XVII — THE SACRED HEART AND THE EUCHARIST

Presence of God. — Sacred Heart of Jesus, teach me to live with You through the Sacrament of your love.

Meditation

1 — Devotion to the Sacred Heart must lead us to a life of intimate union with Jesus, and Jesus - we know it - is living and true in the Eucharist. These two devotions, to the Sacred Heart and to the Eucharist, are intimately linked. They call each other forth and - one might say - require each other. The Sacred Heart explains to us the mystery of Jesus’ love, who made Himself bread to nourish us with his substance; and, on the other hand, in the Eucharist we have the real presence of this same Heart living in the midst of men. It is beautiful to contemplate the Heart of Jesus as symbol of his infinite love, but it is still more beautiful to find it always living near us in the Sacrament of the altar. The Sacred Heart we honor is not the heart of a dead one that no longer beats, so that one must be content with its memory, but the heart of one living, eternally living. Living not only in heaven, where the holy Humanity of Jesus dwells gloriously, but living also on earth wherever the Eucharist is kept; and from the Eucharist this Heart repeats to us: “Behold, I am with you all days even to the end of the world” (Mt. 28:20). In Communion, then, this Heart comes to beat in us, comes to make contact with our heart, comes to nourish us with his Flesh and his Blood, so that we may remain in Him and He in us. “In the Eucharist,” says Benedict XV, “this divine Heart governs and loves us by living and dwelling with us, so that we may live and dwell in Him, because in this Sacrament... He offers and gives Himself to us as victim, as companion, as nourishment, as viaticum, and as pledge of future glory” (9 Nov. 1921).

2 — Jesus’ Eucharistic presence in us is limited to those brief moments during which the sacred species endure, and it ceases as soon as these are consumed. Nevertheless, Jesus expressly declared: “He who eats my flesh and drinks my blood remains in me and I in him” (Jn. 6:57). The verb “to remain” cannot indicate a passing state, but clearly expresses something stable, enduring; this makes one think of a union with Jesus that remains even when the sacred species are already consumed. And that is precisely so. First of all, union with Jesus’ Divinity endures, since the three divine Persons continuously indwell souls in grace; but then a certain union with his Humanity also endures which, though no longer present in the communicant by its substance, is present by the influence of its operative presence, by the outpouring of its grace. If, once the appearances of bread and wine are destroyed, the Heart of Jesus is no longer in us by sacramental presence, nevertheless it remains with us spiritually by the irradiation of its love, of its life-giving activity, since all that we receive in the supernatural order we always receive through the mediation of Christ’s most holy Humanity. True, this spiritual union with Jesus, with his Sacred Heart, does not necessarily require Communion; it requires only the state of grace. Yet the Eucharistic Bread nourishes, consolidates, strengthens this union, makes it deeper, in the sense that Jesus takes ever more under his influence the soul of the communicant, that his divine Heart irradiates ever more its love and all its virtues in the heart that receives Him sacramented. It is not, therefore, a utopia to aspire to an effective, permanent union with Jesus, with his Sacred Heart; indeed it is precisely this union that the Church has us ask each day in the beautiful prayer of the Mass before Communion: “a te numquam separari permittas,” permit me never to be separated from You.

Colloquy

“Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the living God, who by the will of the Father and with the cooperation of the Holy Spirit gave life to the world by your death, deliver me by this your Body and Blood from all my iniquities and from all my evils, and make me always faithful to your commandments, and never permit me to be separated from You” (MR.).

“Oh, what magnificent and close union is produced between the soul and You, most loving Lord, when it receives You sacramented! Then the soul becomes one thing with You, provided that by the exercise of virtues it is disposed to imitate what You worked in your life, passion, and death. No, I cannot unite myself perfectly with You, O Christ, and You with me in Holy Communion, if first I do not make myself like You by denying myself and exercising myself in those virtues that please You most and of which You gave us such great examples. And my union with You in receiving You sacramented will be more or less perfect in proportion as I make myself more or less like You by means of virtues” (cf. St. Mary Magdalene de’ Pazzi).

“O Jesus, You alone I love and desire, for You alone I hunger and thirst, in You I want to lose and consume myself. Envelop me in the flame of your charity and make me cling so firmly to You that I may never be separated from You!

“O Lord Jesus, O immense sea, why do You delay to absorb this little drop of water into your fullness? All my soul’s desire is to go out of myself to enter into You. Open to me, O Lord, your much-loved Heart, for You alone I desire and to You I want to cling with all my fervor. Oh, what lovable union! This intimate familiarity with You is truly more to be prized than life itself! O my Beloved, let me embrace You in the depths of my soul, so that, thus united to You, I may remain bound to You indissolubly!” (St. Gertrude).