A little more than a year ago, the Sacred Heart started pushing its way back into my consciousness. I wasn’t seeking it; I didn’t really understand why it was suddenly front and center. All I knew was that the Sacred Heart would no longer be ignored. I found myself saying novenas, saving images I found online, and repeating the prayer, “Sacred Heart of Jesus, I place all my trust in you.” I even drove up to O’Connor’s Church Goods in Latham to pick up a few of the plastic covered Sacred Heart badges that my mom and grandfather always had in their wallets. I’ve got one tucked in my wallet now.

Soon after, I was digging through some files at home and pulled out a card with my mother’s handwriting on it. Since she’s been gone for more than 38 years, that’s a pretty moving thing for me. It was her Apostleship of Prayer card, with an image of the Sacred Heart on both sides. The card sits on my desk now, next to a small crucifix, a daily reminder of both my mother and the Sacred Heart that binds us to each other across time and space.

To be honest, after last year’s brief-but-intense period of prayer and interest in the Sacred Heart, it faded into the background a bit, only to re-emerge last month with even stronger force. Obviously, this is not something I am supposed to move to the background. Over and over, the Sacred Heart was front and center everywhere I turned — in a book on spiritual poverty I had been asked to “blurb,” at a workshop someone suggested I attend, in the spiritual reading I picked up for retreat planning. Even as my interest and spiritual curiosity increased, however, I felt something holding me back.

The portrait we had at home.

The old-style devotions to the Sacred Heart often felt cloying or quaint to me, something that didn’t seem to have a place in the prayer practices that feel most powerful for me now. But then I happened upon the medieval Nuns of Helfta during a retreat day at Dominican Retreat and Conference Center and came face-to-face and heart-to-heart with the deep mystical tradition that gave rise to this devotion.

Pope Francis, in his last encyclical, referenced the Nuns of Helfta and focused on the heart of Jesus as it pertains to our contemporary world. “Let us turn, then, to the heart of Christ, that core of his being, which is a blazing furnace of divine and human love and the most sublime fulfillment to which humanity can aspire,” he wrote in ‘Dilexit Nos,’ (He Loved Us). “There, in that heart, we truly come at last to know ourselves and learn how to love.”

As always, it all comes back to love, whether we are praying to the Sacred Heart of Jesus specifically, reading the words of saint and mystics, reflecting on the Gospels, or receiving the Eucharist — Jesus broken and given for each one of us out of sheer love.

“Christ’s love can give a heart to our world and revive love wherever we think that ability to love has been definitively lost,” Pope Francis wrote in 2024.

In a world seemingly “lost” to hate, division and violence, the Sacred Heart shows us the way forward on the path of love. It’s not an easy path, as evidenced by the crown of thorns that surround the Sacred Heart, but it is a path where love always has the final word.

This column originally appeared in the June 11, 2025, issue of The Evangelist.

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As my husband, Dennis, and I searched out items on our lengthy list, I did what I do any time I’m in an unfamiliar place, be it a new city or a new grocery store: I engage with the people around me, usually through some sort of goofy humor. Before I knew it, I was laughing with another mom in the trail mix section, as we both sought out particular mixes requested by our children. Later in the cheese section, not one but two women recommended an inexpensive-but-tasty cheddar they said I should not pass up. Done! Finally, a worker in the chip aisle came to my aid several times as I searched for a variety of unusual treats. I found myself giddy with the fun-loving community I discovered among the shelves, the kind of community that reminds me of what many of us are looking for when we go to our parish churches.

We go to church not just for Mass, to be fed by the Eucharist and the Word, but to be among those who are searching, just as we are, for something that is not always easy to find in this crazy world of ours. And just as we might shy away from a place in our everyday life that leaves us overwhelmed, we often do the same on the spiritual journey. Rather than dive in and sidle up to someone else who is trying to navigate the same challenging path, we try to figure it out on our own.

Our lives are busy. We often rush into Mass with only a few minutes to spare and rush back out again, not because we don’t want to linger, but because life and its demands can make lingering feel like a luxury or an impossibility. And yet those human interactions are vital to our lives as Christians and as compassionate people on a troubled planet.

My family often jokes about my penchant for striking up a conversation with anyone who happens to be near me — in the grocery store, the library, the doctor’s office. But I find that when I let down my guard and approach someone not as a stranger but as a companion on the way, they almost always respond with happy surprise. I have navigated entire cities like this, relying not on Google or Yelp to get me to locations or restaurants but rather the kindness of strangers and the good advice of those who have been there before.

And isn’t that a lot like our faith journey? We are all on the path together, and each of us has something to offer based on the way we have encountered God. It is only when we are willing to turn to strangers on the sometimes-challenging terrain of our spiritual landscape that we find the spiritual friends and the community that will point us toward the thing we are seeking and remind us that we are not alone.

I’m going to guess that most people don’t go to Trader Joe’s and come home with spiritual revelation packed up alongside the vegetable dumplings and sourdough bread, but the truth is that God’s mystery and majesty are always swirling around us. We think of mysticism as something only for saints who spend hours in contemplation, but it’s always right there, waiting to be plucked off a shelf and gathered into our heart.

This column originally appeared in the Aug. 22, 2024, issue of The Evangelist.

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On this particular night, Dennis decided to solve the mystery and drove across the bridge to the church you see there on the left, St. John the Evangelist-St. Joseph, just down the street from the train station. We caught a beautiful sunset from that spot and found a lovely little garden dedicated to St. Padre Pio. And so I thought I’d share some Wednesday Wisdom from that beloved Italian saint: 

“Any mental picture of your life that focuses on past sins is a lie and thus comes from the devil. Jesus loves you and has forgiven you your sins, so there is no room for having a downcast spirit. Whatever persuades you otherwise is truly a waste of time. It is also something that offends the heart of your very tender Lover. On the other hand, if the mental picture of your life consists in what you could be, then it comes from God.” ~Padre Pio’s Spiritual Direction For Every Day

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