Today’s readings abound with statements of God’s love, a
love that is eternal and is practical. God’s love brought us into existence,
put us together in our mother’s womb, taught us to walk and talk, to think and
understand, to feel and respond with compassion. “I fostered [you] like one who raised an
infant to his cheeks; …though I stooped to feed [you, you] did not know that I
was [your] healer’( Hosea 11: 1, 3-4, 8c-9).
God goes on to say “My heart is overwhelmed, my pity stirred…I will not
give vent to my blazing anger” when I see you walk away from Me, the Source of
your life. I will not blaze out in anger toward you when I see you worshipping
false gods, looking for fullness of life in empty cisterns; mocking Me, beating
me, abusing Me, cursing Me,” as you do whenever you do these things to your family
members, loved ones, strangers, your neighbour, persons different from you
because of race, gender, or culture (cf. Mt. 25: 40). God seems to be reminding
us that He is as hidden in the other person as He is in the Sacred Host. My faith tells me that every human being, all
of creation, is a sacrament, a sign of God’s love for me, of God’s Presence, of God’s life-giving Spirit,
for in God, “we live and move and have
out being” (Acts 17:28). What does your faith tell you?
Today we celebrate the Feast of the Sacred Heart of Jesus,
the feast of God’s love. The second person of the Blessed Trinity, God the Son,
in total obedience to the Father assumed human nature to show us the way back to
the Father, that is, the way of obedience to our God. In total self-giving, Jesus becomes the
unblemished Lamb sacrificed to redeem all of humankind and so we pray at every
Mass, the Lamb’s Supper, when the heavens open up and the Son of God comes down
upon our altars: “Lamb of God, who takes
away the sins of the world, have mercy on us.”
Such love! What sacrifices am I willing to make in return for this love?
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