(from Vincentian Reflections, SVDP USA)
THE MOST SACRED HEART OF JESUS
Gospel: (1John 4:7-16)
Beloved, let us love one another, because love is of God; everyone who loves is begotten by God and knows God. Whoever is without love does not know God, for God is love. In this way the love of God was revealed to us: God sent his only Son into the world so that we might have life through him. In this is love: not that we have loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as expiation for our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us, we also must love one another. No one has ever seen God. Yet if we love one another, God remains in us, and his love is brought to perfection in us.
Reflection:
The human heart is a symbol for the life, love and well-being of an individual. The heart therefore as a symbol tries to capture God’s tremendous love for us, God’s constant care, and the security we find in resting against God’s heart in prayer. The Sacred Heart tells us “not that we love God, but that he loves us.”
Vincentian Reflection:
Frederic wrote: “Love possesses something of the divine nature, which gives itself without diminishing, which shares itself without division, which multiplies itself, which is present in many places at once, and whose intensity is increased in the measure that it gains in extension. In your wife you will first love God…You will draw comfort from her tenderness on bad days, you will find courage in her example in perilous times, you will be her guardian angel, she will be yours.” (Ramson, Praying with Frederic, p.63)
Discussion: (Share your thoughts on the readings after a moment of silence.)
Frederic found his vocation, his primary commitment in life, in marriage where he found the love of God. How have you found the love of God reflected to you?
Closing Prayer: (Together)
Lord Jesus, we dedicate and consecrate to Your divine Person and to Your Sacred Heart this our Conference (Council) and all the the members who compose it, the poor whom we visit in Your name, the youth and children to whom we respond…and all the works we have undertaken in various places for Your Glory… inflame us with that fire which from the depths of Your Heart Thou desire to see burning more and more each day, in order that, filled with the tenderness of Your Heart…we may love and help our neighbor. Give us the grace to live our vocation, loving our spouse, family and others in the example of Frederic and Amelie.
Amen
