Christ Crucified by Diego Velázquez (1632).
Praying the Holy Hour on Thursday evening, I sang, quietly to myself, in Latin, the Litany of the Sacred Heart of Jesus.
And the refrain: ‘Cor Jesu, lancea perforatum, misere nobis’ (Heart of Jesus, pierced with a lance, Have mercy on us) remained with me, resounding in my heart.
I then gazed up at a beautiful old crucifix above the tabernacle.
As I beheld Our Lord hanging there upon the cross, in total submission to the Father’s will, ‘jusque ad mortem obediens factum’ (obedient unto death), I imagined the moment His Sacred Heart was pierced with the lance.
And how the Precious Blood and water poured out from His Holy Wound.
And in that sacred moment, pierced, hanging, dead upon the Cross, as the fullness of life radiated out of His holy person, He gave us everything.
Everything was born from Him.
Thus, from His Sacrifice, death became life.
With the pouring forth of His Precious Blood, Sanctifying Grace gushed into the world, cleansing us of our sin.
As He gave us His mercy, His love, His Body, His Blood, His humility, His Glory – all that we need to be reunited to the Father – the fullness of all the gifts of His Eternal Sacrifice were realised.
Thus, the opening of His Heart gave birth to Holy Church, the Body through which we would receive sanctifying grace, the means of our salvation.
‘For it was from the side of Christ as he slept the sleep of death upon the cross that there came forth the “wondrous sacrament of the whole Church.’ (From the Catechism of the Catholic Church, quoting Sacrosanctum Concilium 5).
As I pondered these things before the tabernacle, before the crucifix, Holy Mass began.
Then, the priest having uttered the words of consecration: ‘Hic est enim calix sanguinis mei, novi at aeterni testamenti: mysterium fidei: qui pro vobis et pro multis effundetur in remissionem peccatorum’ (For this is the chalice of my blood, of the new and eternal testament: the mystery of faith: which shall be shed for you and for many unto the remission of sins) raised the chalice.
As he did so, I gazed up again at the crucifix above him and once more imagined the Precious Blood pouring from Our Lord’s Sacred Heart, this time, into the chalice.
‘Be mindful, O Lord, of thy creature whom thou hast redeemed by Thy Most Precious Blood’. (Traditionally, the faithful were encouraged to silently pray these words at the elevation of the chalice.)
As His Blood and Water poured forth, all that Jesus had preached and foretold throughout His entire Incarnation, was in those moments realised.
And I am struck by the relevance of this small passage from Bl. Columba Marmion that I read today, as I write:
‘The Sacrifice of Jesus, because it is His essential work, is the culminating point towards which all the mysteries of His earthly life converge, and the source whence all the states of His glorious life derive their splendour.’ (Christ in His Mysteries, p. 75.)
Thus, in this eternal moment, the Word Incarnate bears the fullness of all He is – Divine Infant, High Priest, Mediator, Sacrifical Lamb, Victim, Ruler of Heaven and earth, King of Eternal Glory, Head of Holy Church.
And day in, day out, He feeds the members of His Body, with Divine nourishment – His very own Flesh and His very own Blood, poured out for our salvation.
3 Comments
Kim, I found this very beautiful and touching. Thank you. May our Jesus be forever blessed and glorified by us and by all his children in the Church militant, suffering and triumphant!
All this started with my daughter in law and I speaking of our worries for the Church and abut the Holy Father. I was helping her with the house and the six children and she mentioned her friends were reading Malachi Martin.
Today I wrote her a text: “It’s interesting to read in this book “The English Jesuits” just how much maligned the Jesuits (the Society of Jesus) have been down the centuries. By historians, and by the likes of Sir Winston Churchill and the late English Prelate, Cardinal Manning. Even in dictionary definition. And this because of the lies of certain secular priests, like 17thC Dr John Sargeant, and of the Catholic recusant author Charles Dodd, who both had a deep seated hatred of the Jesuits, and of the out and out criminal Titus Oates whose fake plot incriminated all Catholics and started a new wave of persecution of the Jesuits and other priests and Catholic laymen and women long after Elizabeth I was dead and buried. Just as Nero blamed the early Christians when Rome burned, and threw them to the lions, so Protestants blamed Jesuits and Catholics for starting the Great Fire of London in 1666, and “proved” they did it.
People still believe all this today even though it has finally been shown to be false by the historian Malcolm Hay.
I’m wondering what the people you mention are “finding out” about the Jesuits. I’ll have to look up Malachi Martin again.”
I considered a website/blog titled, in Latin most Sacred Heart of Jesus would be good place to look and I found Roger whise post I promptly sent to Melanie. Then in checking out “Roger” I further advised her: “The previous post I sent seems to be from the blog of the Irish
Author, Roger Buck, and I’m guessing this is his wife, Kim’s, blog.
Interesting.”
Next I come to check out Kim and what do I find?!
I love what I found!
I am the descendant of faithful Irish Catholics! My paternal great grandparents Irish born Mary McCabe and Patrick O’Brien lived in Adelaide, South Australia. My maternal great grand parents were Irish born: John Maroney and Ellen Sullivan; John Connell and Ellen McLafferty. The latter Ellen’s parents were Roger and Hannah and he the Lighthouse Keeper on Tory Is off the West Coast of Ireland. John Maroney sailed from Ireland to New South Wales, Australia with his mother, Margaret, a presumed widow, her husband having been a Convict, and four brothers and sisters, at the time of the Potato Famine.
One of my parents’ nine children became a daughter of Venerable Catherine MacCauley: she originally took the name Sr Mary Fedelma, though, by the time she died, young, at 61, in 1992, she was known as Sr Lorna O’Brien RSM. Faithful to her vows to the end!
May the Good Lord bless you and all Ireland. Her real Catholics will be ever true.
Do write back to
Yours sincerely,
(Mrs) Anne Buchan.
PS I have read the life of the Irish Jesuit, Fr Willie Doyle!
Correction: “Roger, whose post…”
NOTE: This response from my wife Kim was written long, long ago. It is entirely my fault – Roger who manages this site – that it somehow got lost and never appeared. Please forgive me!
Dear Anne,
Thank you so much for your enthusiastic appreciation of my writing. It is thrilling and touches me most deeply when I know I have reached someone!
I too have felt a profound connection to the Jesuits and all they have done for our Holy Church. They have been passionate and key in the spreading of devotion to the Cor Jesu Sacratissimum. Malachi Martin’s book on them is most enlightening.
Just to put the record straight, neither Roger nor I are Irish. Although Roger’s mother’s maiden name was Connealey (God rest her soul) – ancestors from Oranmore, Co Galway.
But he was born in Los Angeles of English parents. And I was born in London, England, of Australian parents! And we have travelled a lot around Europe.
I don’t know if you have read Roger’s book, The Gentle Traditionalist. But it touches on many themes about living in Protestant heritage countries, as apposed to Catholic heritage cultures. The differences are incredible striking and tragic when one has experienced them both, particularly regarding how much the faith has been and is obscured and erased – now tragically happening forcefully in Ireland.
We must pray, hard.
Thank you again and God bless you and your family,
Kim