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When Leo Dehon first dreamed of giving himself completely to God as a priest, he had also felt a simultaneous urge to reach out to others so that they too might come to know the great love of God in their lives. This twin desire would remain the constant motivation in all that he would do and say: love of God and love of God's people. This was the way he interpreted Jesus' teaching on the greatest commandment: Love the Lord your God with all your heart, mind, soul, and strength, and love your neighbor as yourself (Mark 12: 30 — 31).
Father Dehon's way of proceeding is deceptively simple. He begins with the fundamental fact of our faith: God loves each one of us. However, many people today, and in Father Dehon's time, seem to ignore God's love. The founder was convinced that this lack of response was the root cause of all sin and unhappiness. To counteract this trend, especially among the working class, Leo Dehon thought that there was a way to help people understand how much God loves and cares for them. In his own life, Leo experienced the reality of God's love through his devotion to the Heart of Christ. For him, this symbol of the human heart of Christ could serve as a means to lead people to this greater understanding of divine love. As people experienced Christ's love, they would be better motivated to practice personal prayer and to rediscover the powerful presence of Christ in the Eucharist.
In Father Dehon's time, the working class was becoming more and more alienated from God and the Church. Low wages, long hours, and terrible working conditions made the worker feel abandoned, abused and angry. Father Dehon felt the Church needed to respond to this injustice. He learned all that he could about the economics and politics of his day and with others began to find ways to make known the plight of the worker and ways to counteract the injustices they had to endure.
This concern for those suffering from poverty and injustice has been carried on through the congregation Father Dehon established, the Priests of the Sacred Heart. In Father Dehon's vision, the love God has for us demands a  like response from us. He chose to express through Sacred Heart spirituality a strong, devoted love for Christ and a life lived in solidarity with the poor and neglected. As disciples of Father Dehon, the Priests of the Sacred Heart strive to carry on his vision in today's world.
The Priests of the Sacred Heart invite like-minded men to join them in their unique mission to continue Father Dehon's dream. Contact an SCJ vocation director if think you might be called to live that dream with us.
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