To live the spirituality of the Heart of Jesus is an invitation to :

♦ propel oneself into a dynamism of life.
♦ assume one’s vulnerability as a chance.
♦ live nearness as a respectful distance from the other.

Dynamism

The spirituality of the Heart of Jesus invites to contemplate a Heart that beats. Our spirituality is effectively marked by a rhythm in duple time where alternate, exterior and interior, passivity and activity.

Vulnerability
The spirituality of the Heart of Jesus invites to contemplate a Heart that is discovered through apierced side. The Heart is not spontaneously accessible to the eye. Above all, it is a pierced sidethat the disciple contemplates. Therefore, access to the Heart passes through this vulnerability of an opened wound. Such a spirituality tells the importance of the body, of the human experience.

Nearness
The spirituality of the Heart of Jesus invites to contemplate a Heart making itself near. It gives rise to our specific mission : to live a love of nearness that imprints a certain style of relationship.

Exterior and interior
The heart, apprehended in its exteriority, is likely to be affected and be called upon for action. Because it lets itself be moved, it is the centre of emotions and feelings, an interior impact upon what is lived, it is the seat of decisions. It is the active centre of freedom where the act is the person’s own. The heart is the place for the decision.

Passivity and activity
The heart beats at a rhythm in duple time, like the ebb and flow of the sea.
The passive time is the diastole when the heart expands to receive : it is the time to welcome.
The active time is the systole when the heart contracts to propel : it is the time of self-giving.
Rhythm in double time

The whole mission of the Sisters of the Sacred Heart of Jesus will be influenced by this binary spirituality of giving and receiving, to go forth and come back, to act and to be moved, to be strong and vulnerable. If one of these is missing the heart is uncoordinated, it enters into fibrillation and life can be at stake. Progressively, this binary rhythm leads us to a harmony with the opposites : we gradually learn to live interiority in exteriority. Our prayer itself becomes contemplation in action, as in the tradition of the Ignatius spirituality.

Human experience
The body, the humane are, for the Sisters of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, the privileged place for the divine. The theology that supports our mission is the theology of the Incarnation, in direct line with the French School : in Jesus, the humane reveals the divine.
 Sister Anne Chapell, General Superior