Vital devotions to the Sacred Heart of Jesus



  

 

Enthronement of the Sacred Heart at home,

and the Nine First Fridays of Reparation.

 

 

Philip Kosloski of Aleteia lays it out at:

https://aleteia.org/2016/04/29/5-things-catholics-should-know-about-first-fridays/

 

5 Things Catholics Should Know About First Fridays

Learn about devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus and the graces that come from observing First Fridays

 

It is no wonder, therefore, that our predecessors have constantly defended this most approved form of devotion — the pious devotion of the faithful toward the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus [and] the custom of receiving Holy Communion on the first Friday of every month at the desire of Christ Jesus, a custom which now prevails everywhere.—Pope Pius XI Miserentissimus Redemptor

 

What’s so special about First Fridays?

 

Our parents grew up going to church every First Friday of the month and taking part in Sacred Heart devotions, but in recent decades the pious practice has fallen out of practice, and is dismissed by some as an “old-fashioned” anachronism.

A main reason for the decline in interest in this devotion is probably rooted in simple ignorance: people don’t know what First Fridays are all about; families and parishes may not have adequately passed down their importance to the next generation. Here are five things to know.

 

1. How did the First Friday Devotion begin?

 

While some saints referenced the Heart of Jesus in their writings even centuries earlier, in 1673, a French Visitandine (Visitation) nun named Margaret Mary Alacoque had visions of Jesus, wherein he asked the Church to honor His Most Sacred Heart. In particular, Jesus asked the faithful to “receive Communion on the First Fridays, for nine consecutive months.” The request was connected to a specific promise made to all who venerated and promoted devotion to the Sacred Heart. After Margaret Mary’s death, the First Friday practice steadily spread in the Church — endorsed by popes and promoted by saints — but it greatly increased in popularity when Margaret Mary was canonized a saint in 1920 by Pope Benedict XV.

2. Why nine consecutive months?

 

The number nine is traditionally associated with a novena and finds its origin in the nine days that the apostles spent in prayer before Pentecost. A novena provides an extended amount of time for preparation and interior renewal.

 

3. What am I supposed to do on First Fridays?

 

Go to Mass and receive Holy Communion with the intention of honoring Christ’s Sacred Heart. If you are not in a state of grace, and thus unable to receive, you will also need to go to confession.

 

4. What are the “promises” connected to this devotion?

 

Jesus said to St. Margaret Mary, “In the excess of the mercy of my heart, I promise you that my all powerful love will grant to all those who will receive communion on the First Fridays, for nine consecutive months, the grace of final repentance: they will not die in my displeasure, nor without receiving the sacraments; and my heart will be their secure refuge in that last hour.” This means that if a person faithfully receives communion for nine consecutive months on First Fridays, Jesus will grant that person extra graces at the time of their death, making it possible to repent of their sins and receive the last rites (if needed).

This promise is the last of 12 promises connected to the Devotion to the Sacred Heart, particularly attached to the Enthronement of the Sacred Heart in one’s home:

 

(1) I will give them all the graces necessary in their state of life.

(2) I will establish peace in their homes.

(3) I will comfort them in all their afflictions.

(4) I will be their secure refuge during life, and above all, in death.

(5) I will bestow abundant blessings upon all their undertakings.

(6) Sinners will find in my heart the source and infinite ocean of mercy.

(7) Lukewarm souls shall become fervent.

(8) Fervent souls shall quickly mount to high perfection.

(9) I will bless every place in which an image of my heart is exposed and honored.

10) I will give to priests the gift of touching the most hardened hearts.

(11) Those who shall promote this devotion shall have their names written in my Heart.

(12) I promise you in the excessive mercy of my Heart that my all-powerful love will grant to all those who receive Holy Communion on the First Fridays in nine consecutive months the grace of final perseverance; they shall not die in my disgrace, nor without receiving their sacraments. My divine heart shall be their safe refuge in this last moment.

 

5. Are the First Fridays a “ticket” to heaven?

 

It is not as simple as going to Mass for nine months and then clocking out, never going to Mass again and leading a sinful life! The entire purpose of this devotion is to draw a person closer to the heart of Christ. If a person fulfills these obligations with sincere faith, it is natural for he or she to be closer to God and better prepared for death. The moment that this devotion is observed in a superstitious manner, neglecting the need to live a virtuous life, all bets are off and Jesus’ promise is null and void.

Jesus wants us to rest on his heart, like St. John, and the First Friday devotion is an opportunity for us to encounter him more than just on Sundays and to deepen our love of him.

Coming to know, love and trust that we may take rest in the Sacred Heart of Jesus, and place our anxieties within, is what the First Fridays are all about.

 

[Editor’s Note: Take the Poll – Do You Still Celebrate First Fridays?]

 

 

 

1^st (Friday) March, 2019

Location of Arimathea and the "Resurrection Tomb Mystery"

 

 

Meanwhile, Richard Bauckham, who was consulted for the documentary but has drawn very different conclusions about the tomb, has detailed no less than 13 possible readings for the inscription which James Tabor reads as ‘O Divine Jehovah, raise up, raise up’.

 

 

 

The following blog, christianevidence, gives this rather negative view of the controversial documentary of 2012, The Resurrection Tomb Mystery:

http://christianevidence.org/history/page/the_resurrection_tomb_mystery

Posted: 16 April 2012

On the Thursday before Good Friday this year, the Discovery Channel screened a documentary, The Resurrection Tomb Mystery, claiming to reveal the earliest evidence for belief in the resurrection of Jesus. The documentary was about a sealed 1st century tomb found in Talpiyot, a suburb of Jerusalem, which contains ossuaries, or bones boxes.   Working with a camera mounted on a robotic arm, the filmmakers found an image on one of the boxes which biblical historian James Tabor believes is of the great fish in the story of Jonah. The early Christians used the story of Jonah, who was swallowed by the fish but later escaped from it, as a parable for the death and resurrection of Jesus. Another of the boxes has an inscription which, according to James Tabor, says something like: ‘O Divine Jehovah, raise up, raise up’. Tabor, who is at the University of North Carolina, says he is 95 per cent certain in linking the image and inscription with Jesus.   Simcha Jacobovici, who produced the documentary, also made The Lost Tomb of Jesus in 2007, claiming that another tomb, just 200 metres from the ‘Resurrection’ tomb, contained the bones of Jesus and some of his earliest followers, including Mary Magdalene. That tomb also contained a number of bone boxes, but the Da Vinci Code-like conclusions drawn by the documentary were ridiculed by archaeologists who were involved in excavating the tomb. This time round, The Resurrection Tomb Mystery has generated huge debate and disagreement on academic blogs around the world. Robert Cargill, of the University of Iowa, has demonstrated that the image of the ‘great fish’ has been clumsily Photoshopped for the documentary to make it more fish-like. At the time of writing, Simcha Jacobovici and James Tabor have yet to admit that the image has been manipulated. Robert Cargill and other scholars believe the image is much more likely to be an amphora, or storage jar.   Meanwhile, Richard Bauckham, who was consulted for the documentary but has drawn very different conclusions about the tomb, has detailed no less than 13 possible readings for the inscription which James Tabor reads as ‘O Divine Jehovah, raise up, raise up’. Most of them have no resurrection theme. One of them reads, ‘Here are my bones. I, Agabus, crumble not away’.   Mark Goodacre of Duke University, North Carolina, who live blogged the screening of the documentary, said, ‘I was surprised to see… just how weak the attempts to link the tomb to Jesus appeared.’ [End of quote]   Richard Bauckham clarifies the situation in NT blog, in an article that also provides the location for the biblical town of Arimathea in connection with 1 Maccabees: http://ntweblog.blogspot.com/2012/04/joseph-of-arimathea-and-talpiyot-tomb-b.html

 

 

Joseph of Arimathea and Talpiyot Tomb B, by Richard Bauckham

 

I am delighted  to have the opportunity to blog the following guest post from Prof. Richard Bauckham.  It is also available as a PDF file here.

 

Joseph of Arimathea and Talpiyot Tomb B

 

Richard Bauckham

 

The “Resurrection Tomb Mystery” documentary attempts to suggest that Talpiyot Tomb B was the tomb of Joseph of Arimathea. Hardly any evidence for this is actually provided. The only point at which some reason for the identification is given is this:

 

“The two [Talpiyot] tombs were found on what had been in the first century a rich man’s estate, complete with wine press and ritual bath. And the area is dominated by two hills. Joseph of Arimathea was a rich man and his name, in Hebrew, means ‘Two Hills.’”

 

This comment obviously depends on the usual explanation of Arimathea as representing the Hebrew place name Ramathaim (1 Sam 1:1), and correctly notices that this is a dual form of the word ramah. The latter means ‘height’ but is scarcely used except in place-names, either alone, as Ramah (there are 4 or 5 towns so-called in the Hebrew Bible), or in compounds, such as Ramoth-Gilead. In such cases, it designates a town built on a high place. For the Arimathea/Ramathaim from which Joseph is named, there needs to be a town, not just an estate ‘dominated by two hills’.

That there was a town, or even small village, called Ramathaim, so close to Jerusalem but mentioned nowhere else in our sources, seems unlikely.

 

The most likely identification of Joseph’s place of origin is with the Ramathaim (textual variant: Rathamin) mentioned in 1 Macc 11:34 as the headquarters of a toparchy transferred in 145 BCE from Samaria to Judea. This Ramathaim is clearly not near Jerusalem, but near the borders of Judaea and Samaria. Eusebius’s Onomasticon places it at the village of Remphis (Israel map grid 151159), which is about 30 km north-west of Jerusalem. It should be noticed that the dual form of Ramathaim is an archaic form, which has survived unusually in this place name (otherwise only in 1 Sam 1:1, which may refer to the same place, evidently called Ramah later in the narrative of I Samuel). It is therefore very distinctive (unlike the common Ramah) and we should not multiply Ramathaims unnecessarily.

 

The makers of the documentary perhaps assume that, since Joseph appears in the Gospel narratives in Jerusalem and has a tomb near the city, Arimathea must be near Jerusalem. But this is a mistake. Like many aristocrats in the ancient world, Joseph had estates in the country (not necessarily at all near Jerusalem) but lived most of the time in the city. This is the most obvious way of explaining why he has a new tomb, not yet occupied, near Jerusalem. His aristocratic family would surely already have a tomb – back in Arimathea. But Joseph has decided that he would like to be buried near the holy city, rather than having his body transported back to Arimathea. We now have a nice parallel in the case of the Caiaphas family, another aristocratic Jerusalem family. They had the now well-known tomb in north Talpiyot, where the high priest Caiaphas himself was interred, together with other family members. But from the ossuary inscription that was made known to the public only last year (the ossuary of Mariam daughter of Yeshua of the Caiaphas family), we now know that there was also a family tomb elsewhere, somewhere in the vicinity of the Elah valley (where the ossuary is said to have been found), plausibly at Khirbet Qeiyafa. This will have been where the family estates were located. (See my article, ‘The Caiaphas Family,’ JSJH 10 [2012] 3-31.)

 

So the only shred of evidence presented in the documentary for identifying Talpiyot Tomb B as that of Joseph of Arimathea is entirely without value.