February 2025
Reflections of God's Goodness

February brings thoughts of love! The heart seems to be a universal symbol of love. In his recent encyclical “Dilexit Nos” on the human and divine love of Jesus, Pope Francis is not speaking of our ‘physical’ heart but rather that place deep inside us where we find ourselves. It’s where we think about the important things in life and decide how we will act and who we will be.

In Paul’s letter to the Romans, he says,

For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor present things, nor future things, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Romans 8:38-39

Yet, day in and day out, we forget this amazing truth. Taking time each day to get in touch with the heart of Jesus in our own heart will help us remember. We know from God’s Word that we were made for love. Oh, how the world needs an infusion of God’s love!

Let’s face it, much of our world is unconcerned about God and the deeper meaning of our lives. “…we find ourselves immersed in societies of serial consumers who live from day to day, dominated by the hectic pace and bombarded by technology, lacking in the patience needed to engage in the processes that an interior life by its very nature requires. In contemporary society, people ‘risk losing their center, the center of their very selves.’” (Dilexit Nos, 9)

This month let’s focus on our heart and the heart of Jesus. We can make time to visit ourselves in this place deep inside us, connecting with Jesus, so that we can be empowered to love.

Pope Francis reminds us, “We need once more to take up the word of God and to realize, in doing so, that our best response to the love of Christ’s heart is to love our brothers and sisters. There is no greater way for us to return love for love.” (Dilexit Nos, 167)

The Scriptures make this clear:

For the whole law is fulfilled in a one statement, namely, ‘You shall love your neighbor
as yourself.

Galatians 5:14

Together, let’s pray with St. Paul,

… that he may grant you in accord with the riches of his glory to be strengthened with power through his Spirit in the inner self, and that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; that you, rooted and grounded in love, may have strength to comprehend with all the holy ones what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, so that you may be filled with all the fullness of God. Now to him who is able to accomplish far more than all we ask or imagine, by the power at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever. Amen.

Ephesians 3:16-21

Blessings,

Sister Mary Ann Barnhorn, SNDdeN