MSC Vision Statement
We, Missionaries of the Sacred Heart of the U.S. Section by our religious profession, and in partnership with our lay members, proclaim that the motivation force in our lives is our belief in the love God has shown us in the Heart of Christ. “We have come to know and believe in the love God has for us.” (1John 4:16)
Our Charism calls us to be the Heart of Christ poured out in compassion, mercy, justice and forgiveness on the powerless, the alienated, and on all who suffer from “the modern ills” of society. Through our love, humility and simplicity modeled on the Good Shepherd, we respond by bringing light, hope, affirmation, hospitality to those struggling to establish meaning and direction in their lives.
In prayer and in the celebration of the Eucharist and in fraternal love we form a Community that is aware of its limitations and imperfections, yet faces the future full of hope, openness and fidelity as we respond to the diverse needs of a wounded world.
Spirituality of the Heart
As adults, when we live from our central core-values then we can say that we have a spirituality. For a Christian the central value is Christ. A spirituality is not the same as a devotion. Our founder, Fr.Jules Chevalier, lived as an MSC during the second half of the 19th century, a great time for all types of devotions. We could say that a devotion is a set of practices, like praying to favorite saints, praying before icons, statues, or using incense and so on. You can have several devotions at any one time. A spirituality is much different and deeper. It emerges from our particular way of seeing Christ in the Gospels, a particular way of following Him, and a particular way of serving Him in others.
Jules Chevalier loved to contemplate and meditate on St.John’s Gospel and Letters, on St. Paul’s Letters and on the Letter to the Hebrews. What he discovered from his prayer and life reflection was Christ the Good Shepherd who literally gave everything of Himself to protect His flock, to lead them to sources of food and drink, a Christ who cared for the weak and vulnerable. All of this was summed up for him in Spirituality of the Heart. As he contemplated and observed the central France of his day, he realized that this was the answer to the social, political, economical and religious "evils of the day."
As a seminarian, he had already committed himself to use all of his energies as a future diocesan priest to help transform society in the region. In devotion to the Sacred Heart, as it was called then, Jules discovered a Christ who was far more concerned about the “modern evils” (as he called them) than he himself was. For him, this called for a radical conversion and a totally different way of serving Christ. Now the emphasis was much more on ‘being’ than ‘doing’. It meant permitting Christ to captivate our hearts so as to live His Father’s reign in and through us. Jules realized that he would have to surrender himself completely, his own ambitions and ideas, so as to be able to say with St. Paul :
"I live now, not I, but Christ lives within me" (Gal 2:20). So he had discovered his charism, the living out of this charism would be the spirituality of the heart.
Spirituality of the Heart is not about knowing a lot of Scripture or Church doctrine, it is very much about experience, the experience of being known personally and loved uniquely by Christ. "We have come to know and believe in the love that God has for us in Christ" (1Jn 4:16).
Chevalier felt called to found religious congregations of men and women, as well as lay MSC Associates to respond to the of the Church and society of his day. Because of the previous history of France, the French Revolution and the subsequent Napoleonic Wars, the aftermath of rationalism and religious indifference, he saw spirituality of the heart as the answer to the despondency of the people which could offer new hope and renewed vitality to counteract the indifference he saw all round him. His vision has had a huge impact on the world since then.
Spirituality of the Heart has a deep biblical foundation. In the Scriptures the heart refers to the heart of the person, the whole person. It can refer to the heart of God, of man, or of the Messiah. All three come together in Jesus! It celebrates God loving us through the human heart of His Son, Jesus. From the open side (heart) of Jesus on the Cross flowed blood and water which the dead Jesus (who had already entered into His glory) bequeathed over His Body, the Church.
This "new heart" is mentioned many times in the Hebrew Scriptures, viz. Jerm 31:31-34, Ezechiel 11:17-20, and 36: 24-27, and of course many times in the New Testament, especially in St. John and in St. Paul’s Letters.
Spirituality of the Heart means that I am convinced that I am personally loved by God, that the Trinity dwells within me, and that I am missioned to share this experience of a compassionate, merciful, forgiving and caring Jesus with everyone I encounter.
Because it emerges from deep within our own hearts, it does not depend on special "uniforms or badges" or on anything external. It can be expressed by any Christian through their own personalities, through permitting the risen Christ to love and act in and through them in their ordinary everyday lives. To love as Jesus did. In other words, we are called to be the heart of Christ in the world! "We have come to know and believe in the great love God has for us in Christ" (1John 4:16).
May the Sacred Heart of Jesus be everywhere loved. (MSC motto).
