s, Avila. The saint later chose her as her companion and nurse, and she subsequently brought the Teresian spirit to France and Belgium, where she proved herself, like Teresa, a daughter of the Church in her great zeal for the salvation of souls. She died at Antwerp in 1626.
About the author of the Second Reading in today's Office of Readings:
Second Reading: St Bonaventure (1218 - 1274)
Bonaventure was born at Bagnoregio in Etruria in about 1218. He became a Franciscan in 1243 and studied philosophy and theology at the University of Paris. He became a famous teacher and philosopher, part of the extraordinary intellectual flowering of the 13th century. He was a friend and colleague of St Thomas Aquinas.
At this time the friars were still a new and revolutionary force in the Church, and their radical embracing of poverty and rejection of institutional structures raised suspicion and opposition from many quarters. Bonaventure defended the Franciscan Order and, after he was elected general of the order in 1255, he ruled it with wisdom and prudence. He is regarded as the second founder of the Order.
He declined the archbishopric of York in 1265 but was made cardinal bishop of Albano in 1273, dying a year later in 1274 at the Council of Lyons, at which the Greek and Latin churches were (briefly) reconciled.
Bonaventure wrote extensively on philosophy and theology, making a permanent mark on intellectual history; but he always insisted that the simple and uneducated could have a clearer knowledge of God than the wise. He was declared a Doctor of the Church in 1588 by Pope Sixtus V.
Liturgical colour: white
White is the colour of heaven. Liturgically, it is used to celebrate feasts of the Lord; Christmas and Easter, the great seasons of the Lord; and the saints. Not that you will always see white in church, because if something more splendid, such as gold, is available, that can and should be used instead. We are, after all, celebrating.
In the earliest centuries all vestments were white – the white of baptismal purity and of the robes worn by the armies of the redeemed in the Apocalypse, washed white in the blood of the Lamb. As the Church grew secure enough to be able to plan her liturgy, she began to use colour so that our sense of sight could deepen our experience of the mysteries of salvation, just as incense recruits our sense of smell and music that of hearing. Over the centuries various schemes of colour for feasts and seasons were worked out, and it is only as late as the 19th century that they were harmonized into their present form.
| Mid-morning reading (Terce) | Jeremiah 31:2-4 |
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The Lord says this: They have found pardon in the wilderness, those who have survived the sword. Israel is marching to his rest. The Lord has appeared to him from afar: I have loved you with an everlasting love, so I am constant in my affection for you. I build you once more; you shall be rebuilt, virgin of Israel. Adorned once more, and with your tambourines, you will go out dancing gaily.
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| Noon reading (Sext) | Jeremiah 32:40 |
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I will make an everlasting covenant with them. I will not cease in my efforts for their good, and I will put respect for me into their hearts, so that they turn from me no more.
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| Afternoon reading (None) | Romans 5:8-9 |
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What proves that God loves us is that Christ died for us while we were still sinners. Having died to make us righteous, is it likely that he would now fail to save us from God’s anger?
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