Recently, I was asked to give a talk at a Spirit Alive Retreat for colleagues, friends of RSCJ and those interested in the Society of the Sacred Heart. The theme was our life and mission.

As those who know the Society are aware, St. Madeleine Sophie founded the Society in the midst of the French Revolution, when the fabric of society and religion were in disarray. Madeleine Sophie felt called to bring the light of faith through education to a time in history when darkness seemed to prevail. From a group of 4 women then, we now have approximately 3,400 Religious of the Sacred Heart in 32 Provinces or Regions in 45 countries. Our most recent foundations are in Indonesia, Moscow and Haiti.

In all places and in all times we are called “to discover the love of Christ and to manifest it.” As St. Madeleine Sophie described it, the Society has two movements, the first is with Mary to sit at the feet of Jesus, to listen to his Word, to let it enter our hearts and then the second movement, which is as important as the first, is to go out into the whole world and proclaim “know God’s heart.” Both elements of that mandate are important for us.

To Discover: we are called to discover the Love of Christ. To encounter a God who loves us as we are. To encounter a God who calls us to be God’s own love in the world by our actions and by our very way of life. We are called to enter into our own hearts and there, to touch the heart of God. To do this, we need to pay attention to the life of our heart and to allow God to enter our heart and to shape it.

Recently, I read a wonderful article in the Catholic Worker (July, 2003) called “How to Sing our Days, written by Mary Margaret Nussbaum, a teacher in New Your City. She had an insight that in the midst of the noise and confusion of New York City, that human hearts should be like drums beating. She asked her class one day “What was the first sound that you heard?” The answer: “It was your mother’s heart beating.” She says:

That cadence [of you mother’s heart beat] got caught in the way you speak, in the way you walk down a street. That old, common beat is what seeps up in you when you hear a guitar weep. It’s what makes you dance on a lovely night with the drums and the band going so. It’s what you’ll sigh out when you die. It’s what makes poetry, like music persist. We are meant to measure our days by such time.

I found this to be an image of prayer…. to let the beat of Christ’s heart inform the rhythm of my own life. For me, this is “to discover”.

To Manifest is to go the next step. To live with this God beat in my heart, to bring this love to all those I meet in my day, to allow myself to receive forgiveness and in turn to be forgiving with others.

Barbara Dawson, rscj gave a wonderful talk to our Associates on this topic, noting that in some translations of the Society’s documents this second movement is alternatively translated “to reveal” or “to manifest.” I agree with Barb that the word “to manifest” is a much stronger, much more active verb. To manifest is to live what you know in your heart.

I came across a passage from Richard Bolles (How to Find Your Mission in Life, and What Color is your Parachute?) in which he describes this two-fold movement in a different way:

• Seek to stand hour by hour in the presence of God, the one from whom your mission is derived. [To Discover]
• Do what you can, moment by moment, day by day, step by step, to make this world a better place, following the leading and guidance of God’s spirit within you and around you. [To Manifest]
• Find your unique gift, the talent which is your birthright and which brings you joy, and use it how and where the spirit leads you. [Your unique way in mission]

Uniting ourselves with Christ’s heart and then manifesting it in all that we do is a tall order and it will change us even as we seek to change our world. As our Superior General, Clare Pratt wrote to us for the Feast of the Sacred Heart:

“The Heart of Jesus is a place of refuge and welcome, a shelter, a safe place, a place of peace, where every fear is put to rest. His is a heart open to ALL. Like a mother, He reaches out to the weakest and most vulnerable, the mentally and physically handicapped, the psychologically fragile, the addict, the prisoner, the refugee, the unwanted and unloved, those suffering any forms of rejection. His heart IS the wounded heart of humanity....”

Let us discover this heart and then go out to the whole world and to those near at hand and manifest it.