Text: Bishop John Wilson at Mass welcoming relics to start of Sacred Heart of Mercy Mission

Bishop Wilson at Farm Street Church

Bishop John Wilson gave the following homily on Wednesday, the Feast of the Dedication of the Lateran Basilica, at the Mass to welcome the relics of St Margaret Mary Alacoque and St Claude La Colombiere, to Farm Street, for the start of the Sacred Heart of Mercy Mission.

Tonight we celebrate a love story. In fact, we celebrate the greatest love story every known, the greatest love story ever told. The love in this story is older than the heavens, but it's as fresh as the present moment. The love in this story stretches wider than the entire human race, but it's as personal as you and me. The love in this story is more costly than the finest jewels, but it's given freely and without restraint. The love in this story is constantly being poured out, but it's never ever exhausted. The story of this love is truth, not fiction. It is the story of God's love for the world, made real in His son, in a person who walked the earth, who lived and died and rose again. God's definitive revelation of His love has a name. God's unique communication of His love has a face. God's divine-human presence in love has a heart. God's tremendous love comes through Jesus Christ, whose Sacred Heart is beating now to pump mercy throughout the whole of creation.

It's been said that devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus began at the Last Supper, when St John, the beloved disciple, rested his head on the Lord's breast, close to His heart. The temple of the Lord's body housed a warm hearth, aglow and burning with the fire of love. And even when that temple was destroyed on the cross, it was a death-defying, sin-forgiving love that raised it to new life: "Destroy this temple, this sanctuary, said Jesus, and in three days I will raise it up." As blood and water flowed from the pierced side of Christ, the water of eternal life gushes from the temple of His risen body. It irrigates the trees to produce good fruit and medicinal leaves. It is the source of abundant life and radical healing.

When the scriptures speak of someone's heart, they portray the deepest truth of the person. When we seek the Heart of Jesus, we encounter the deep truth of who He is. When we open our hearts to His Sacred Heart our story becomes one with His story. We meet the fountain of His love and mercy and our hearts are made His own. In the simple words of St Claude, "[Jesus'] heart is still the same, always burning with love, always open so as to shower down graces and blessings upon us, always touched by our sorrows, always eager to impart its treasures to us and to give himself to us, always ready to receive us, to be our refuge, our dwelling place, and our heaven even in this world."

A love story often involves the sending of love letters. People have described the Bible as a collection of God's love letters, or as one long love letter to the human race. A few years ago I read in a newspaper about a post box at Birmingham New Street railway station that had not been emptied for twenty three years. Although it was decommissioned in 1989, people had continued to use it. When workers opened it in 2012, they found letters and postcards destined for addresses at home and across the world, all covered by a thick layer of dust. And Royal Mail set about trying to deliver these messages to their destination. It's all too easy for God's love letter, the word and person of Jesus, to be forgotten or ignored, to be discarded or remain unopened. Despite His searching love for us, many people have decommissioned God. They are closed to His message and to the love story which He longs for us to embrace in and through His Son.

And yet, the Lord is kind and faithful, patient and forgiving. In every age He chooses people and ways to overcome the obstacles, to break through the barriers, and to deliver again the message of His love. So he chose St Margaret Mary to receive a new love letter through her visions of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. And he chose St Claude to help her understand what this all meant. Together, their human hearts were united with Jesus' Sacred Heart, to bring afresh to the Church and world of their day the love that is pure and gentle, the love that teaches God's blessed will, the love that shows us the print of Jesus' footsteps, the love that stays close to us when we fall.

Of the many visions that St Margaret Mary received, chief among them are what are known as "The Three Great Revelations." Significantly, each one of these took place when she was in prayer before the Blessed Sacrament. The call to the Heart of Jesus is a call to His Eucharistic presence. Here, wrote St Margaret Mary, "He made me rest a very long time on His divine breast, where he revealed to me the wonder of his love." When we adore Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament we come close to His Heart, pierced for love of us, burning with love for us. And with great trust in Him we invoke His mercy. In a letter written from London, St Claude put it like this: "It is certain that the confidence that honours Our Lord the most is that of a sinner who is so certain of this infinite mercy of God that all his sins seem to him but an atom in comparison."

Through their relics our spiritual friendship with St Margaret Mary and St Claude is made tangible. They are both our friends in heaven and near to us on earth, interceding for us and for our missionary outreach.

Dear St Margaret Mary and Dear St Claude, please pray for us; that we might lead people to meet Jesus Christ, for we know He is the face and heart of the Father's mercy.

See also: ICN 11 November 2016 - Relics of St Margaret Mary Alacoque, St Claude La Colombière in London www.indcatholicnews.com/news.php?viewStory=31321