By Alessandro Gisotti
“It could be said that I am my heart, for my heart is what sets me apart, shapes my spiritual identity and puts me in communion with other people.”
This is one of the powerful passages of Dilexit nos, Pope Francis’ encyclical published on October 24—a magisterial document which did not receive the widespread attention that the two social encyclicals, Laudato si’ and Fratelli tutti, have but which, nevertheless, represents an interpretative key to the entire Pontificate.
Dilexit nos can also be useful to better understand events such as the Synod on Synodality that just ended and the 2025 Jubilee that will start in a few weeks.
Filipino Cardinal Luis Antonio Tagle, Pro-Prefect of the Dicastery for Evangelization, spoke to Vatican News about this new encyclical and reflected on the devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, which is very widespread in the Philippines and which he learned in his youth.
Q: The publication of “Dilexit nos” has generated some surprise. After his social doctrine encyclicals, “Laudato si’” and “Fratelli tutti,” Pope Francis released this spiritual encyclical. How did you receive this document?
Pope Francis is a pope of surprises. While the announcement of the encyclical and its eventual publication were sort of unexpected due to the focus on the Synod of Bishops, I was not totally surprised that the Holy Father would release an encyclical on Jesus’ love for us, symbolized in His Sacred Heart. For me, it was the Holy Father’s way of making the Christological foundation of the social encyclicals “Laudato si” and “Fratelli tutti” more explicit.
When we receive the love of Jesus, it enables us to see a brother and sister in other human beings (Fratelli tutti) and to be caring, humble, and responsible stewards of our common home (Laudato si’). I should say that Pope Francis’ writings and discourses are consistently grounded on our faith in the person and mission of Jesus Christ. I suggest that we read once again these two social encyclicals to find traces or seeds of Dilexit nos already present in them.
Q: In the Philippines, devotion to the Sacred Heart is very popular and primarily engages the everyday people, the people of God. What has been your experience of this devotion in your country?
The devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus is widespread in the Philippines. We are grateful to the many religious orders bearing the name “Sacred Heart”, the Society of Jesus and the Apostleship of Prayer that promote the devotion in dioceses, parishes, schools and families. In addition to vigils and prayers every first Friday of the month, it is customary to have the image of the crowned Sacred Heart in one’s home. We beg the Heart of Jesus to rule and govern our families and nation with His mercy and love. This prayer comes from a people whose hearts have experienced being wounded when injustice, greed, corruption and indifference rule.
The devotion is also a reminder that we should constantly beg Jesus to transform our hearts to be like His. To this day, we still, on some occasions, sing the official hymn of the International Eucharistic Congress held in Manila (1937). It is a hymn to the Sacred Heart in Spanish where the nation offers its heart to Jesus: “no más Amor que el tuyo, O Corazón Divino. El Pueblo Filipino te da su corazón.” The song never fails to bring consolation to the heart and tears to the eyes.
Q: In “Dilexit nos,” the Pope observes that humanity today seems to be losing its heart and invites us Christians to rediscover how the heart of Jesus loves us. What can be done to revitalize the awareness that everything springs from our heart?
In Dilexit nos, Pope Francis describes the phenomenon and causes of superficiality that is spreading as a culture, preventing us from getting in touch with the heart, from where love, truth, and compassion emanate.
I suggest that we read the description of superficiality provided by the Holy Father as a guide to an examination of conscience. An awareness of how I am slowly losing touch with my interiority and my truest self is the first step in re-awakening our heart.
I also like Pope Francis’ enumeration of saints or what I call the “parade” or “procession” of saints who give us their testimony of their unfathomable love of the Heart of Jesus and how it has transformed their lives and mission. I suggest we look at the “parade” and join the “parade.” We can revitalize awareness of the heart not by concepts or abstraction but by listening to the hearts that have found true life in the loving Heart of Jesus.
Q: The heart calls to mind the individual person and relationships. At the recently concluded Synod on Synodality, in which you participated, there was much discussion—also in the final document—about the conversion of relationships. Can this encyclical serve as a compass to guide the journey of a synodal Church, as Pope Francis encourages?
Dilexit nos has much to teach the Church who wants to be synodal and missionary. During the recently concluded session of the Synod of Bishops, it was repeatedly said that synodality is ultimately about relationships: with God, with all the baptized who make up the Church, with the whole of humanity and of creation.
The renewal of the Church in missionary synodality can be achieved only if we relate with trust, obedience and humility to the Triune God who is love. Missionary synodality requires a heart-to-heart relationship between pastors and the faithful, between local churches, etc. where everyone’s heart is purified of prejudice toward others and of self-promotional pride and is therefore capable of listening with empathy.
Without human relationships purified by divine grace, missionary synodality might be reduced to merely bureaucratic and legalistic proposals without a heart that burns with the Holy Spirit, the flame of Divine love.
Q: The Jubilee is approaching—a year of grace, reconciliation, and liberation—a Holy Year that the Pope has centered on the theme of hope. How does the encyclical on the heart of Jesus relate to this upcoming Jubilee?
I see the connection between Dilexit nos and the upcoming Jubilee is centered on the pilgrimage in hope, in the missionary dimension of the devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus. To begin with, the Heart of Jesus is a missionary heart that brings overflowing divine love through a human heart to all people, to all human situations, and to creation.
The merciful love of the Heart of Jesus offers hope to a broken world, especially to those who see no possibility of redemption in their lives. Pope Francis invites us to receive the love of Jesus in our hearts and to let it flow and not to block the love of Jesus from flowing to other people and to society.
Dilexit nos is a valuable spiritual and missionary resource for this Jubilee to prepare each one of us to be a pilgrim who shares the love of Jesus to others, the love that liberates all hearts from fear, pride, selfishness, indifference, vengeance and despair. He loves us, so we have hope. – Vatican News
