I remember when I was growing up, often visiting my dear grandmother. She and I were best friends in so many ways. I remember when we visited that she had a beautiful framed picture in the living room, given a spot of honor where everyone could see it, and that picture was of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. Whenever I think of the Sacred Heart, I remember grandma, whose name was Margaret Mary, named after the saint who promoted veneration of the Sacred Heart in the first place.
And so, today we celebrate, with incredible gratitude, the Sacred Heart of Jesus. Through his most Sacred Heart, the love of God is made manifest among us. This love is a pervasive love that burns in our hearts and changes our lives and leads us back to the God who made us for himself. This love is irresistible if we give ourselves over to it. It is a love that pursues us and a love that can go far beyond whatever distance we have fallen from grace. It is a love that, as Ezekiel tells us in the first reading, takes us out of the foreign land of our sinfulness and restores us to the promised land of grace, and, as St. Paul tells us in the second reading, is poured into our hearts from the heart of Jesus through the Holy Spirit. The love of God pours forth from the heart of Christ just as the water and blood poured forth from his side as he hung dead on the cross. Death could not stop the outpouring of grace that he came to bring.
Today’s Gospel reading gives us a beautiful picture of God’s love for us. This love seeks out the errant sinner. The question Jesus asks is a trick question, because not many shepherds would leave ninety-nine sheep behind to seek one out for fear that he’d lose the other ninety-nine too. But Jesus is the good shepherd, the one who seeks the wandering ones out and dances with joy when they are found.
Today’s feast of the Sacred Heart of Jesus finds us wholly consumed by grace. We have been loved into existence by our God who made us like himself. We have been loved into grace by Jesus who gave his life rather than live without us. And we are being loved into heaven as we give ourselves over to the work of the Holy Spirit who is that love between the Father and the Son. God is love and today we experience how powerful that love can be if we give ourselves over to it.