Every first Friday of the month is dedicated to the most holy heart of Jesus. This respect has been held for centuries. If we wanted to find a beginning, we would have to look back to the early Christian age. But the most tremendous respect was held in the 17th century, when St. Margaret Mary Alacoque received a revelation from the Lord Jesus. Among other things, he requested a memorable holiday in which people would worship the „Divine Heart of Jesus“. We celebrate this holiday on the Friday after the octave of the feast of the Body and Blood of the Lord. In addition, we commemorate every first Friday of the month, especially.
Why do we worship the heart??? Because the heart in the biblical view represents the center of the PERSON of man. The heart forms an essential characteristic of a person. Even today, when we want to say that someone is good, we use the expression: „ has a good and noble heart.“
The reverence of the Heart of Jesus is not the reverence of a carnal heart separated from his person, but in it the whole human and divine person of the Son of God is worshiped. However, Christ’s eternal and immense love is mainly worshiped. The love that is given to us is given to us to be given further through us. In the litanies to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, we also have an invocation: „Heart of Jesus, burning hearth of love“. Here we see that there is no mention of a flame, but a focus of love, from which love for us radiates to penetrate even into our hearts.
Today’s people are often characterized as being who is thirsty for love. French priest Guy Gilbert says: If a person looks tough and dull, if he opposes and rebels, if he is aggressive, it is because he feels ‘weakly loved.“ Our task is to receive and give God’s love, originating from Jesus’ heart. („Come to me all you who labor and are overburdened, and I will strengthen you. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am quiet and humble in heart; and you will find rest for your soul. My yoke is pleasant and my burden is light.“Mt 11,28-30)
Jean Ladame says: „If Christians will have an open heart and understanding for the needs of others, if they are not afraid of otherness ( skin color, culture, religion) if they cry with those who cry, rejoicing with those who rejoice to be able to obey, help, sympathize with their brothers and cooperate in everyday life, then they will become a question mark for many, because people will ask: „Where they take that attention to every person, that presence in every suffering, to alleviate it, in every injustice, to face it with courage, in every difficulty, to share it.“
If we even partially succeed, we will be able to say not so much in words as in deeds: „ Through God’s love, God’s grace, Divine heart I am what I am.“
But by God’s grace I am what I am, and his grace was not in vain in me. After all, I worked more than all of them, actually not even me, but God’s grace with me (1Cor. 15,10).
