On June 11 at our mid-year meeting in Orlando, the U.S. Catholic bishops consecrated our nation to the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus. The next day, here in Los Angeles, we offered our prayers for this consecration with a special Mass at the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels.
As Catholics, we make this consecration in spiritual observance of the 250th anniversary of our nation’s founding.
The American story, of course, begins long before the Declaration of Independence was signed in Philadelphia on July 4, 1776.
I would say it begins with Our Lady of Guadalupe’s appearances at Tepeyac in 1531.
Within a decade of Our Lady’s coming, millions of native peoples were baptized and Mexico had become the spiritual capital of the New World, sending out missionaries for the evangelization of the Americas, Asia, and Oceania.
Already in the early 1500s, missionaries from Spain were proclaiming the Gospel in our country, from present day Georgia and Florida to Texas and California. The first Mass in our land was celebrated in 1565 in St. Augustine, Florida. In these same years, French missionaries were active from the Great Lakes down to the Gulf of Mexico.
In consecrating the nation to the Sacred Heart, we remember that our country’s founding was a chapter in salvation history, part of the great mission that Jesus entrusted to his Church — to proclaim his saving love and make disciples of all nations, to the ends of the earth.
We recognize, too, that America’s founding is exceptional in the history of nations. The Declaration of Independence is not only a political document, it is also a profound spiritual testament and inheritance.
America’s founders conceived of a nation under God and declared that every human being was created with dignity and equality and made to live in freedom. They dedicated themselves to forming a government that would serve men and women and promote and protect their God-given rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
We take these ideas for granted today. But no nation before had ever made such commitments.
The founders’ ideas were rooted in the Enlightenment thinking of their times. But this thinking was rooted even more deeply in the ancient faiths of the Jewish and Christian peoples, especially their belief in a personal God — a God who creates and directs the course of history and the life of every soul according to his loving purposes.
America’s founders believed that the form of government they were establishing could only be maintained by a people shaped by religious and moral commitments.
This is important for us to remember as American society becomes more secularized with each passing year, and religious believers and their viewpoints become more marginalized. This is also why our consecration of the nation to the Sacred Heart is so important.
My prayer is that this consecration will lead to a national spiritual and moral renewal, and that all of us, along with our neighbors, will rediscover the religious foundations of our nation.
I also pray that we will be renewed in our commitments to pursue the sacred task of promoting human dignity and freedom.
Our history has not been pure. It has been filled with tragedy and violent betrayals of our deepest values. From the original sins of slavery and the cruel mistreatment of native peoples, to our struggles today with racism and a revived nativism — the American dream is still a work in progress.
America’s founders, and the missionaries who came before them, understood that all human life is sacred, that all men and women were born with a dignity and a transcendent destiny that can never be denied, no matter who they are or where they come from.
Three years before the Declaration of Independence, the great missionary and founder of the Church in Los Angeles, St. Junípero Serra, wrote a “bill of rights” for California’s indigenous peoples.
As Catholics and Americans, we are the heirs to this long and noble tradition in defense of human dignity.
Our commitments as Catholics are rooted in the love that Jesus showed in giving his life on the cross for us. Our Lord’s Sacred Heart is a heart that was pierced for love.
Jesus’ love is a priceless gift. It is also a sacred obligation.
So let us love our God, our families, our neighbors, and our country with all our heart and all our strength. And by our love, may we help this great country recover the promise of its founding.
Pray for me and I will pray for you.
We entrust our nation to his Sacred Heart, and to the Immaculate Heart of the Blessed Virgin Mary. She was there, at the foot of the cross, when her Son’s heart was pierced. May she always help us to believe in the power of his love.
