St Therese Congregation

June is Men’s Health Month, a national observance used to raise awareness about health care for men and focus on encouraging boys, men and their families to practice and implement healthy living decisions, such as exercising and eating healthy to improve physical and mental health.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, men in the United States, on average, die 5 years earlier than women and die at higher rates from the three leading causes of death, heart disease, cancer and unintentional injuries.

During Men’s Health Month, we encourage men to take control of their health, and for families to teach young boys healthy habits throughout childhood.

Why do we celebrate the Hearts of Jesus in the month of June?

Devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus is an ancient practice. We can see its Scriptural origins in Jesus’ own references to His Heart. “Come to me, all you who labor and are burdened, and I will give you rest … for I am meek and humble of heart” (c.f. Matthew 11:28, 29).

The devotion received a surge of popularity in the late 1600s. Jesus appeared several times to a French religious sister, St. Margaret Mary Alacoque, pointing to his heart. During this time, the Jansenist heresy had risen in France, which preached limited predestination for salvation. When appearing to Margaret Mary, Jesus affirmed his love for all mankind: “Behold the Heart which has so loved men that it has spared nothing.” He asked for a special feast celebrating his Sacred Heart on the Friday following the feast of Corpus Christi. Over time, June has become known as the month of Sacred Heart. ©LPi

(PRACTICING) CATHOLIC - RECOGNIZE GOD IN YOUR ORDINARY MOMENTS
By Colleen Jurkiewicz Dorman

True Food
Like most millennial women, I have a bizarre relationship with food.

I’m so busy and distracted that most days, I forget to eat — until nighttime, when I make some very questionable decisions, usually involving cake. I also came of age in a time when any woman without a visible eating disorder was labeled as “curvy” (and curvy was understood by everyone to be A Very Bad Thing). Thus, I have a deep feeling of shame whenever I do eat, even when I am hungry, and even when it’s something good for me.

I’m so messed up when it comes to food that I often wonder if I even have a good point of reference for understanding the Eucharist. What is “true food” and “true drink,” when you live in a society where bodily nourishment is so plentiful — at least for certain fortunate people like me — that we reject it out of pride, that we feel a shame for needing it, and that we use it as a balm for feelings of boredom, pain, and fear?

But I suppose there’s no better way to understand the Eucharist, when you really think about it. The Israelites survived on manna from Heaven — what they would have given for a grocery store. What they would have given for redemption.

I am given both. I appreciate neither to the extent that I should.

True food, true nourishment, true life — physical and spiritual — these are things we all desperately want. And so many of us have them. But our ability to understand what they mean — well, it’s hampered. This isn’t Eden, after all.

We are reading a book missing half its pages, singing a harmony missing half its parts. We stumble forward, knowing that the fullness can come, will come — one day.

If we keep trying. ©LPi