The Solemnity of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, so special to the Visitation Order, will be celebrated on June 3rd this year.
With the profound thoughts of our holy Founders as reflections, we offer this nine day mini-novena as you prepare for this great Feast.
Day 1- May 26
St Jane de Chantal:
It is in a spiritual fashion that God gives Himself, reaching to the deepest depths of the heart with His inspirations, and uniting Himself so gently with the soul that words cannot express what happens. The net result is that whoever is thus joined to God becomes one spirit with Him. Let us drown ourselves then in this Ocean of holiness, of infinite purity. If we lost all, we shall thereby gain all. The divine Heart will never fail us, this I tell you for certain, if we do not fail Him. And even if we did, He would not fail us, because His fidelity is greater than our unfaithfulness. He is not one of those who breaks faith with a person who has broken faith with Him, and we shall forever find Him ready to call us back. Let us humble ourselves before the grandeur of God, let us make ourselves nothing in the presence of this adorable Unknown, let us lose ourselves forever with never a thought of finding ourselves again, let us plunge into this divine abyss. If only we could say in utter truth these words: “My God and my all,” we would never find our prayer long or boring.
SCP 27-28
Day 2 May 27
St Jane de Chantal
While others are eating various meats at the table of the Savior, we may repose our souls and all our affections, by a simple confidence, on his loving heart.
ASJ 402-03
Day 3 May 28
St Francis de Sales
God is not only in the place in which you are, but He is, in a most particular manner, in your heart and in the very center of your spirit. This he enlivens and animates by his divine presence, being there as the heart of your heart and as the spirit of your spirit. For just as the soul, being diffused through the whole body, is present in every part thereof and yet resides in a special manner in the heart, so likewise God is present in all things and yet resides in a more particular manner in our spirit. For this reason David calls him “the God of his heart.” And St. Paul says that it is in God “we live, and move, and are.” Therefore, in consideration of this truth, excite in your heart a profound reverence towards God, who is there so intimately present.
IDL 2: 2
Day 4 May 29:
St Francis de Sales
It is certain that the Heart of our dear Jesus beheld your heart from the tree of the Cross and loved it. By the love that He bore it, He obtained for it every good that you shall ever have, and among others your resolutions. We may all say with the prophet Jeremias, “O Lord, before I was Thou didst behold me, and called me by my name.”
Day 5 May 30
St Francis de Sales
I’m sure you are advancing always along the way of your good resolutions. Don’t be upset by these little attacks of anxiety and sadness that are brought on by the multiplicity of your household cares. No, my dear daughter, for this gives you the opportunity of practicing the dearest and best virtues that our Lord recommended to us. “Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me; for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.” Matt. 11:29-30 Note: Francis’s favorite scripture passage, the source of his love for gentleness and humility.
LSD 161
Day 6 May 31
St Francis de Sales
“My Beloved is mine and I am His.” I do nothing except to please Him; His Heart is always turned towards me in watchful care, as mine is always turned towards Him in confidence.” Having done all things for our Beloved in this life, He will have care to provide us with His eternal glory as the reward of our confidence; and there we shall see how happy are those who cast away all the anxious and superfluous cares which we generally have about ourselves and our perfection, devoting themselves simply to their work, abandoning themselves without any reserve into the hands of the divine Goodness, for which they have labored. SPC 23-24
Day 7 June 1
St Francis de Sales:
God’s love is seated within the Savior’s heart as on a royal throne. He beholds through the cleft of his pierced side all the hearts of the children of men. His heart is king of hearts, and he keeps his eyes fixed on our hearts. Just as those who peer through a lattice see clearly while they themselves are only half seen, so too the divine love within that heart, or rather that heart of divine love, always clearly sees our hearts and looks on them with his eyes of love, while we do not see him, but only half see him. If we could see him as he is, O God, since we are mortal men we would die for love of him, just as when he was in mortal flesh he died for us, and just as he would still die for us were he not now immortal. Oh, if we could hear this divine heart singing with a voice infinitely sweet his canticle of praise to the divinity! What joy, what strring within our hearts to spring up to heaven so as to hear it forever.
TLG 1, 5:11, 263
Day 8 June 2
St Francis de Sales
Bearing with the imperfections of our neighbor is one of the chief characteristics of love. Our Lord showed us this upon the cross. His heart was full of tenderness and love for us; for us, I say, and even for those who caused His death, and who thereby committed the most monstrous sin that man could ever commit.
Day 9 June 3 Feast of the Sacred Heart of Jesus
St Francis de Sales
What do you think this means, digesting Jesus Christ spiritually? People who have a good digestion feel their whole body strengthened as the food distributes itself evenly to every part of them. In the same way people who have a good spiritual digestion feel that Jesus Christ who is their food penetrates to every part of their soul and of their body and communicates himself to them. They have Jesus Christ in their head, heart, breast, eyes, hands, tongue, ears and feet. But what does our Savior do in them? He straightens everything out, purifying, mortifying, quickening all things. He loves in our heart, understands in our head, inspires our actions within us, he sees in our eyes, he speaks with our tongue, and so with all the rest: he does everything in us, and then we live, not we ourselves, but Jesus Christ lives in us.
LST 145-46