(OSV News) — Devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, which signifies “the divine response to the wounded human heart,” is “more timely than ever,” said Archbishop Paul D. Etienne of Seattle.
The archbishop shared his thoughts in a new pastoral letter inviting the faithful of the diocese “to rediscover this beautiful devotion.”
Released May 18, the nine-page letter, titled “Learn from Me for I Am Meek and Humble of Heart,” lays out the case for a renewed appreciation of both the theology and practice of devotion to the Sacred Heart.
Archbishop Etienne noted his letter comes as the nation’s Catholic bishops will consecrate the U.S. to the Sacred Heart June 11 to mark the 250th anniversary of the country’s founding.
Origin of the Sacred Heart devotion
He recounted the origin of the Sacred Heart devotion, which was revealed to St. Margaret Mary Alacoque, a French Visitation nun, in a series of mystical revelations that took place from 1673 to 1675.
During the encounters, Jesus Christ appeared to the sister displaying his heart “on fire with love,” said the archbishop.
He quoted Christ’s words to St. Margaret Mary Alacoque: “Behold, this Heart which has so loved human beings that it has spared nothing, even to exhausting and consuming itself, in order to testify its love.”
The archbishop underscored that in unveiling his Sacred Heart, Jesus “is not merely offering a poetic image or inviting sentiment,” but instead “revealing the interior truth of his person.”
Pointing to the Gospels, Archbishop Etienne highlighted that the heart is “consistently” identified by Jesus as “the center of moral and spiritual life.”
Scars of the human heart
The scars of the human heart are reflected in “the disorder of the world” and in “the divisions within families, communities and even within the Church,” said the archbishop.
“These are not just structural or political problems. They begin in the human heart,” he stated.
Moreover, he said, “devotion to the Sacred Heart speaks directly to this reality,” and does so “without naïveté, recognizing that the obstacles to conversion are often interior.”
Those hurdles include “tepidity, self-love, pride and passions left unchecked,” said the archbishop.
Yet, he stressed, “the Sacred Heart is proposed not as a rebuke to our humanity, but as a remedy — the divine response to the wounded human heart.”
God ‘gives a new heart’
God “gives a new heart,” leading not just to conversion, but to the indwelling presence of Christ in the human heart, said the archbishop.
He quoted St. Paul’s Letter to the Galatians, in which the saint wrote that “Christ lives in me” (Galatians 2:20), and also cited the saint’s Letter to the Romans, where he explained that “the love of God has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit” (Romans 5:5).
“Devotion to the Sacred Heart, rightly understood, is profoundly sacramental and ecclesial,” said Archbishop Etienne. “It is ordered toward communion and unity: Christ dwelling in the heart of the believer and shaping the believer’s heart according to His own.”
A true recognition of Christ’s love “leads toward reparation,” a participation in Christ’s saving work and “the proper response of love to love rejected,” said Archbishop Etienne.
Reparation acknowledges “a sober truth,” he said — namely, that “love can be refused.”
‘Age of distraction, spiritual fatigue’
“In an age of distraction and spiritual fatigue,” said Archbishop Etienne, “interior recollection is itself an act of reparation.”
Contemplating the Sacred Heart in an image or through Eucharistic adoration or “is not escapism,” Archbishop Etienne clarified. “It is an act of resistance to a culture that no longer knows how to dwell with love.”
Archbishop Etienne highlighted the centrality of the Eucharist in devotion to the Sacred Heart, since the Eucharist is “the privileged place where the Church encounters the living Heart of Christ.”
That encounter, in turn, impels the faithful to proclaim the good news of salvation to others, said the archbishop.
“True devotion to the Sacred Heart does not withdraw the believer from the world but configures the Church for her evangelical mission,” he said.
Christ’s three requests made during apparitions
In his pastoral letter, Archbishop Etienne described the three requests Christ made during the apparitions: to receive holy Communion on the first Friday of each month, to pray in reparation of the indifference and ingratitude of those who spurn Jesus’ love, and to establish a feast honoring the Sacred Heart on the octave day of the Corpus Christi solemnity.
The archbishop exhorted families to enthrone an image of the Sacred Heart in their homes, and parishes to revive the first Friday devotion, a practice that has waned over the decades in many parishes.
He particularly called on clergy to “lead by example,” and to “return often to the Heart from which your vocation flows” amid “a time of complexity and strain.”
The archbishop, who entrusted his archdiocese to the Sacred Heart, assured “the young, the poor, the sick and all who carry heavy burdens” that “the Heart of Christ is open to you. He is not distant. He is near, merciful and faithful.”
The letter included the text for an act of consecration to the Sacred Heart of Jesus — and regarding the upcoming consecration of the U.S., Archbishop Etienne asked, “What would it look like for us as a nation to live this consecration — mutual love, respect for persons, loving the neighbor, working for peace?”
Gina Christian is a multimedia reporter for OSV News. Follow her on X @GinaJesseReina.
