The Journey of the Heart

by fr. John D'Orazio - published on 12/10/2024

 

We are about to celebrate the Jubilee Year, a great celebration of God's mercy towards humanity. One of the visual expressions of this mercy is precisely the image of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. What better way to experience the spirituality of the Jubilee than by retracing, physically or ideally, the places associated with the devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus?

On October 24th last year, Pope Francis gifted the Church an encyclical letter entitled “Dilexit Nos” (“He Loved Us”) on the human and divine love of the Heart of Jesus Christ. In it, he summarizes the history of devotion to the Sacred Heart and its theological and spiritual significance for Christians. Referring to the meaning of the “heart” in ancient and modern philosophy, literature, and the spiritual experience of many saints and religious congregations, the Pope points to the need to “return to the heart” in a liquid society marked by consumerism:

Human beings “risk losing their center, the very center of themselves.” “Indeed, contemporary man often finds himself disoriented, divided, almost lacking an inner principle that creates unity and harmony in his being and acting. Unfortunately, widely diffused behavioral models exacerbate either the rational-technological dimension or, conversely, the instinctual.” The heart is missing.

The encyclical also beautifully refers to human experiences that bring poetry to life, such as a child’s culinary apprenticeship with a grandmother at the home’s hearth, the smile provoked by a joke, or the contemplation of nature’s beauty that enriches our treasure of experiences.

When we embark on a pilgrimage, we seek the heart. We open our eyes to the beauty of nature in many countries of the world. We share experiences of faith and culture with a community of fellow travelers that expand our hearts and allow us to connect our hearts to the cultures and places we visit. Pilgrimage to the sites associated with the Sacred Heart of Jesus enables us to feel, even today, that touch of God’s tenderness, who “does not love us with mere words, but comes close to us and, in being close, gives us His love with all possible tenderness.”

 

Saint Gertrude of Helfta

 

Germany

Traveling through northern Germany, between Saxony, Hesse, and Westphalia, we encounter some of the first figures to propagate devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus.

Saint Gertrude of Helfta, known as “the Great,” was born in Eisleben, Germany, in 1256—the same city that later gave birth to Martin Luther. She became a Cistercian nun at the school of Saint Mechtilde of Magdeburg in the nearby Monastery of St. Mary of Helfta (Kloster St. Marien zu Helfta). Gertrude tirelessly spread devotion to the humanity of Jesus Christ, symbolized by the Sacred Heart. A stop at this monastery on an itinerary between Berlin and Cologne offers an experience of peace and serenity. Some of her relics are kept in Italy, in the Mother Church of Santa Maria di Licodia.

Dominican friar and later Carthusian monk Ludolph of Saxony (1295–1377), possibly the author of the renowned The Imitation of Christ, also found in devotion to the Sacred Heart a way to fill his relationship with Jesus Christ with affection and intimacy. He passed through the monasteries of Strasbourg, Koblenz, and Mainz; the latter two are along the route between Cologne and Frankfurt.

 

France

Similarly, in northern France, an ideal itinerary linked to the Sacred Heart leads from Caen (just an hour from Mont Saint Michel) to Lisieux, Montmartre in the heart of Paris, Paray-le-Monial in Burgundy, and Annecy in Haute-Savoie.

 

Sanctuary of Saint Therese of Lisieux

 

In Caen, a city made memorable by William the Conqueror in the 11th century, we encounter Saint John Eudes (1601–1680), whose mortal remains are venerated in the crypt of Notre Dame de la Gloriette. Founder of the Congregation of Jesus and Mary (Eudists), he secured official approval for the Feast of the Adorable Heart of Our Lord Jesus Christ in his diocese, the first time the celebration was formally authorized in the Church.

A short distance from Caen, in the Carmelite monastery of Lisieux, Saint Thérèse of the Child Jesus (1873–1897), the youngest Doctor of the Church, offered poetic prayers to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, which she described as her “elevator” to heaven.

Moving towards the capital, atop the Montmartre hill in Paris, where once stood a Roman temple dedicated to Mars and where Saint Denis of Paris was martyred in the 3rd century, we find the Basilica of the Sacred Heart. Construction began in 1873 and was consecrated in 1919. After the Eiffel Tower and Montparnasse Tower, the Basilica is the city’s highest point.

Continuing south into Burgundy, we arrive at Paray-le-Monial, the “City of the Sacred Heart of Jesus.” Here, in the Visitation Monastery, Saint Margaret Mary Alacoque (1647–1690) responded to the Jansenist rigorism that had overshadowed God’s mercy. Through her mystical experiences, she proclaimed: “He revealed to me the wonders of His Love and the inexplicable secrets of His Sacred Heart… He showed me the indescribable wonders of His pure Love and to what extremes He was driven to love humanity.” The delightful Basilica of the Sacred Heart, on the banks of the Borbince River, was built in the 12th century in the Romanesque style and remains one of France’s most representative examples of this architecture. In St. Peter's Basilica in Rome we find a beautiful mosaic depicting the apparitions of the Sacred Heart to St. Margaret Mary Alacoque.

 

Jesus appears to Saint Margaret Mary Alacoque. St. Peter's Basilica, Rome.

 

Further southeast, near the Swiss and Italian borders, we reach Annecy in Haute-Savoie, a city that became the Counter-Reformation’s capital under Saint Francis de Sales (1567–1622). Inspired by his legacy, Saint Margaret Mary Alacoque’s devotion developed. For Francis de Sales, devotion was never superstition but a personal relationship in which each person feels unique before Christ.

 

Poland

In Kraków, the Shrine of Divine Mercy in Łagiewniki houses the remains of Saint Faustina Kowalska (1905–1938), the Apostle of Divine Mercy. Her influence on Pope John Paul II was profound; he beatified her in 1993, canonized her in 2000, and established Divine Mercy Sunday on the Second Sunday of Easter. Fittingly, he passed away on the eve of this feast on April 2, 2005.

 

Saint Faustina Kowalska

 

Belgium

Finally, we remember the National Basilica of the Sacred Heart in Brussels, Belgium. Inspired by the Sacred Heart Basilica in Paris, King Leopold II initiated its construction in 1905. Completed in Art Deco style, it was consecrated in 1935 and again in 1951. Pope John Paul II beatified Saint Damien of Molokai, the Apostle of the Lepers, in this Basilica in 1995. It remains one of the largest Art Deco buildings in the world.