In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, amen.

My Lord and my God, I firmly believe that you are here, that you see me, that you hear me.

I adore you with profound reverence.

I beg your pardon for my sins and the grace to make this time of prayer fruitful.

My Immaculate Mother, St. Joseph, my Father and Lord, my guardian angel intercede for me.

We read in St. John's Gospel how at the crucifixion the soldiers came to break the legs of the criminals in order that the bodies may not remain that day because of the Passover.

They were kind of in a hurry.

And so the soldiers came and broke the legs of the first and of the other, who had been crucified with Him, with Jesus.

But when they came to Jesus and saw that he was already dead, they did not break his legs,

but one of the soldiers opened his side with a lance, and immediately there came out blood and water.

This is a very powerful symbol that we contemplate today on the solemnity of the sacred heart.

It is obviously a historical event, but it is also a symbolic event of how much our Lord loves us.

He has shed every drop of his blood and even water.

There's nothing left to give on Jesus' part in order for us to be saved. He has been totally magnanimous,

big-souled, big-hearted on our behalf so that we can share in His divinity. The fathers of the

church have always seen this as the birth of all the sacraments in the church, blood and water, come out of Christ's side.

The church is born somehow.

Blood representing the Eucharist water, baptism.

We are redeemed because of Christ's love for us.

Today, in this great feast,

perhaps what we ought to do is take the same attitude that St. John, the evangelist,

the beloved disciple, took at the Last Supper, where, as he himself tells us in his gospel,

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