June 14 — The Chief Desires of the Sacred Heart.

The Chief Desires of the Sacred Heart.

1. While Our Lord was upon earth, He several times expressed to His apostles what He had most at heart, and what was the work He had chiefly come to perform. He told them that He had come to send fire on the earth, and asked them what else they could expect Him to desire except that that fire should speedily be enkindled (St. Luke xii. 49). Yes, Jesus came to kindle on earth the fire of Divine love. Does this fire burn brightly in my heart, and do I fulfill His longing that it should be kindled more and more in me?

2. This fire was not merely the fire of love to God, it was also the fire of mutual charity amongst men. When Christ came, hatred, jealousy, selfishness, strife, was the order of the day. He came to spread charity, self-sacrifice, peace, mutual good will. Yet how faintly this flame burns in my cold heart! How much of selfishness and ill-feeling and petty jealousy still remains there!

3. This fire of love to God and man gives birth to another fire, which also consumes the Sacred Heart of Jesus, and burns in the hearts of all who love Him; the fire of zeal for souls and a desire to labor and suffer for them. How this fire burned in the hearts of the saints, of St. Paul, St. Francis Xavier, St. Vincent de Paul, St. Alphonsus Liguori. I must pray for more of that true zeal that animated the saints of God.