As the nations nears its 250th, many parishes will hold a mass or Holy Hour as the USCCB consecrates the U.S. to the Sacred Heart in June. Does anyone have hymn or motet recommendations or resources that focus on the Sacred Heart of Jesus?
To listen to a wider variety of hymns to the Sacred Heart, all sung by expert choirs from the United States and England, visit https://catholicdevotionalhymns.com
Click Index of Hymns on the lower right to select Sacred Heart hymns. Click sheet music beneath this link for scores to the most popular Sacred Heart hymns.
O Sacred Heart, for ever burning with fire of love for humankind; in thee our hearts their home discerning love’s refuge seek, love’s guerdon find.
O wounded Heart, for our salvation distraught with agonies and fears; accept thy children’s supplication and melt our frozen hearts to tears.
O patient Heart, in silence pleading through lowliest veils of bread and wine; our hearts in shame and sorrow bleeding restore, and fill with grace divine.
O royal Heart, enthroned for ever o’er rebel souls won back, forgiven; our hearts from earth’s allegiance sever, and make us citizens of heaven.
O Heart of God: the One, the Living, O human Heart of Mary’s Son, through thee creation’s great thanksgiving goes up to God the Three in One.
Words: English Catholic Hymn Book (sl. alt.), author unknown Tune: St. Clement English Catholic is a term used by Anglo-Papalists
A common assumption is that there isn’t much in the way of solid Sacred Heart hymnody, but that really hasn’t been my experience. Over the past few years I’ve been surveying older Catholic hymnals, and what stands out is not scarcity but consistency—a small core of hymns shows up again and again across decades. Titles like To Jesus’ Heart All Burning, O Sacred Heart, O Love Divine, and Sweet Heart of Jesus appear with enough frequency to suggest there was once a shared, stable repertoire that supported this devotion in ordinary parish life.
Because of that, I’d suggest the best approach for something like a parish Holy Hour or Mass tied to the consecration isn’t to go looking for newly composed material, but to recover some of this older repertoire. These hymns are straightforward for congregations, theologically focused on the Sacred Heart (love, reparation, kingship), and—perhaps most importantly—already proven in practice. Drawing from them gives you something both accessible and rooted, rather than having to assemble a program from scratch.
Back in 1982, St.Mary's in Akron, Ohio held a concert to the Sacred Heart of Jesus. There are several recordings recovered from an old cassette tape that you can listen to and perhaps draw inspirations from.
If you’re interested, I’ve put together a Preliminary Analysis of my survey of Sacred Heart hymnody. I have been working on this for about 4 years now and I'm happy to share it. Even at this stage, the survey shows that Sacred Heart hymnody isn’t scarce at all—it’s built around a stable core of widely shared hymns with clear devotional themes. Let me know and I can send it to you.
This one is a little more complicated but I forgot about it---its the offertory for the feast of the Sacred Heart but I think the text is really beautiful from the Psalms echoing the reproaches of the Sacred Heart to Margaret Mary "at least you console me."
My heart expected reproach and misery and I desired one who would grieve with me and there was none: I sought one to console me, and I found none: and one who would console me, and I found none: and they gave me gall as my food, and in my thirst they gave me vinegar to drink.
It’s really the Palm Sunday offertory. Unfortunately none of the polyphonic settings lend themselves to the modified text without doing violence to the music if you chop off the end.
@MatthewRoth Yes, I know its Palm Sunday--but it is also for Sacred Heart Offertory. I wasn't saying to chop off the text, I think if you are going to sing it--sing the whole thing.
Unless you are referring to something else?
Its one of my favorite polyphonics, I think the music is very expressive of the words.
If anyone is interested in appropriate organ music, Alexandre Guilmant wrote an "Offertoire pour la fête du Sacré Coeur" and other pieces based on a French hymn for this feast, in one of the volumes of L'organiste liturgique. I have the music somewhere, but I need to find it.
The "Offertoire" is not too difficult, but it is rather lengthy, so I've used it as a prelude.
[It's hard to tell what some of these phrases mean these days. There is a small denomination calling itself "English Catholic" which appears to be conservative Anglican in its positions; so different groups may have different things in mind when they use the term.
For @PaxMelodious, yes, "Anglo-Papalist" is a real concept, a subcategory of "Anglo-Catholics", that is, Anglicans who held Catholic doctrine on various points: e.g., believing in seven Sacraments (unlike their brethren who held to Reformed theology).
Many of these people have come into full communion with the Church in recent decades: some through the Ordinariates, some through diocesan parishes.]
Christ is risen, everyone! Here is a devotional hymn of mine on the Sacred Heart of Our Lord Jesus Christ, earlier drafts of which were posted on these boards: "A crown of thorns the world has plaited,/Jesus Christ, around Your Heart."
It refers to a sub-set of Anglo Catholics in the Church of England. "English Catholic" to distinguish from "ROMAN Catholic." There are still plenty of Anglicans who will correct anyone saying "Catholic," by saying, "I believe you mean ROMAN Catholic." This might be found informative https://liturgicalnotes.blogspot.com/2017/08/the-english-catholic-hymn-book-and.html
"Heart of Jesus, Reign Thou O’er Us," from the Saint Rose Hymnal. The tune (a repeat omitted, and the final cadence differing], is found in the appendix of the Saint Gregory Hymnal, set to another text, "Great King of kings and Lord of lords."
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