Heartfelt Reflections

Written on: February 13, 2019

As Grey Nuns of the Sacred Heart, we profess a special love for the Sacred Heart of Jesus. Praying to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, or Immaculate Heart of Mary were popular devotions. Images of the Sacred Heart and Immaculate Heart were prominently displayed in many homes  Today, fewer people understand that imagery.

We are sharing a way of thinking about what this devotion means, what it can mean, in your own spirituality. Thank you to both Richard Rohr, OSF and to Take Five for Faith for their contributions to our understanding.

In his book Immortal Diamond, Franciscan friar Richard Rohr suggests moving your negative thinking “from your head to your heart.”

When you feel animosity toward someone, he says, imagine them literally inside your beating heart, surrounded by your flowing blood, until it’s impossible for you to remain antagonistic.

“Do it in an almost physical sense, and you will see how calmly and quickly it works,” he says. “Now the Sacred Heart [of Jesus] and the Immaculate Heart [of Mary] have been transferred to you. . . . The ‘sacred heart’ is then your heart, too.”

Powerful.

Perhaps, this can be a way to find more peacefulness in our hearts and in our world.

This entry was posted in Matters of Faith and tagged: head, heart, Immaculate Heart of Mary, negative thinking, Richard Rohr OSF, Sacred Heart, Sacred Heart of Jesus, Take Five for Faith, transferred