The Sacred Heart of Jesus

“Legionário”,  São Paulo (Brazil), No. 458, June 22, 1941

Plinio Corrêa de Oliveira

Image of the Sacred Heart of Jesus venerated by Prof. Plinio since his childhood

The Holy Fathers have persistently recommended that humanity intensify the devotion it renders to the Sacred Heart of Jesus so that, regenerated by God’s grace and understanding that God must be the center of its affections, the tranquility of order may reign again in the world—a tranquility from which we grow ever more distant as the world descends into anarchy.

Thus, a Catholic newspaper could not overlook the feast of the Sacred Heart, which occurred a few days ago. This is not merely a duty of piety imposed by the very order of things, but a duty made all the more urgently tragic by the contemporary tragedy.

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There is no one who is not alarmed by the extremes of cruelty to which modern man can descend. This cruelty is not only evident on battlefields. It manifests itself at every step, in both the great and small incidents of everyday life, through the extraordinary hardness and coldness of heart with which most people treat their fellow human beings.

Mothers whose love for their children grows ever fainter in their hearts; husbands who cast an entire household into ruin solely to satisfy their own instincts and passions; children who, indifferent to the misery or moral abandonment in which they leave their parents, turn all their attention to the enjoyment of this life’s pleasures; professionals who enrich themselves at the expense of others—all often display a cold and calculated cruelty that causes far greater horror than the extremes of fury to which war can drive combatants. Indeed, while acts of cruelty in war may be more easily measured, those who commit them have, if not an excuse, at least the mitigating factor of being driven by the violence of battle. But what is plotted and carried out in the tranquility of daily life often cannot claim the same mitigation. This is especially true when it is not a matter of isolated actions but of ingrained habits that endlessly multiply evil deeds.

War, as it is waged today, is an indicator of cruelty, but it is far from being the only manifestation of contemporary moral hardness.

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To speak of cruelty is to speak of selfishness. Man only harms his neighbor out of selfishness, desiring to gain advantages to which he has no right. Thus, the only way to eradicate cruelty is to eradicate selfishness.

Theology teaches us that man can only achieve true and complete self-denial when his love for his neighbor is rooted in the love of God. Apart from God, human affections lack stability and fullness. Either man loves God to the point of forgetting himself, in which case he will truly know how to love his neighbor, or man loves himself to the point of forgetting God, in which case selfishness tends to dominate him completely.

Thus, it is only by increasing men’s love for God that a deep understanding of their duties toward their neighbor can be achieved. Combating selfishness necessarily involves, in the beautiful words of St. Augustine, “expanding the spaces of the love of God.”

The feast of the Sacred Heart of Jesus is, par excellence, the feast of God’s love. In it, the Church proposes as the theme of our meditations and the object of our prayers the most tender and unwavering love of God, who, having become man, died for us. By showing us the Heart of Jesus burning with love despite the thorns with which we surround it through our offenses, the Church opens to us the prospect of a merciful and boundless forgiveness, an infinite and perfect love, and a complete and immaculate joy, which should constitute the enduring charm of the spiritual life of all true Catholics.

Let us love the Sacred Heart of Jesus. Let us strive to ensure that this devotion triumphs authentically (and not merely through superficial symbols) in every home, in every environment, and above all, in every heart. Only then will we succeed in reforming modern man.

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“Ad Jesum per Mariam”. It is through Mary that we go to Jesus. Writing about the feast of the Sacred Heart, how can we not say a word of filial emotion before this Immaculate Heart which, better than any other, understood and loved the Divine Redeemer? May Our Lady obtain for us some sparks of that immense devotion she had for the Sacred Heart of Jesus. May she kindle in us a little of that fire of love with which she burned so intensely. This is our prayer during this sweet and comforting octave.