Good morning. We are called to love in spite of not being loved. We love knowing we will be disappointed. This is the love we are called to from the cross. We are reminded of this in today’s readings for the Solemnity of the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus. We are reminded in the first reading that God loves us despite our failings, and in receiving His love which is unfailing we come to experience love and in our experience we come to love. Pope Benedict reminds us in his encyclical Deus Caritas Est that “God’s way of loving becomes the measure of human loving” and that marriage provides for us an iconic view of God’s relationship with us. He reminds us that “Love grows through love. Love is “divine” because it comes from God and unites us to God; through this unifying process it makes us a “we” which transcends our divisions and makes us one, until in the end God is “all in all” We are called to love endlessly, as God loves us until the end. However, we are reminded in the today’s second reading that the love of Christ for us is beyond our understanding. This is such a challenge, to love as He loves us, to love even when we fail each other. Not just when it feels loving, not just when it is warm and endearing, but despite our failings He loves us. God is so full of goodness, He loves us even when we have sinned against Him. It is our hope that the more we experience the love which flows from His Sacred Heart, the more we will want to share it with each other.
Love is essentially a giving of self. This giving of self is witnessed in the union of a man and woman in marriage and in our loving one another even when we don’t feel loved, for it is in giving this love that love comes to be. We are reminded of this giving of self in the cross, and in His Most Sacred Heart. Let us imitate Saint Vitus, whose life we recall today, and all the saints in their dancing amid the thorns of life. Let us recall the words of St. Therese we read in the reflections of another St. Teresa in her book Come Be My Light:
“Should my roses be gathered from amid thorns, I will sing notwithstanding, and the longer and sharper the thorns, the sweeter will grow my song.” Today’s Gospel reminds us that He willfully was pierced for us despite our failings. How can we do any less? We are called to love despite each others failings. May we come to love as He loves. May our heart be as His Sacred Heart. Make a great day! 
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