14 June 2013 A promotion of social justice Pope Pius XII in his encyclical “Haurietis Aquas”, brought a new era in the history of the devotion by giving it a solid and extensive scriptural and theological foundation. He also explained why the Church gives the highest form of worship (‘latria’) to the Heart of the Divine Redeemer. The Heart of Jesus is the chief sign and symbol of the threefold love with which the Son of God unceasingly loves His Father and sinful men: 1) divine love which he shares with his Father and the Holy Spirit; 2) burning love of the God made man; and 3) sensible love since he possesses complete powers of perception and feelings. In this devotion, is a summary of the mystery of the redemption and the ‘most perfect way of professing the Christian religion’. In our generation, Pope Paul VI issued the Apostolic Letter, “Invetigables Divitias” on the occasion of the second centenary of the liturgical feast of the Sacred Heart instituted by Pope Clement XIII. He also stressed in his second letter on 25 May 1965 the intimate link between the devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus and the Holy Eucharist. A devotee of the Sacred Heart must necessarily be also a devotee of the Holy Eucharist. Pope John Paull II gave a new dimension to the devotion by connecting it to social justice. In his encyclical “Dives in Misericordia” (30 Nov 1980), he expounded on the mercy of God as revealed in Jesus Christ. If the heart is the seat of all emotions, feelings and attitudes, truly the center of man, then God’s mercy inevitably brings us to the Heart of Christ. The Pope traced the fundamental link between mercy and social justice. ‘Mercy is an indispensable element for shaping mutual relationships between people in a spirit of mutual brotherhood.’ An authentic Sacred Heart devotion must lead to promotion of social justice. True piety leads to good works. The title of his encyclical on the Centenary of the Consecration of the Sacred Heart of Jesus (11 July 1999) can be translated as ‘His heart is the heart of the Church’. Ref: A F Makalinao, “Apostle of the Sacred Heart”, pp31-2 The Church Appeals to the Mercy of God The Church proclaims the truth of God’s mercy revealed in the crucified and Risen Christ. She seeks to practise mercy towards people through people, an indispensable condition for solicitude for a ‘more human’ world, today and tomorrow. However, in no historical period, especially at the moment as critical as our own, can the Church forget ‘the prayer that is a cry for the mercy of God’ amid the many forms of evil which threaten humanity ... The more the human conscience loses its sense of the very meaning of the word ‘mercy’, moves away from God and distances itself from the mystery of mercy, the more ‘the Church has the right and the duty’ to appeal to the God of Mercy ‘with loud cries’ (cf Heb 5:7). These ‘loud cries’ should be the mark of the Church of our times; cries uttered to God to implore his mercy, the certain manifestation of which she professes and proclaims as having already come in Jesus crucified and risen. This Paschal Mystery bears within itself the most complete revelation of mercy, of that love which is more powerful than death, more powerful than sin and every evil, the love which lifts man when he falls into the abyss and frees him from greatest threats. Modern man feels these threats ... anxiously wonders about the solution to the terrible tensions which have built up in the world and which entangles humanity. If at times he “lacks the courage to utter the word ‘mercy’”, or if in his conscience he does not find the equivalent, ‘so much greater is the need for the Church to utter this word’, not only in her own name but also in the name of all the men and women of our time. ... Let us have recourse to that fatherly love revealed to us by Christ, a love which reached its culmination in his Cross, in his death and Resurrection. Let us have recourse to God through Christ, mindful of the words of Mary’s ‘Magnificat’, which proclaims mercy ‘from generation to generation’. Let us implore God’s mercy for our generation. May the Church which also seeks, following the example of Mary, to be the spiritual mother of mankind, express in this prayer her maternal solicitude and confident love, from which is born the most burning need for prayer. Ref: “Dives in Misericordia, Encyclical Letter by Pope John Paul II”, 1980, pp78-9 • Our Lady of Esquernes, half a league from Lille, in Flanders. This image began to work miracles about the year 1162. — Buzelinus, Annals of Gaul, lib. ii. (“Catholic Gems or Treasures of the Church” Historical Calendar; www.bethlehemobserver.com) • Our Lady of Esquernes (Near Lille, Flanders). (maryfest.htm / www.starharbor.com/santiago/m_feasts.html) • Our Lady of Esquernes, Flanders (1162). (www/divinewill.org/feastsofourlady.htm); (www.iskandar.com/ourlady/ourladyfeasts.html) • In the year 371, there fell from heaven, at Arras, something like white wool mixed with heavy rain, of which mention is made by St Jerome, and it is maintained that the famine being great in the country, the inhabitants of Arras had recourse to the Blessed Virgin, who sent them this heavenly present, commonly called manna, some remains of which are still to be seen in the church dedicated in her honor. — Archives of the Abbey of Trull. (“Catholic Gems or Treasures of the Church” Historical Calendar; www.bethlehemobserver.com) • “Notre Dame d'Arras”. France. 371. Mary saves the people of Arras from famine by sending them bread from heaven. Black Madonna. The most remarkable primitive Gothic cathedral in “Pas-de-Calais” was “Notre Dame d'Arras”, but the cathedral, like many others in this war-torn region, was destroyed. (www.marylinks.org/Mary-Calendar.htm) • Our Lady preserved the inhabitants of Arras from famine by sending bread from heaven. France 371. (www.miraclehunter.com/marian_apparitions/calendar/index.html); (maryfest.htm / www.starharbor.com/santiago/m_feasts.html) • Our Lady of Arras, France (371). (www/divinewill.org/feastsofourlady.htm); (www.iskandar.com/ourlady/ourladyfeasts.html)