Today is June 20, Friday of the Eleventh Week in Ordinary Time.
We read at today’s Mass, “Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and decay destroy, and thieves break in and steal. But store up treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor decay destroys, nor thieves break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there also will your heart be” (Mt 6:19-21).
Our Lord’s warning about earthly treasure is really an invitation: he wants our hearts to be anchored in heaven, not chained to passing goods. One of the most reliable guides for keeping our hearts in the right place is the Church’s treasury of popular devotions — simple, time-tested practices that lead ordinary people to an extraordinary love for Christ.
Both Pope Francis and Pope St. Paul VI have praised these practices, especially devotion to the Sacred Heart. Writing on the 300th anniversary of St. Margaret Mary’s visions, Paul VI lamented that this devotion “has somewhat weakened” in places and urged the faithful to let it “flourish more and more every day.” Why? Because the Heart of Jesus reveals the very center of the universe: “the firstborn from the dead, so that in everything He might be pre-eminent” (Col 1:18).
A living call to conversion
When we enshrine an image of the Sacred Heart in our homes, pray its litany or consecrate the month of June to his Heart, we are asking the Lord to reshape our own hearts to make them look like his. Far from being a quaint relic, the Sacred Heart is a living call to conversion. Holy cards in our wallets, stickers on laptops and quiet moments before a Sacred Heart icon are practical acts of evangelization — signs that say, “My treasure is not here; it is in him.”
Let us be unabashed promoters of this devotion, confident that as love for the Sacred Heart spreads, hearts will be set ablaze with Christ’s own charity.
Let us pray,
O God, strength of those who hope in you, graciously hear our pleas, and, since without you mortal frailty can do nothing, grant us always the help of your grace, that in following your commands we may please you by our resolve and our deeds. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, God, for ever and ever. Amen.
