Today is the feast day of Saint Alphonsus Liguori, an 18th Century Italian priest and bishop, who founded the Congregation of the Most Holy Redeemer, also known as the Redemptorists. Saint Alphonsus practiced as a lawyer before being called to the priesthood and this part of his history has always resonated with me as I also practiced as a lawyer before embracing the full-time call to homeschooling — in a way, forming my own little “congregation”. I’ve also been very inspired by Saint Liguori’s devotion to the Holy Eucharist. In a very moving reflection, he describes how our “most loving Savior, knowing that his hour was now come for leaving this earth, desired, before he went to die for us, to leave us the greatest possible mark of his love . . . his own body for our food.” His own Body. And what part of His Body did Christ leave us? His Heart. His Sacred Heart. His Beating Heart. The very source and center of Jesus’s bodily personhood as a human being, sacrificed on the Cross, pierced by the Centurion’s lance, with water and blood pouring out. The Beating Heart that bore Christ’s agony and suffering on the Cross is the one and same Heart that lives in every tabernacle of the Catholic Church. Eucharistic miracles throughout the centuries have corroborated the truth of this awesome reality—that Christ left us with the incomprehensible gift of His very own Flesh, his Beating Heart, for us to adore, gaze upon and consume so that He is as close to our own beating hearts as we are to His. This is a profound mystery and a profound consolation every moment that I truly reflect on the Holy Eucharist. And I know that my holiness project would go nowhere if I didn’t desire Jesus in the Eucharist to be my ultimate center—the absolute requirement for every attempt at growing in virtue in whatever form or plan I devise. His Beating Heart beats for me and is waiting lovingly in every tabernacle—earnestly desiring to join his Beating Heart to mine. Saint Alphonsus Liguori, pray for us.
Beating Heart
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