Among Catholics, the month of June is traditionally dedicated to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, “the chief sign and symbol” of God’s love (CCC 478). The Solemnity of the Sacred Heart, which moves each year based on the date of Easter, almost always falls in June: The earliest possible date is May 29, and the latest possible date is July 2. This year, the Solemnity of the Sacred Heart falls on Friday, June 16, 2023.

The image of the Sacred Heart, revealed to St. Margaret Mary Alocoque in the seventeenth century, simultaneously reminds us of Christ’s great love for us and of his deep sorrow over our sins. The flames surrounding Jesus’ heart remind us that he is burning with an intense love for every one of us. The crown of thorns piercing his heart reminds us that he is wounded when we reject him through sin: Jesus is greatly saddened when he sees us looking for joy in things that cannot satisfy – this is the essence of every sin – instead of turning to Him to find the meaning, belonging, and identity for which we long. Only the Heart of Jesus can satisfy the longings of our hearts.

In our secular society, June is celebrated not as the month of the Sacred Heart, but as “Pride Month.” The month has its origin in the Stonewall Riots that began on June 28, 1969, after New York police raided a gay club called the Stonewall Inn. In the years that followed, “pride parades” were planned each June to promote gay rights. Craig Schoonmaker, who is credited with coining the phrase “gay pride,” said, “The poison was shame, and the antidote is pride.” Schoonmaker argues that “pride” here means not the deadly sin of pride, but “self-esteem.” Today signs of Pride Month are everywhere, from beer commercials to elementary schools.

For the past couple of weeks, there’s been an ongoing back and forth among Catholics between those who support Pride Month and those who don’t. The U.S. Embassy to the Holy See made headlines by tweeting a picture of a Pride Flag hanging outside its Vatican headquarters in obvious protest of Catholic sexual morality. Matt Fradd from Pints with Aquinas, on the other hand, is selling “Reclaim the Month” Sacred Heart T-Shirts for the month of June. Fr. James Martin, SJ, well known for his controversial outreach to LGBTQ Catholics, has instead argued that Catholics can and should celebrate Pride Month and wave pride flags, not because they agree with everything they’d see in a pride parade, but because they support the human dignity and basic rights of every LGBTQ person. On his Counsel of Trent podcast, Catholic apologist Trent Horn convincingly argued in response that the pride flag is more than just a sign of compassion for those who identify as LGBTQ: It’s a symbol meant to convey that the Catholic, traditional view of sexual morality is wrong.

There have also been widespread headlines announcing that the L.A. Dodgers will honor the so-called “Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence” – a group of men who dress in drag in mockery of nuns – with a “Community Hero Award” on June 16, the Solemnity of the Sacred Heart. (The scandalous slogan of the so-called Sisters, by the way, is “Go and sin some more.”) In response, the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops is urging Catholics to pray the Litany of the Sacred Heart “as an act of reparation for the blasphemies against our Lord we see in our culture today.” Some Catholics have organized a protest of the L.A. Dodgers June 16 Pride Night, while the Archdiocese of Los Angeles has distanced itself from the rally, instead urging prayers of reparation to the Sacred Heart of Jesus.

As I watch this tension between Sacred Heart and Pride Month unfold, I have been thinking about how Jesus would want us to think about Pride Month. The goal of the Christian life, after all, is for our hearts to be united and conformed to the heart of Jesus, isn’t it? Does the Lord want us to have the kind of pride that is highlighted in “Pride Month”?

Catholic Tradition acknowledges that there is a good kind of pride – a reasonable love of one’s self – and a sinful kind of pride – an excessive love of one’s self (cf. St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae, II-II, 162, 1). To be “proud” of one’s heritage or of other individual traits can be a good thing. There’s no problem, for example, with being “proud to be an American.” There would be no issue if Pride Month and pride flags just meant, “I’m proud of the way God made me, with all of my uniqueness.” Jesus loves and delights in each one of us, with all our diverse personalities, quirks, and challenges. Recognizing that each of us has an innate God-given dignity is a good kind of pride.

Pride does become sinful, however, whenever we attempt to exalt ourselves over and above the moral law of our Creator. While it’s good to say, “I’m proud of the way God made me,” none of us should ever say, “I’m going to do whatever I want, regardless of what God wants me to do.” God’s moral law is made known to us first in nature itself, then in Scripture, in Tradition, and in the teachings of the Church. If I believe that God has made known his will in Scripture, Tradition, and Catholic teaching – as every Catholic should – then it would be an act of sinful pride for me to set aside any aspect of Catholic moral teaching for the sake of my own desires. Whenever we intentionally reject God and his revelation, we’ve crossed the line from the good kind of pride to the deadly sin of pride.

There are many kinds of sins, but sins of unchastity are most relevant here. Catholic teaching warns of several serious sins against chastity, such as lust, fornication, masturbation, adultery, rape, contraception, pornography, and homosexual acts (cf. CCC 2351 and following). To willfully disregard the moral truths that God has revealed in these or any other moral areas would be sinful pride. Such acts no doubt wound the Sacred Heart of Jesus and call for prayer and reparation.

As I touch upon the controversies surrounding Pride Month, I am intensely aware of those baptized Catholics who identify as LGBTQ and struggle with the teachings of the Church. Please know that are loved by God and you deserve to be treated with dignity and respect. One Catholic organization that seems to be doing a great job ministering to persons who experience same-sex desires or discord within their maleness or femaleness is Eden Invitation. As I look at the stories featured on their website, I see people who know that they are loved by God, who are not ashamed of their uniqueness, and who are striving to support one another in the pursuit of holiness, in accordance with the teachings of the Catholic Church.

So, what does the Lord want us to do during this month of June? I’m certainly not a leader in the culture wars, so I’ll just give simple advice that all of us should strive to follow: Be holy! Love the Lord wholeheartedly and love one another unconditionally! The Lord has an indescribably intense, burning love for us – whether we are liberal or conservative, gay or straight, et cetera. There is not a single person alive today for whom Jesus did not die. Precisely because he loves us, however, he is deeply saddened by our sins. The Lord is saddened both when we fail to treat one another with “respect, compassion, and sensitivity” and when we engage in unchaste, disordered sexual acts (cf. CCC 2357 – 2359). Only by turning from sin (of every kind) and toward the Lord can we discover the joy for which we were created.

If you’d like to pray the Litany of the Sacred Heart on June 16, as I plan to, or any other time, it can be found at https://www.usccb.org/prayers/litany-sacred-heart-jesus. If you’d like to learn more about the devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, a video of a presentation that I did in 2019 can be found on our parish website at https://saintaloysiuschurch.org/sacred-heart.