(ANS – Rome) – Don Bosco’s devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus is well-known: the Basilica of the Sacred Heart in Rome, which he built with great effort in the last years of his life, is its most obvious symbol; but he expressed it in many forms. For example, in the publications of the Salesian Bulletin in 1886, he spent a series of 11 articles (from February to December) celebrating the Sacred Heart of Jesus, highlighting the central role of this specific spirituality in his educational work.
In view of the Solemnity of the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus, scheduled this year for Friday June 27th, ANS intends to go back over those articles written by Don Bosco, to rediscover the roots of a spirituality so important for the Salesian Family, and thus, stimulated by the Saint of Youth, to savour once again its freshness, value and – including with the differences in language and vision, due to the changing times and sensitivities – its enduring relevance.
In the first article in February 1886, Don Bosco proposes to the faithful a pressing invitation to honor worthily the Sacred Heart of Jesus through a specific form of devotional practice, ‘the Guard of Honor to the Sacred Heart of Jesus.’
This practice consists of choosing a time of the day when, while continuing one’s normal occupations, one unites oneself spiritually with Jesus present in the Tabernacle to console Him with love, make reparation for offences received, and adore Him fervently. Such an hour thus becomes a sacred, personal, and continuous time of adoration, according to the spirit passed on by St. Margaret Mary Alacoque, who received from Jesus the invitation to promote a reparatory worship addressed to his pierced Heart.
Don Bosco’s article highlights well the vast development of the Guard of Honor: the first member was Pope Leo XIII, who personally and fervently adhered to it, and after him more than three hundred cardinals, bishops, more than one hundred thousand priests, and numerous religious communities, colleges, and educational institutions.
With his usual practical and entrepreneurial spirit, and in order to achieve greater benefits in one fell swoop, Don Bosco suggested in particular to adopt a small manual published by the Salesian printing house in San Benigno Canavese, the proceeds of which were all destined to support the church of the Sacred Heart of Jesus in Rome. And that’s not all: in order to encourage greater diffusion of the text, making it more suitable for the different audiences it was intended for, the Youth Saint had also provided for different editions of the same manual: for communities, lay people, and women’s houses of education.
Finally, the context in which Don Bosco’s exhortation is placed deserves mention: the second centenary of the first public consecration to the Sacred Heart. In 1886, 200 years had passed since, in 1686 at Paray-le-Monial, the place of the revelations to the Blessed Alacoque, this form of devotion, which he now intended to continue and propagate, had in a certain sense been made known to the public for the first time.
The full text of the article written by Don Bosco for the Salesian Bulletin of 1886 is available in the original Italian version of the time is available for download below.
English translation:
The Guard of Honor to the Sacred Heart of Jesus on the Second Centenary of His Public Cult
Last December, we proposed several books that would serve as preparation for the coming of the Divine Savior, aimed above all at making Him well known. Now that He has come, we must try to treat Him well, imitating the Shepherds and the Magi who hastened to adore Him with the greatest fervor and with the best gifts they could find, and could no longer detach themselves from His cradle; in a word, we must guard Him as befits a King. Our Bethlehem, the cradle of Jesus, is now the Tabernacle, and it is here in the Most Holy Sacrament that we must recognize, adore, receive, and honor the Child of Bethlehem as best we can. All the more so since the time of Carnival has begun, in which the Sacred Heart of Jesus receives the greatest outrages and disgusts in the Sacrament of His love.
Therefore, all people who have a little heart compete these days, both in public and in private, to console this adorable Heart or to compensate it for so many outrages and disgusts. Now among the Practices that best correspond to the desire expressed by the Divine Savior to Blessed Alacoque, namely that her adorable Heart be honored with a special cult of reparation and love, it seems to us that one of the first places is occupied by the Guard of Honor to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, an eminently reparative and Eucharistic Work, as it has for its purpose to offer a never-interrupted cult of Glory, Love and Reparation to the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus, who, once visibly wounded by the lance on the Cross, is continually wounded invisibly and even more cruelly by the oblivion, ingratitude and sins of men in the very Sacrament of his love. To achieve this goal, the Guards of Honor choose an hour of the day, during which, without neglecting anything of their ordinary occupations, but rather doing them better and with more heart, they go in spirit to the foot of the Tabernacle, and there they try to console the Sacred Heart of Jesus with their love and repair Him for the outrages of His enemies.
And to make better known a Work so excellent and now widespread in all parts, we propose the Little Manual of the Pious Association of the Guard of Honor to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, published in the year just gone by our printing house in S. Benigno Canavese. “This is, as the praiseworthy Unità Cattolica wrote on September 16 last, a little book, as small in size as it is important for the object to which it refers.”
It was approved and highly commended by pious and learned Bishops, among whom stands out the Most Eminent Cardinal Alimonda, our Archbishop, who, recently, not only inculcated the learned Pious Association, approved and also favored with spiritual graces by the Supreme Pontiffs, but added one hundred days of indulgence for each hour of guard, and imparted a special blessing to the Associates and Zealots of the Work.
The purpose of this Manual is to make known, but also to enjoy the spirit and practices of the Pious Association of the Guard of Honor. And so that everything is directed to a single holy purpose, the price of this Manual, which is L. 0.40 per copy, is entirely destined to the benefit of the Church of the Sacred Heart of Jesus in Rome, so that it also contributes with the zeal of the sacred Pastors and the piety of the faithful to the fulfillment of the national Vow of the Italians.
For greater convenience, the Manual has been joined by the Zealous Tickets of the Guard of Honour, which until now were printed separately; therefore, the said Manual is divided into three Series according to the quality of the Zealous Tickets that it contains at the end, that is,
1st. Series for Community Persons;
2nd. Series for Secular Persons;
3rd. Series for Female Educational Homes.
For Seminaries, the one from the 2nd Series could be adopted, or the Latin Zealous Tickets, made specifically for the Clergy, could be used.
Moreover, returning to the Pious Association of the Guard of Honour to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, there is no one who ignores the large development it has undergone in a short time. In fact, this humble Association counts as its first Guard of Honour the glorious Pontiff Leo XIII, who makes his Hour every day, receives his Zealous Ticket every month, and already he alone instituted ten Archconfraternities of the Guard of Honour. After him come three hundred Cardinals, Archbishops and Bishops, more than one hundred thousand priests and a great number of religious communities, colleges and educators. We see this sweet devotion, which already numbers in Italy more than sixty canonically erected Confraternities, entering our Seminaries, as it has already entered those of France, Switzerland, and other nations. Thus the Heart of Jesus is taking possession of the hearts of those initiated into the sanctuary and fills them with His graces and His virtues, so that these may then be poured out on all the people and with the universal establishment of His kingdom of love that consoling word will soon come true: the time will come when there will be no more.
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