The Litany of the Sacred Heart of Jesus
A Substack Notes initiative
Hey, everybody. Happy Thirteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time.
Today is the final day of June, and you’re reading The Collect, the newsletter where I, a Catholic liturgist and general thinker of thoughts, write about stuff and things from time to time. If you’re new, welcome, and if you’re not, welcome back!
As I mentioned on my birthday last week, it’s been a while since I’ve actually written more than a Link’s Links intro, but I’m going to take the first step towards getting back into the swing of things today, with a look at the Litany of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. If you follow me on Substack Notes, you may already have an idea of where I’m going with this.
Some History
Disclaimer: I am not a historian. Most of this information comes from the internet (though I have tried to correct Wikipedia’s errors by reading legitimate sources—for instance, the claim that the 1899 encyclical Annum Sacrum established June as the month of the Sacred Heart is just wrong, which anyone can tell by actually reading the encyclical).
Devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus can be traced all the way back to the Church Fathers, who meditated on the Wounds of Christ, especially on the wound in His Side, from which, according to the Gospel of John, “poured out blood and water,” (John 19:34). This symbolism was developed, and developed, and developed, and in the 12th/13th centuries, devotion arose in monastic communities to the Sacred Heart as such, but it remained a rather obscure, very personal devotion.
That changed with the private revelations of Saint Margaret Mary Alacoque, a 17th century French Visitandine sister who received a series of apparitions of Christ from late 1673 to mid 1675. Instructed by her spiritual director to write the apparitions down, the devotion proceeded to spread like wildfire. Suddenly not the realm of religious or clergy, devotion to the Sacred Heart became commonplace in organizations of laity and in family life. In particular, the tradition of the First Fridays devotion spread with the writings of S. Margaret Mary.
In 1856, Pope Blessed Pius IX established the Memorial of the Sacred Heart on the Friday after the Octave of Corpus Christi; in 1899, Pope Leo XIII raised the celebration to the status of Feast.
Also in 1899, Pope Leo XIII published his encyclical letter Annum Sacrum (which can be read here), encouraging devotion to the Sacred Heart and establishing days in June as particular days of prayer to the Sacred Heart; additionally, the Pope presented the text of the Consecration to the Sacred Heart, and on June 11th of that year, the entire world was consecrated to the Sacred Heart.
With the reforms of the calendar after the Second Vatican Council, the Feast of the Sacred Heart was given the rank of Solemnity, and the entire month of June was dedicated to the Sacred Heart, official recognition of an already widespread practice.
The Litany of the Sacred Heart, already in common use in the eighteenth century, was formally approved in the aforementioned Annum Sacrum of Pope Leo XIII; today it is one of six litanies listed in the Enchiridion Indulgentiarum as having a partial indulgence attached to its recitation. The Litany consists of an introduction (common to all litanies), thirty-three petitions, a conclusion with verse and response, and a final prayer.
What I did with it
This year, through the month of June, I posted one of the thirty-three petitions each day on Substack Notes, and included a brief reflection on the petition for the day.
The reflections vary in length, subject, profundity, and the like; sometimes they were even written before I had my coffee for the morning. Most notably, the first petition did not get a reflection (because I hadn’t yet decided what I wanted to do with the petitions) and the last three petitions never even got posted (because June only has 30 days).
Here, I gather all of those reflections together, completing the whole Litany of the Sacred Heart for your perusal. Use this as you will—as a prayer aid, a daily reflection, a psychoanalytical tool, or whatever else. Whatever you do with the following Litany, I pray that it draws you closer to Christ.
Introduction
Lord, have mercy.
Christ, have mercy.
Lord, have mercy.Christ, hear us.
Christ, graciously hear us.God, the Father of Heaven, have mercy on us.
God, the Son, Redeemer of the World, have mercy on us.
God, the Holy Ghost, have mercy on us.Holy Trinity, one God, have mercy on us.
One
Heart of Jesus, Son of the Eternal Father, have mercy on us.
Christ’s identity and mission are caught up in his filial relationship with the Father; a relationship which we are invited to share, for “to those who believe, he has given power to be made Sons of God.”
Two
Heart of Jesus, formed in the womb of the Virgin Mother by the Holy Ghost, have mercy on us.
Today, in the dioceses of the United States, we celebrate the Solemnity of Corpus Christi, the Body (and Blood) of Christ. We can only celebrate what is real; the Heart of Christ, a real Heart pumping real Blood, beating for you and for me.
Three
Heart of Jesus, united substantially with the word of God, have mercy on us.
Christ is fully God and fully Man; he is truly one of us, so that we may be one with him.
Four
Heart of Jesus, of infinite majesty, have mercy on us.
Christ is king over all the earth; he is our lord and our ruler, and yet our brother and our friend, all for love of us. We bend the knee to our king and receive his love.
Five
Heart of Jesus, holy temple of God, have mercy on us.
The heart is the dwelling place of the soul; in Christ’s Sacred Heart, opened to us on the Cross, the Spirit of God dwells, and by grace enters too into our own hearts.
Six
Heart of Jesus, tabernacle of the Most High, have mercy on us.
The term ‘tabernacle’ means, literally, ‘tent’ or ‘hut’ (sharing a Latin root with the word ‘tavern’). The Heart of Jesus is a home, a dwelling place, which we are invited into so that we may dwell with God.
Seven
Heart of Jesus, house of God and gate of heaven, have mercy on us.
By the Sacred Heart, by drawing near to the Sacred Heart, and by passing through the Sacred Heart, with all its suffering and burning love, we enter into the Blessed Life of the Trinity.
Eight
Heart of Jesus, glowing furnace of charity, have mercy on us.
Charity, or love, is the motion of the Will towards the good of another; Christ, in his Sacred Heart, is constantly willing our good, and the good of the whole world.
Nine
Heart of Jesus, vessel of justice and love, have mercy on us.
In God, there is no justice without love and no love without justice; and for this we should be grateful, for “If you, O Lord, count iniquities, then who could stand?”
Ten
Heart of Jesus, full of goodness and love, have mercy on us.
The Sacred Heart burns for love of us, burning desire for our good.
Eleven
Heart of Jesus, abyss of all virtues, have mercy on us.
One of my favorite lines in the litany; the depths of the Sacred Heart are infinite, and we spend our entire lives and our eternities delving further and further into his Heart.
Twelve
Heart of Jesus, most worthy of all praise, have mercy on us.
We praise God not because he needs us to, but because it is right, and we are fulfilled by our worship of him.
Thirteen
Heart of Jesus, king and center of all hearts, have mercy on us.
When we enthrone Christ in our hearts, ordering everything else around him, everything falls into place. As a holy writer once said, “Christ will be King or he will be nothing, but he will not take second place.”
Fourteen
Heart of Jesus, in whom are all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge, have mercy on us.
The Heart of Christ knows the depths of our hearts, and draws near to us.
Fifteen
Heart of Jesus, in whom dwelleth all the fullness of the Divinity, have mercy on us.
On Saturdays, the Church traditionally honors the Blessed Virgin Mary; today I am reminded that the Council of Ephesus in 431 AD the Church declared that Mary is Theotokos, God-bearer, because Christ is truly God. If Mary is not Mother of God, then Christ is not fully God, and all of Christianity falls apart. But if Mary is the Mother of God, then Christ is God, and his love fills our hearts.
Sixteen
Heart of Jesus, in whom the Father is well pleased, have mercy on us.
The life of Christ reveals the infinite love between the Father and the Son; the love which we are called to enter into, immersing our hearts in his Sacred Heart.
Seventeen
Heart of Jesus, of whose fullness we have all received, have mercy on us.
This line of the Litany of the Sacred Heart comes from the Gospel of John: “Of his fullness we have all received, and grace for grace.” Christ is whole and entire; and by grace, we partake of his existence, which is everything we could ever desire.
Eighteen
Heart of Jesus, desire of the everlasting hills, have mercy on us.
Another scripture reference, this line comes from the blessing of Joseph by Jacob/Israel in the book of Genesis: “The blessings of thy father are strengthened with the blessings of his fathers: until the desire of the everlasting hills should come.” In Christ, the ultimate desire of all human hearts is fulfilled; he is our true fatherland, the hills of heaven upon which we long to rest.
Nineteen
Heart of Jesus, patient and rich in mercy, have mercy on us.
The Lord never grows weary of receiving our penitence and forgiving our sins; as Pope Francis said, “the issue is that we grow weary… we tire of requesting forgiveness.” Let us not grow weary of throwing our cares on the Lord!
Twenty
Heart of Jesus, rich to all who invoke Thee, have mercy on us.
The Heart of Jesus is meant to be invoked! Call on him, speak to him, pray to him; for all that we ask the Father in his name will be granted to us.
Twenty-One
Heart of Jesus, fount of life and holiness, have mercy on us.
In her Diary, Saint Faustina speaks of Divine Mercy as an immersion in the Heart of Christ; we steep our hearts in his, and he fills us with his life.
Twenty-Two
Heart of Jesus, propitiation for our sins, have mercy on us.
Forgiveness is opened to us because of Christ’s sacrifice on the Cross; by entering in to that sacrifice, the Passion and Death of the Lord, we receive the forgiveness that he wants to offer us.
Twenty-Three
Heart of Jesus, saturated with revilings, have mercy on us.
By his stripes, we are healed.
Twenty-Four
Heart of Jesus, crushed for our iniquities, have mercy on us.
When we look at the Crucifix, we are first convicted—Christ is suffering because of us. But if we are able to maintain our gaze, we are led from conviction to comfort—Christ is suffering on our behalf. Both are necessary, but we cannot understand the Cross with only one or the other.
Twenty-Five
Heart of Jesus, made obedient unto death, have mercy on us.
This line resonates with me, especially because today is my birthday; but how much should I read into that? That’s the subject of my last post, which you can read here:
Twenty-Six
Heart of Jesus, pierced with a lance, have mercy on us.
Christ’s heart has been cut open so that we may enter into that place of love and holiness. He invites us into his Sacred Heart.
Twenty-Seven
Heart of Jesus, source of all consolation, have mercy on us.
He beckons us to his Heart, torn open for our sins and pouring his love onto the world. It was this spring that Isaiah once spoke of: “In that day, all will draw water from the springs of salvation.”
Twenty-Eight
Heart of Jesus, our life and resurrection, have mercy on us.
In the Heart of Jesus—in the Heart of the Trinity—we find the source of all life, unchanging and ever-new.
Twenty-Nine
Heart of Jesus, our peace and reconciliation, have mercy on us.
Our hearts are restless until they rest in his Heart, where peace flows in waves of mercy; in resting within his Love, his Sacred Heart, we find our truest selves and are reconciled to all creation.
Thirty
Heart of Jesus, victim for our sins, have mercy on us.
Our sins led Jesus to the Cross, where he suffered and died for us; because of our sin, his Heart was pierced, and his Love poured out upon the world.
Thirty-One
Heart of Jesus, salvation of those who hope in Thee, have mercy on us.
The name Jesus means ‘God saves,’ and it is in our hope in the Name and our closeness to his Heart that we are saved from our sins, brought to live in the love of God.
Thirty-Two
Heart of Jesus, hope of those who die in Thee, have mercy on us.
For the Christian, death is not the end; and by drawing close to the Heart of Christ, we recognize the hope inherent in his promise, “I go to prepare a place for you, and I will come again to take you to myself.”
Thirty-Three
Heart of Jesus, delight of all saints, have mercy on us.
The Communion of Saints is united in the Heart of Christ, where all community is perfected and brought to perfect fruition. It is the delight of the Saints to recognize that God is God, and to proclaim that truth for all eternity.
Conclusion
The concluding petitions are common to all Litanies:
Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world, spare us, O Lord.
Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world, graciously hear us, O Lord.
Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world, have mercy on us.
Finally, the Verse and Response summarize the entire intention of the Litany of the Sacred Heart:
V: Jesus, meek and humble of Heart,
R: Make our hearts like unto Thine.
Let us pray:
Almighty and everlasting God, look upon the Heart of Thy well-beloved Son and upon the acts of praise and sanctification which He renders unto Thee in the name of sinners; and do Thou, in Thy great goodness, grant pardon to them who seek Thy mercy, in the name of the same Thy Son, Jesus Christ, who lives and reigns with Thee, world without end.
Amen.
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