READING 1
Proverbs 4:20-23
My son, be attentive to my words; incline your ear to my sayings. Let them not escape from your sight; keep them within your heart. For they are life to him who finds them, and healing to all his flesh. Keep your heart with all vigilance; for from it flow the springs of life.
READING 2
From the encyclical Dilexit Nos, on the Sacred Heart of Jesus, by Pope Francis
13. All our actions need to be put under the “political rule” of the heart. In this way, our aggressiveness and obsessive desires will find rest in the greater good that the heart proposes and in the power of the heart to resist evil. The mind and the will are put at the service of the greater good by sensing and savouring truths, rather than seeking to master them as the sciences tend to do. The will desires the greater good that the heart recognizes, while the imagination and emotions are themselves guided by the beating of the heart.
14. It could be said, then, that I am my heart, for my heart is what sets me apart, shapes my spiritual identity and puts me in communion with other people. The algorithms operating in the digital world show that our thoughts and will are much more “uniform” than we had previously thought. They are easily predictable and thus capable of being manipulated. That is not the case with the heart.
15. The word “heart” evokes the inmost core of our person, and thus it enables us to understand ourselves in our integrity and not merely under one isolated aspect.
16. This unique power of the heart also helps us to understand why, when we grasp a reality with our heart, we know it better and more fully. This inevitably leads us to the love of which the heart is capable, for “the inmost core of reality is love.”
REFLECTION
Blaise Paschal said famously in his Pensées, “The heart has its reasons which reason knows nothing of.” When we learn to encounter reality from the heart, we see more clearly, respond to things as they are, and our responses are more grounded. We bring the core of our person to bear and act out of our true identity. This is different than heady abstractions or merely emotional reactions. Do you remain in touch with your heart as you encounter the world around you? Do you listen to the reasons of the heart as you try to decide what to say or do next? Do you see with the eyes of heart when you are interacting with other human beings? Are you able to see that the inmost core of reality is love?
Litany of the Fearful Heart
Radiating Christ
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