First Friday August 2, 2024 

Guards of Honor 1st Friday / August 2024 Fr. David Bellusci, OP 

“My Heart has expected reproach and misery and I looked for one who would grieve together with Me, but there was none; and for one that would comfort me, and I found none!” (Ps. 68)

“We place all the intentions of our members in the Loving Heart of Jesus and ask Him to bless them.”

St. Margaret Mary teaches us perseverance

As we read St. Margaret Mary’s letters, we discover her ongoing struggle: to make the Sacred Heart of Jesus known. On July 4 th , St. Margaret Mary writes from Paray-le-Monial to Mother Louise-Henriette de Soudeilles at Moulin. Jesus tells St. Margaret Mary that His Sacred Heart is meant to be adored – and so the significance to display the image of the Sacred Heart. 

St. Margaret Mary insists on this point. The struggle she has manifests itself in two ways: 1.) the blasphemes against the Holy Eucharist in the form of indifference, rejection, and unprepared reception of the Sacrament; and 2.) the numerous obstacles that St. Margaret Mary encounters to spread the devotion. St. Margaret Mary tells Mother Louise-Henriette, “I do not know, dear Mother, whether you understand this devotion to the Sacred Heart of Our Lord Jesus Christ of which I am speaking.” St. Margaret Mary even had difficulty to have the devotion accepted in her own monastery at Paray-le-Monial. Mother Greyfié at Semur, St. Margaret Mary’s former Superior, was the first to introduce the devotion -- at the monastery of Semur. Devotion to the Sacred Heart spread because St. Margaret Mary persevered, conveying what Jesus revealed to her in spite of the skepticism of her own Religious Sisters. In other words, the Sacred Heart devotion we promote today and that we strive to live by started with serious difficulties, nevertheless, a courageous woman; namely, the cloistered Visitandine nun. St. Margaret Mary guides us in what we still find today: the indifference towards the Sacred Heart of Jesus and His precious Body and Blood in the Sacrament; the challenges in spreading the devotion in our pagan culture. Yet, if a cloistered nun by the grace of God succeeded in transmitting the devotion that is now spread across the world, we can certainly persevere in transmitting the devotion in our own communities.

Sacred Heart of Jesus, let us love you by making your Divine Love known.

Prayer to Renew Our Fidelity and Devotion 

Divine Jesus, my Saviour and my King, with all my heart I renew the promise which I have made to love, to glorify and to console Your adorable Heart as a member of the Guard of Honor. Grant O good Master, to make me daily more loving, more devoted and more faithful. I ask this same grace for all the Associates through the Immaculate Heart of Your Mother. AMEN