Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Hey, friends. Every June, the Catholic Church celebrates the Sacred Heart of Jesus and specifically the feast day. The solemnity of the Sacred heart fell on June 12 this year. And the Sunday right after this coming Sunday, we hear the reading where Jesus heart is moved with compassion for the crowds, for they were like sheep without a shepherd.
[00:00:16] All this focus on the heart. You know what's funny? For Catholics who are more advanced, a lot of times I kind of look down in the emotional realm, look down on the heart. Like I've posted beautiful videos of kids in worship with their hands in the air in heartfelt worship. Meaning that the song and the way they're singing it incorporates emotion. And I'll get comments online sometimes like, ah, just emotionalism.
[00:00:43] As if the incorporation of emotion is always emotionalism or you know, an unhealthy reliance on emotion or emotional manipulation or you know, as if showing emotion is an imbalance inherently. It's not. It's not.
[00:01:00] The emotional realm is beautiful.
[00:01:02] God thinks so and the church thinks so. You see, because the church and I was honored to speak at a rally in Wisconsin a couple years ago with Bishop Barron. He gave a beautiful homily and it was on the solemnity of the Sacred Heart. And he said, you know, the church doesn't have a solemnity of the sacred intellect or a solemnity of the sacred will, but a solemnity of the Sacred Heart. And, and the heart's always been seen as the seat of emotion in a person.
[00:01:28] Now again, some more advanced Catholics start to look down on that because why? Well, I guess it can make sense. Your emotions can lead you in the wrong way, if not guided by the intellect and will, guided by the Holy Spirit.
[00:01:39] The emotions are something that we share with animals. My dogs can feel anger, affection. They can feel shame even. Isn't that wild?
[00:01:50] So it's part of our biological reality that we have these emotions.
[00:01:55] And yet the church celebrates the Sacred Heart of Jesus.
[00:02:00] There's a great mystery in why. I think part of the reason we do this, that we think about his heart, the emotional seat of Jesus, the part of him that was moved with compassion at the crowds, the part of him that got angry, the part of him that flipped tables, the part of him that wept, Jesus wept.
[00:02:19] That part of him that felt profound love, his passion. Actually, we don't just call it the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross. We call it the passion of Jesus.
[00:02:27] And he did it in a dramatic way. Our faith is filled with drama.
[00:02:32] We love the heart because just thinking about the heart of God moves us. But it Also gives us hope.
[00:02:38] I think when we think about the intellect, the sacred intellect of Jesus, it feels beyond our reach. I mean, honestly, for me, it does.
[00:02:44] I mean, we can get smart, but, you know, Jesus, Jesus smart, Jesus, intellect, that pure, that insightful, that formed.
[00:02:53] Ain't gonna happen, buddy.
[00:02:55] We can form our wills and grow in virtue, but Jesus goodness, no, no, no, no. But when we see his emotion expressed in the gospel, I think right away, that's me.
[00:03:07] He knows exactly what I feel, and I know exactly what he felt.
[00:03:10] Because the Word made flesh took on our humanity and its fullness and all that that means and goes through the stuff that we go through in our daily lives.
[00:03:21] And he showed us how to do it. And the way he showed us to do it is not crushing it. It's not labeling it less than.
[00:03:29] It's not becoming this computerized version of human. That's not what he did when the Word took on flesh.
[00:03:37] It's becoming fully alive, fully human, and directing our emotion, not crushing them. But even in worship, as the Psalms show us how to do, the Psalms were not unemotional.
[00:03:46] They packed in every. The entire range of human emotion. This is the model for Christian prayer, to take all of it in all your passion, all your sadness, all your anger, everything, and bring it all to the Lord.
[00:03:59] That's how he shows us how to be fully alive, fully holy, and fully human. I love the abolition of man, C.S. lewis's book, and he has a whole chapter called Men Without Chests. And he said, you know, if you look at a waterfall and call it sublime.
[00:04:12] You're not saying that I feel sublime about that waterfall. You're saying that's how one should feel when you see this waterfall.
[00:04:19] That there should be an emotional formation in a person, that we respond, that we let reality hit the heart in a way that moves us in just the right way.
[00:04:28] Likewise, a person listening to Beethoven's Ninth. You're not judging that music. If you think it's bad. The music is judging you. If it doesn't move you, there's something missing there, man. Natalie actually put me through a great test when we were dating, one of our first dates. She's like, we're going to just hang out and just listen to Beethoven's Ninth from beginning to end. She was watching me to see if I could take it.
[00:04:48] What a great test that was.
[00:04:50] But he talks the abolition of man. How people who haven't formed their hearts are men without chests, Right? That we need to form our intellectual, we need to form our will. He talks about the men without heads, men without guts. That's your will working in formation of virtue. But men without chests are the ones who haven't formed their hearts that we should lean into to a heartfelt response to Almighty God. And the saints were men with chests, guys.
[00:05:15] They had heart filling them. I think of St. Paul. He was in agony over preaching the Gospel and his flock going astray and worrying about them all the time. I think of Monica weeping for Augustine. I think of Augustine at his conversion saying, late have I loved you, O beauty, ever ancient, ever new.
[00:05:34] It was a heart wrenching moment of conversion. I think of Saint Therese of Lisieux saying that prayer is an inward surge of her heart to God. Guys, it is not, it is not, it is not advancement in sanctity to somehow think I'll grow beyond the childish stuff that you see teens at a youth conference worshiping with all their heart. That's good. That's for the kids. But a really advanced Christian is primarily an academic one.
[00:06:02] Just ask all the people on the Internet with lots of books behind us. No, no, guys, the academic life is good, don't get me wrong.
[00:06:10] But an advanced Christian is one that's fully human, fully alive, and is a man with head, gut and chest all open to reality, hitting them all at the same time.
[00:06:26] Most Sacred Heart of Jesus, we love you.
[00:06:28] Help us to live life to the full. Amen.
[00:06:32] Guys, you're watching this right now from my driveway. There's some trash cans behind me, but I'm pre recording this because by the time you watch this, I'll be on pilgrimage in Portugal. So I'd love you to come up pilgrimage with me someday. Lead lots of pilgrimages. Link below the video Going to Sisi. We're going to the Holy Land with Jimmy Wahlberg this year. Going to pilgrimage to beauty in Kauai and then Kalaupapa. It's going to be mind blowing, but a lot of times you can't afford to or whether time or money, and that's totally fine too. I mean, whenever the Lord calls you, if he calls you. But St. Carlo Acuta said, you know, pilgrimage, whatever. I mean, Jesus is right in the Blessed Sacrament down the street for me.
[00:07:09] So he's always calling us to have pilgrim hearts and to journey toward him in our daily lives, to be moving somewhere. It's one of the reasons I love pilgrimage. But if you're watching this, you're probably not on pilgrimage with me. I'd like to take you with me in my heart. I want to pray for you. So what I'M asking you to do right now. If you have particular intentions. You want me to pray for. For conversion of someone's heart while I'm in Fatima, because that apparition is all about conversion. Or while I'm in Lourdes for miraculous healing, just post it below this video. And I promise I will bring you with me, and I will go to those holy places and I will read your name to the Lord. Because I love you. That's why I make these videos. God bless you, friend. Pray for me. I'm praying for you.
