Being fully God and fully human, Jesus has a human heart and that human heart is the heart of God. The Sacred Heart of Jesus represents his divine love and infinite mercy for all men.
For centuries, devotion to the wounded heart of Jesus has allowed faithful Catholics to focus on the love of Jesus that moved him to give up his life to atone for the sins of men.
The devotion spread after St. Margaret Mary Alacoque experienced a series of apparitions between 1673 and 1675, where Jesus revealed a vision of his Sacred Heart to her.
The Sacred Heart of Jesus is depicted as a human heart shining with light representing his divine and human love. The heart sits on the chest of Jesus as he points to it with his wounded hand.
A Cross crowns the heart reminding that Jesus lived among men in the Incarnation and atoned for man’s sin by his Passion and Death. Flames shooting from the heart represent the burning love of God which caused Him to send his only Son.
The heart is wrapped with a crown of thorns symbolizing the suffering that Jesus endured for humanity’s sins. Water and blood coming from the wounded heart represents God’s love poured out that washes away man’s sin
All of humanity was consecrated to the Sacred Heart of Jesus by Pope Leo XIII in 1899.
The Solemnity of the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus is celebrated by the Church nineteen days after Pentecost, falling on the Friday after the Solemnity of the Most Holy Body and Blood of Christ.
The entire month of June and the first Friday of each month are also dedicated to the Sacred Heart of Jesus.
The heart that loved so deeply:
Devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus consists of love and reparation:
So the soldiers came and broke the legs of the first and then of the other one who was crucified with Jesus. But when they came to Jesus and saw that He was already dead, they did not break his legs, but one soldier thrust his lance into his side, and immediately blood and water flowed out.
John 19: 32-34
The heart is the seat of love:
His heart is literally on fire with love for you:
More than a metaphor for the love of Jesus:
Jesus knew and loved us each and all during his life, his agony and his Passion, and gave Himself up for each one of us: “The Son of God. . . loved me and gave himself for me.” He has loved us all with a human heart. For this reason, the Sacred Heart of Jesus, pierced by our sins and for our salvation, “is quite rightly considered the chief sign and symbol of that. . . love with which the divine Redeemer continually loves the eternal Father and all human beings” without exception.
Catechism of the Catholic Church 478
“Make my heart like unto thine.”:
The bond between Jesus’ humanity and his divinity:
An indication of who Jesus truly is:
And so the Heart of our Savior reflects in some way the image of the divine Person of the Word and, at the same time, of his twofold nature, the human and the divine; in it we can consider not only the symbol but, in a sense, the summary of the whole mystery of our redemption. When we adore the Sacred Heart of Jesus Christ, we adore in it and through it both the uncreated love of the divine Word and also its human love and its other emotions and virtues, since both loves moved our Redeemer to sacrifice Himself for us and for His Spouse, the Universal Church, as the Apostle declares: “Christ loved the Church, and delivered Himself up for it, that He might sanctify it, cleansing it by the laver of water in the word of life, that He might present it to Himself a glorious Church, not having spot or wrinkle, or any such thing, but that it should be holy and without blemish.”
Pope Pius XII, Haurietis Aquas, 15 May 1956
A wounded heart, thorns, a cross, and fire:
The month of June is devoted to the Sacred Heart of Jesus:
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