Pope Francis received at the Vatican the Missionaries of the Sacred Heart who are participating in their General Chapter held under the title “From the ego to the eco.” The Pontiff invited the religious to “flee from sadness, which is the worm that ruins personal and consecrated life.”
At the beginning of his speech on 2 October, Pope Francis remarked that Father Jules Chevalier, founder of the Institute, thought of his members “as missionaries committed to making the love of God known in the world to obtain a response of love from men.”
From this perspective, the Holy Father reflected on three fundamental attitudes of the charismatic identity and missionary commitment of those present: “Knowing the Heart of Jesus through the Gospel; “deepening his message in fraternal sharing and announcing it to everyone in the joy of the mission.”
The Heart of Jesus, according to the Holy Father, can be known “by contemplating his immense mercy in the Gospel.” Furthermore, he invited them to meditate on the Gospel and asked them not to be “afraid of silence.”
He then stated that this experience “must also go through the enrichment of sharing” in order to become “light for the path.”
The Holy Father stressed that we must recover “the gift of wonder that is born in the heart when one encounters the Lord.”
In this sense, he urged to “always put at the base of everything and above all the fraternal sharing” of their “encounter with Christ, in the Word, in the Sacraments and in life.”
According to the Holy Father, this is how they will be able to “constructively confront even the most pressing problems.”
Later, he remarked that “the poor, the emigrants, the many miseries and injustices that continue to renew themselves in the world urgently challenge us.”
“In front of them, do not be afraid to let yourself be enveloped by the compassion of the Heart of Christ; As your Founder said, allow him to love through you and manifest his mercy through your goodness.”
He also encouraged them to do so with courage, “letting the irresistible tenderness of the Sacred Heart shape, modify and even disrupt, if necessary,” their “plans and projects.”
He also asked them not to be afraid of tenderness and recalled, as on previous occasions, that “God’s style can be summarized in three words: closeness, compassion, and tenderness.”
He reiterated that without prayer “things do not work” and urged them to “flee from sadness, which is the worm that ruins personal and consecrated life.”
“That sadness that depresses you, not the good sadness of repentance, which is something else, but that daily sadness is a worm that ruins,” Pope Francis concluded.