Clavis Corde Jesu

Today at work, shortly after I arrived and while my computer was booting up, I *knew* I needed to head down to the chapel...or at least in that direction.  Surely enough, I saw in the copy room nearby a volunteer with whom I needed to speak, we had a wonderful conversation, and then, finally, I headed in to pray. Instead of going to the chapel, though, I stayed in the Church, opting to remain in the presence of Our Lord, enclosed in the tabernacle.

After praying Morning Prayer, as I stood and genuflected to say goodbye to Jesus, something about the tabernacle caught my attention. I stopped to look more closely and realized that the key had been left in the lock!

Knowing that it should not be there, I stood and carefully removed the key, then took it to the office as I wasn't exactly sure WHERE in the sacristy it belonged.  I had a guess but wanted to be certain so that the next time it was needed Father didn't have to tear the place apart looking for it!

After verifying the proper place for the key, I headed to the sacristy, where I found Father himself, who apparently needed it and before I arrived, did not know that it was "missing"! Happily I handed it over and verified where it should go should I ever find it in the same way ever again.

Key to God's House....and His Heart

I don't normally have the tabernacle key in my hand, I don't normally approach the residence of Our Lord, and today sensed it to be a great privilege to hold something so important. I realized that perhaps the desire to head to the chapel to pray in EXACTLY that time was in order to offer this exact service for Jesus and His entire Body, to defend against sacrilege.

And maybe something more.

The "feeling" of the key in my hand wouldn't leave me today; I knew the true weight of the key itself as being far more than its mere mass would indicate, and there is no way to explain this seeming dichotomy.

Today is a First Friday, a day set aside each month to honor the Sacred Heart of Jesus. As I went about my work I pondered His Most Sacred Heart and how He offers Himself so freely, and with such vulnerability to us in the Holy Eucharist.  I recalled the Miracle of Lanciano and the evidence that revealed it as heart tissue.  When we receive Holy Communion, we receive the very heart of Christ!  He gives us that great symbol, and more importantly, the REALITY of His own love and life, without which NONE of us could ever exist!

I recalled my plaintive prayer to Jesus from last summer as my plane landed in Hartford, CT. I had to wipe tears from my eyes again as I seem to continue to pray that same prayer to Him, one I can't seem to stop praying:  "Jesus, please don't break my heart."

He never has and never will, but I, of course, have broken His over and over again.  I can't seem to stop doing so, either. It becomes clear that even as I desire to offer everything, I still hold much in reserve, even as He quite literally offers His own Sacred Heart to me especially through the Most Blessed Sacrament!

Today, in an unexpected blessing, He entrusted me with the physical key to His heart.  Not just with Himself...but with the highly guarded key to that which we hold most Sacred.Even the Angels who adore Him and are always in His Presence are not given such an honor.

I can still feel the weight of that key in my palm and hear the echo of Jesus' own plea back to me:

"I trust you with MY heart....won't you trust Me with yours?"
*

The Good Shepherd Lives

Last weekend we celebrated Good Shepherd Sunday, and I spent that day working on a paper on Luke-Acts for my New Testament class.

As I read again the narrative of the birth of Christ, suddenly I was struck by the fact, and the inherent symbolism of those first told of the birth of Our Lord: the Shepherds.

His very birth itself, the very location, of course, makes this call to the Shepherds obvious, for Jesus was not born into a pristine stable akin to the ones found at Churchill Downs, but rather, a cave. The caves that skirt Bethlehem, to this day, are used in the same way; to protect the flocks at night. This is where Jesus Christ was born.

Our Lord, the Good Shepherd, was born in a place used to shelter sheep, and was placed in a wooden manger, from which those sheep might be fed.

St. Leo the Great declared that the wood of the manger is that of the wood of the Cross, so we see that immediately from birth, our Good Shepherd was being prepared, as the gospels say, to lay down his life for his sheep.

Yet there is another connection; the Shepherds themselves. The Angelic messengers were sent to the Shepherds by God to call them to the side of Christ as He lay in the manger.

Are you seeing what I am seeing? Are you seeing the pattern emerging?

The Shepherds...shepherds...were CALLED by God (via the Angels), to go to the side of Christ as He lay in the manger.

The Shepherds were called to the SIDE OF CHRIST. 

33 years later, the Church would be born out of that precious side, from the very act Jesus proclaimed in the gospels in such eloquent terms; for Jesus is the Good Shepherd who laid down His life for the flock. He laid down on the Cross, and then was lifted up, drawing all men to Himself, and there, from His pierced side, the Church was born.

What did the Shepherds do when they left the side of the Infant Jesus? They proclaimed the Good News, the birth of the Messiah. They proclaimed the miracle. They were first called by God, and then sent to fulfill His will. The Shepherds...proclaiming the Good Shepherd who was born amidst a flock and laid in the wood of the manger. (Luke 1:8-20)

But there's more, isn't there? What is the Priesthood? Who are the Bishops? 

Pastors. Shepherds.

Who proclaim the good news and by laying down their own lives, they lead us through the Cross and into Eternal Salvation.  

Have you seen a Bishop's crosier lately?

Just as the Shepherds were called to the side of Christ and sent to proclaim the good news of His birth, so was the Church born out of the side of Christ, Apostles called to the scene of His Resurrection, and the Holy Spirit sent to the Apostles to continue the saving mission of Christ:  to preach the Good News, to bring Christ to the world, yet in a perfect fulfillment of the New Covenant. For the Shepherds today, too, are called to proclaim the Gospel, but with a profound authority that can be given only by God to those whom He calls, they bring Jesus Christ to His people, for it is the Good Shepherd Himself who continues to feed His flock through their hands. 

Just as the call to the Shepherds in Luke was expressed through the Angelic messengers, so today is the call and the authority passed on today through Holy Orders, for God speaks clearly through those to whom He gave the authority. (John 20:21 ff,  Luke 9: 1-2,  Acts 6:6)

It is this image, this proleptic image of the shepherds called to the side of the Infant Jesus that struck me on Sunday as I realized the eternal call of Christ to those who would Shepherd in His place, in His name, through His direct authority.  

In and through them, the Good Shepherd is brought to us, is fed to us, body, blood, soul, and divinity.  They, who have been called to the side of Christ, to enter into His wounds, to become one with Him, so that we might all have life within us.

  

If there were no Shepherds to offer the Sacrifice of Christ on our behalf, to come after us when we are lost, to call us again to the side of the Good Shepherd, we would be lost forever.  We would be taken by the wolves that roam so freely.  

We know our Good Shepherd, and we know those who stand in His place, and through them, we heed His voice and are fed, not just the Word, but the entirety of salvation. 

Our Good Shepherd, Jesus Christ the High Priest, did not lay down His life in vain, but continues to live through those He has chosen and who have answered that Call.  He comes to us through their consecrated hands, made present among us and uniting us in Holy Communion of His Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity.  Jesus claims us as His own through Baptism, completed in Confirmation, and speaks through His Priests in the Sacrament of Confession. He passes His authority through the Sacrament of Holy Orders.  He heals and brings salvation to us through the Sacrament of the Sick. 

 

All through the hands and authority of those chosen to Shepherd and guide we, His flock.  

Thank you, Jesus, for the gift of your Priesthood, and for all those you have chosen and called to serve in your place.  

*

Preaching the Cross

I just finished watching Fr. Corapi speaking with Fr. Pacwa on EWTN, and he made a major point; we don't often enough hear about Christ Crucified. We aren't told about the Cross. In many parishes, the crucifix has been replaced with a "resurrection cross", showing Jesus resurrected, but only a sterile reminder of His suffering.

We shouldn't be so surprised, then, that people are trying to end suffering through euthanasia rather than embrace it and understand its redemptive power. If we don't learn about the Cross...we can't truly know Christ.

I grew up with images of our Crucified Lord all over the house; in the images of the Sacred Heart of Jesus and Immaculate Heart of Mary, in the crucifixes, in learning the Sorrowful Mysteries. At Mass, I used to look at my First Communion Mass book at the images of Jesus suffering, trying to understand...especially because there didn't seem to be a lot wrong with Him.

Over time, and especially in the last couple years, I've fallen in love with Jesus. Not because He's such a "nice guy", but because of His suffering. I don't love Jesus because He said some interesting things and inspired some people to change their ways and performed a few miracles. I love Jesus because He DIED for me. He suffered HORRIBLY...for me.

I can't tell you the moment it happened, but one day I looked at the Cross, at the suffering of Christ, and realized His sacrifice was REAL, it was PERSONAL, and it was done out of LOVE.

Once I knew what love REALLY was, I was changed forever.

It was the Cross that drew me to Him. It was His suffering, His redemptive suffering that made me approach.

"When I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all men to myself."
~Jn 12:32

When Christ was first lifted from the earth, He was Crucified. The second time He was lifted, he was Resurrected, and the third time was his Ascension.

And every day, if we so desire or are able to go, we can see Christ lifted again, during the Sacrifice of the Mass...and we are drawn to Him even more closely, through Holy Communion.

We need to hear about the Cross, we need to understand the sacrifice of love that draws us to Him, and we need to understand His own invitation to unite our own sufferings with His, for that is where we will truly find Him. And in making an offering of our own trials...that is where we will learn to love others.

If we don't understand the message of the Cross, we can't possibly understand love.

Worth the Price?

Today at Mass, on the Solemnity of Corpus Christi, Father pointed to the crucifix, established just above the tabernacle, speaking of the Body and Blood of Christ, proclaiming, "Jesus sacrificed Himself on the Cross for you because He thought you were worth it."

That phrase reverberated right from my mind to my heart and straight to my soul...and back. Over and over again.

"Jesus sacrificed Himself on the Cross for you because He thought you were worth it."

Jesus sacrificed Himself...for me....because He thought...I...was worth it?

Forgive me, but I really do have a difficult time getting my mind around this. I know that I love Jesus, I know that Jesus died for me, I believe that fully, and I even believe it's personal. But it's still that last part that I can't seem to really grasp.

I want to say that I'm NOT worth it. Not one bit. Not even close. That's different than saying I merit it or don't merit it; we all know that none of us merits such a gift of salvation. For some reason, though, today that phrase really hit me hard.

Jesus thought I was worth it. I gazed at the crucifix suspended above us, unable to tear my eyes away. Jesus thought I was worth THAT. Because, had He not thought I was worth it, He wouldn't have done it. The reality was right there in front of me.

One of our essay questions for this last class dealt with the beatific vision; that Jesus Christ had that eternal and all-knowing vision, that knowledge of each and every one of us, before and even at His conception. Jesus has always known us each individually. When He became Incarnate at His conception, He knew us. And when He sweated blood in his Agony in the Garden, He saw us, the good and the bad, loved us...and decided that we, as individuals, were worth it. He would have gone to the Cross if only ONE of us had been created.

So maybe it's the information I've absorbed throughout this semester that disposed me today, or maybe it was just a pure gift of Grace, another unmerited gift. We often pray, "Lord, I am not worthy..." and indeed, that is the proper disposition of our hearts, because we have to realize that nothing we can do can make us worthy of such suffering, such a sacrifice.

But our Lord looked upon each and every one of us, and He decided that indeed, we were worth it. It was His decision to die for us, His judgment that we were worthy.

But far from instilling a sense of pride in me, it has instilled a deep sense of ...awe. Because when I consider my life and the choices I've made and those I make every day, I can't honestly look at the Cross and think that I am worth THAT. I'm not worthy of such a price. No one should die for me...especially God Himself.

And yet...He did, for it did not end with His suffering and death.

At Communion the choir sang my favorite hymn...can you guess? Adoro Te Devote. They began in English and I read the words, completely undone. It was perfect...the words I could fully understand as I prepared my heart to receive Jesus...and the Latin to aid my gratitude as I moved forward and then returned to my pew to pray. It doesn't happen often anymore, but it did today...I couldn't stop the tears, and they were tears of gratitude and amazement that Jesus would make such a sacrifice for me...because He thought I was worth it.

I can't see my own worth in God's eyes. I can only see my lack of worth through my own.

Thank God that He is in charge, that the sacrifice of the Lamb was not given into my hands, for I would never have allowed Jesus to go to the Cross for me. I would have damned myself to the eternal lake of fire rather than allow such a scandal. But the decision belonged to Christ alone...and He decided that we, personally and individually, were worth it.

Jesus went to the Cross...because HE decided I was worth it.

Thank you, Jesus.

My gratitude is too profound for words, and even tears will never convey what was finally revealed to me this morning at Mass.