by Sr. Anne Joan Flanagan, FSPGod loved us first (cf. 1 John 4:10).That is the message of the coming Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception on December 8th, the day we praise God for the way his grace enfolded the Virgin Mary from the first moment of her existence, without any merit of hers. Mary's Immaculate Conception (her being created and sustained in grace, without any trace of original sin) was the first ray of the "dawn from on high" that brought the world the unsurpassable expression of ...

Our Lord Jesus Christ made these twelve promises to those who honor His Sacred Heart to St. Margaret Mary Alacoque, a French nun, whom he called “the Beloved Disciple of the Sacred Heart” and the Heiress “of all Its treasures”, in the 1670’s. They show us how much he cherishes this devotion. Considering that the blood that redeemed us at Calvary came from His Sacred Heart and that so much love and light still exude from it, we can easily understand why! These promises were revealed in one o...

In the dining room of our house is an unassuming depiction of the Sacred Heart of Jesus embroidered by my grandmother. I can’t remember a time when it hasn’t graced the walls of our home. Beneath it is a simple glass shelf, a small votive candle, and a pamphlet about the Enthronement of the Sacred Heart in the home. Another image of the Sacred Heart stands out from my childhood. In St. James Church, our parish, to the right of the main altar was a marble statue of the Sacred Heart. I often wou...

If there is one word that has characterized the pontificate of Pope Francis, it is the word mercy. As St. John Paul II before him—who called for a recourse to mercy “in this difficult, critical phase of the history of the Church and of the world” (Dives in Misericordia, 15)—Pope Francis has looked out onto today’s world situation and called for a revolution in tenderness. We see Francis modeling this revolution in his actions, in his gaze, in his words…all of which have captured the imagin...

There are three things uppermost in my mind as I write to you and all of these are precious gifts, not to be taken for granted: God’s mercy, the sun, and books. You might think that a strange combination, but they are all very much worth celebrating and all quite connected. Sunday is Divine Mercy Sunday. That naturally has me thinking of the reality of God’s mercy, especially since the liturgy from Holy Thursday through Divine Mercy Sunday has us contemplating the great love and mercy of Jesus...

 In preparation for the Synod on the Family, Pope Francis made it clear that the Synod Fathers do not have to “fix” the family. Rather, he is concerned that the family, rather than being an object for concern and study, be the subject of evangelization.It took me awhile to get to the meaning of the phrase “subject of evangelization.” My memories of diagramming English sentences in school helped me. A subject, Sister taught us, is who or what is doing the acting and an object is who or what i...