Traditional Feast of The Immaculate Heart of Mary


Today is the traditional date for the Feast of the Immaculate Heart of Mary (it is celebrated on the Saturday following the Second Sunday after Pentecost). This year the feast of the Immaculate Heart of Mary is suppressed for the Solemnity of the Birth of St. John the Baptist (June 24). Nevertheless, today is still a wonderful day to celebrate Our Mother's love for her Son and her love for us - her other children. It was also on this feast day 14 years ago that Bill and I exchanged vows in the sacrament of Holy Matrimony, which makes this feast very memorable for me.

Throughout the history of this devotion different titles have been used for the Immaculate Heart of Our Blessed Mother such as "the Maternal Heart of Mary" and also the "Sacred Heart of Mary." Sacred means holy, it does not mean divine. St. John Eudes (d. 1680) wrote of "the Admirable Heart of Mary."

In St. Luke (2:51) we read of Our Lady pondering all these things—about Her Son Jesus—in her Heart. Also from St. Luke (2:35) we see that Simeon at the Presentation prophesied that Our Lady’s Soul would be pierced with sorrow. This is depicted by showing a sword piercing the Immaculate Heart of Mary.

The early theologians of our Faith, the Fathers of the Church, such as St. John Chrysostom (d. 407) and St. Epiphanus (d. 403) referred to Our Lady’s Heart. St. John Damascene (d. 749) explained that the Immaculate Heart of Mary "lives solely on the contemplation and the love of God." In the Middle Ages St. Bernard (d. 1153) wrote that at Calvary, "as Jesus died in Body so Mary died in Heart."

St. Thomas a Becket (d. 1170), the English Martyr, had a special devotion to the joys of the Immaculate Heart of Mary. Our Blessed Mother appeared to him and promised to help those who also have this devotion, especially at the hour of death.

St. Gertrude the Great (d. 1302), the German mystic, was granted a vision of three rays of light coming from the Most Holy Trinity and entering the Immaculate Heart of Mary and then returning to God with great speed, to the Source from which they came. The rays represented Power, Wisdom and the Gifts bestowed upon Mary by the Most Holy Trinity.

St. Bridget of Sweden (d. 1373) was told by Our Blessed Lord, "the Heart of my Mother was like mine. Therefore I can affirm that we worked together for the salvation of the world. I, by the sufferings endured by My Body, She by the sorrows and love of Her Heart." And Our Lady told St. Bridget, "When my Son suffered, I felt as though my Heart endured the sufferings also. When my Son was scourged and torn with whips, my Heart was scourged and whipped with Him. His Heart was my Heart. My Beloved and I redeemed the world as with one Heart."

St. Bernadine of Siena (d. 1444), the Italian Franciscan, is especially known for his devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. He wrote that the Immaculate Heart of Mary was "a fiery furnace of Holy Love."

St. John Eudes, a great Apostle of Devotion to the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary, prayed to both the Sacred Heart of Jesus and the Immaculate Heart of Mary by saying "AVE COR," or Hail Heart in the singular, to show the unity of these Two Hearts.

St. Margaret Mary (d. 1690), the great Apostle of devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, explained that "the most efficacious way to have devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus is through the Immaculate Heart of Mary." And St. Margaret Mary’s spiritual director, St. Claude de la Colombiere stated: "I turn to Mary and ask her to obtain for me the grace to imitate Our Lord’s Heart. I saw how perfectly her Heart copied His."

St. Louis de Montfort (d. 1716), the great Apostle of devotion to Our Lady, tells us, "If you put all the love of all the mothers into one heart it still would not equal the love of the Heart of Mary for her children."

The Venerable Father Francis Liberman (d. 1852), a Jewish convert wrote: "You do not know what a treasure the Holy Heart of Mary is. Jesus Christ has placed in it so great a fullness of grace and favors that they would be sufficient to satisfy not merely the whole world but a hundred thousand worlds and much more."

At Fatima, Our Blessed Mother revealed her Immaculate Heart to the three shepherd children. We saw then that Our Mother’s Heart was surrounded by thorns—the thorns of sin. We were then asked to make reparation to the Immaculate Heart of Mary by prayer and sacrifices—to console her Motherly Heart—to remove those thorns. Also at Fatima Our Lady requested that Russia be consecrated to her Immaculate Heart saying, "In the end My Immaculate Heart will triumph. The Holy Father will consecrate Russia to me and she will be converted and a period of peace will be granted to the world."

She also told them: "Jesus wishes to establish devotion to my Immaculate Heart in the world. I promise salvation to those who embrace it. Tell everybody that God grants graces through the Immaculate Heart of Mary, and that they must ask them from her. Tell them that the Heart of Jesus wishes that by His side should be venerated the Immaculate Heart of Mary. Tell them to ask peace through the Immaculate Heart of Mary; God has placed it in her hands."

For more information on the history and devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary via a video, go here.

~ Excerpted in part from the Monks of Adoration.
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