VALLADOLID, Spain – Fifteen members of three Provinces of the Missionaries of the Sacred Heart in Europe (France, Spain and Italy) and one Spanish MSC sister came together to discuss the Spirituality of Our Lady of Sacred Heart on 21 November 2007 in Valladolid, Spain. The main purpose of the conference is to reflect and explore the important roles of Mary, model, witness, disciple and missionary in line with the mind of Fr. Chevalier and relevant Church documents on Mary.

The conference participants released a document to open up reflection and dialogue on Our Lady of the Sacred Heart. The full text is as follows:

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Our Lady of the Sacred Heart - Valladolid Document
 
1. At the initiative of the three Latin Provinces of Europe (Spain, France/Switzerland and Italy) 13 Missionaries of the Sacred Heart1 met for three days in Valladolid to reflect together on Our Lady of the Sacred Heart.  One Spanish MSC sister was also with the group2.

2. An ambiance of joy and mutual trust facilitated fraternal and fruitful work among the members.  Each was able to share, in simplicity and in an atmosphere of attentive listening, on the place and role of Mary in his or her life.

3. At the end of our meeting this communication is not presented as a final word.  Rather it is offered as a fraternal sharing with all the members of the Chevalier Family which might open up a reflection and dialogue on Our Lady of the Sacred Heart.  It is the beginning of a journey that we would wish to make together, to better honour her (Mary) who was at the origin of the works of Fr Chevalier.

4. To speak of Our Lady of the Sacred Heart today obliges of us a double fidelity: a fidelity to the wish of Fr Chevalier in calling Mary “Our Lady of the Sacred Heart”, and a fidelity to that which the Church proposes regarding Mary throughout the text of Lumen Gentium VIII and in the documents Marialis Cultus and Redemptoris Mater.  We also considered the ecumenical document of the Dombes Group on Mary.  We cannot ignore these documents which require us to examine our way of speaking of Mary.

5. Fidelity to Fr Jules Chevalier: for him Our Lady of the Sacred Heart is “the natural compliment to devotion to the Sacred Heart”.  Mary is the one who will help us live a spirituality of the Heart.  Her example, such as it is presented in the New Testament, invites us, according to the intuition of Fr Chevalier, to “take on the sentiments of the Heart of Christ” and make them our own, as she did.  Our Lady of the Sacred Heart leads us to the source of salvation.

6. Fidelity to the Church: the text of Lumen Gentium is clear.  It speaks of entering into the mystery of Christ and the Church through the assistance of Mary.  Is she not the Mother of Jesus and the Mother of humanity who receives us as sons and daughters and as brothers and sisters of Jesus?  What Paul VI, at the close of the Council, translated by the new term as “Mother of the Church”.  We understand the encyclical Redemptoris Mater as a good “explanation” of the spirituality of Our Lady of the Sacred Heart.

7. Listening to our spiritual tradition in the heart of the Chevalier Family, and thanks to the reception of the teaching of the Church, we are led to make more precise the terms “devotion” and “spirituality” as applied to Mary.  We believe that the concept of “devotion” to the Sacred Heart as employed by Fr Chevalier is better understood today by the use of the term “Spirituality of the Heart”.

 8. Devotions are pious practices which can be transitional and sometimes ambiguous.  They can stifle the Spirit.  In its noble sense, a devotion expresses a personal link or connection to a saint, a place etc..  To express a spirituality external rites and practices (devotions) are necessary.  The words “spirituality” and “devotion(s)” are therefore true companions.

9. In order to live we need to breathe.  Spirituality is a way of living according to a particular spirit, which, for the Christian, is that of the Gospel.  Spirituality of the Heart is a way inspired by this Spirit.  For us, members of the Chevalier Family, this intuition is based on Love.  A love which goes to the limits of love!  The place of revelation of this love is the open heart of Christ.  Our Lady, standing at the foot of the cross, invites us to contemplate this love as she does.

10. The Spirit of Christ comes to enliven all forms of devotion.  Devotion(s) and Spirituality lead us to a relationship of faith.  With Our Lady of the Sacred Heart we enter into a Covenant relationship with the Father, into a relationship of salvation with the Son, and into a relationship with the Spirit who pushes us to act according to the example of Our Lady of the Sacred Heart who allowed herself to be led by the Spirit.  This Marian spirituality allows a dynamic of engagement (of begetting or bringing forth life) to germinate in us so that the new world which flows from the Heart of Christ may come.

11. Thus the Spirituality of Our Lady of the Sacred Heart is lived according to three accents: (1) contemplating with Our Lady of the Sacred Heart Christ in his relationship with the Father [Covenant]; (2) welcoming, with Our Lady of the Sacred Heart, the life which flows from the open heart of Christ [Easter] so that we ourselves might also live with his life; (3) with Our Lady of the Sacred Heart, in the Holy Spirit, we engage ourselves in the building of a new world [Pentecost] as members of the Church.  Following Our Lady of the Sacred Heart we are both “participants” and “witnesses” of the love of God as we are reminded in the opening prayer of the Mass of Our Lady of the Sacred Heart.

12. On this spiritual journey Mary is understood as Mother, as Disciple, as Missionary.  According to Redemptoris Mater, we are invited to take as our model “Mary’s pilgrimage of faith” (RM 17).  This is how we understand the spirituality of Our Lady of the Sacred Heart which introduces us to a relational life.  Fr Chevalier wanted this relationship of Mother and Son to be represented in the iconography of Our Lady.  This maternal and filial link extends to us since we are drawn into this relationship.   At the heart of this relationship: Our Lady; a presence which promotes and which engenders life.

13. Difficulties of language – even for languages with Latin roots (French, Spanish, Italian) – have prevented us from going as deeply as we would have liked.  The list which follows is an invitation to go further in reflection on the many themes linked to the spirituality of Our Lady of the Sacred Heart (the list is not exhaustive):

14. Hope.  We know well the invocation: “Our Lady of the Sacred Heart, hope of the hopeless”.  This expression is harder to use since LG VIII.  Only Christ is the hope of humanity (the teaching of St Paul is clear on this subject).  Mary is a “sign of certain hope” (LG 68).  It seems important to us to express this concept in a dynamic and positive vision.  From this point of view we readily take up the  conclusion of the paper of Sr Merle Salazar3 at the Chevalier Congress (Issoudun, October 2007): “Our Lady of the Sacred Heart brings hope to those who live in situations which are apparently hopeless”.  Further, the first reading of the Mass of Our Lady of the Sacred Heart invites us to take account of the maternal images of the prophet Isaiah as he preaches hope.

15. The treasurer of the Sacred Heart of Jesus.  The ineffable power of Mary over the heart of Jesus.  Even if these terms appear ambiguous to us today we cannot ignore them since they form part of the intuition and expression of Fr Chevalier as he speaks of Our Lady of the Sacred Heart.  We need to look for a new language to speak of the mediation of Mary, paying attention to Conciliar teaching.  John Paul II, in Redemptoris Mater, speaks of “mediation in Christ” (RM 38).  We also need to deepen, by means of human, theological and biblical sciences, the notion of “relation” within the trilogy: Christ – Mary – Us.

16. The title, Our Lady of the Sacred Heart, has an amazing capacity for inculturation and comprehension across all cultures.  The fact that Mary is always seen as linked to Christ and never alone, takes us back to the heart of the mystery of the incarnation.  It is undoubtedly the reason why the term “Our Lady of the Sacred Heart” is adopted by so may peoples with astonishing ease.  The three representations of Our Lady of the Sacred Heart (the one in the Chapel of Issoudun, the one from Rome and the Calvary in the Issoudun Basilica) retain all their merit.

17. At the heart of the Chevalier Family our women religious and the female laity, through their feminine sensitivity, can help us to understand better the title of Our Lady of the Sacred Heart.

18. We have a pastoral responsibility which demands of us a pedagogical effort to renew our way of speaking when we present Our Lady of the Sacred Heart.  Respect for popular piety calls for us to educate the sensitivity and the mentality of people regarding a true Marian piety, as Marialis Cultus reminds us.

19. This pastoral requirement invites us to reflect on our different means of communication and on the way we speak of Our Lady of the Sacred Heart.  We have mentioned the Annales, our sanctuaries, hymns, novenas, statues, iconography.  For example, certain terms used in the novena of Fr. Jouet present real difficulties for a post-Conciliar understanding of the place and role of Mary in the mystery of Christ and the Church.  That calls, on our part, for a creative fidelity which, without disowning the intuition of Fr. Chevalier, allows us to translate, in today’s context, what is essential in a spirituality of Our Lady of the Sacred Heart.

20. Regarding the fidelity of Fr. Chevalier to the teaching of the Church, we can cay without doubt, that he took very seriously the Magisterial texts which we have re-read during our meeting.  It is up to us also to follow this approach so that our way of speaking of Our Lady of the Sacred Heart might be truly renewed.  As in any other area, we cannot be content with merely repeating formulas which originate in a cultural context different from our own.  We are confident that this work can be undertaken in the heart of the Chevalier Family and that each member will draw from it the maximum benefit.  We will be honouring, of course, Our Lady of the Sacred Heart, and remaining faithful to the intuition of Fr Chevalier.

21. According to the traditional expression which asks that the “rule of prayer” be also the “rule of faith” we must be attentive that our expressions in prayer help us in a better understanding of Our Lady of the Sacred Heart.  Following the Council, the efforts of our elders in the updating of the Mass of Our Lady of the Sacred Heart and of the Memorare found expression on the new Mass of Our Lady of the Sacred Heart and in the prayer, “Remember, Our Lady of the Sacred Heart…”

22. We fraternally offer this document to all members of the Chevalier Family as an invitation to deepen the place and role of Our Lady of the Sacred Heart in our lives today.  All the effort that we have already made concerning devotion to and Spirituality of the Heart similarly needs to be undertaken with regard to Our Lady of the Sacred Heart.

23. We are convinced that Our Lady of the Sacred Heart will assist us on this journey of understanding our faith.  She said at Cana to “do all that he tells you” and at the cross we receive her as our mother who by her posture – standing – invites us to live like her in the love of her Son so that his Kingdom may come.

24. At the end of these three days of work on Our Lady of the Sacred Heart, we would like the General Administration to prepare, if possible for the next General Chapter, some complementary numbers in our Constitutions, deepening the spirituality of Our Lady of the Sacred Heart.

Valladolid, 21st November 2007
On the Feast of the Presentation of the Blessed Virgin Mary