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Each year on the day after the
Feast of the Sacred Heart of Jesus the Church honors the Immaculate Heart
of Mary. Devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary is not a new
devotion—many Saints loved and honored Our Lady’s Immaculate Heart.
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. There is a French religious order called the "Sisters of
the Sacred Heart of Mary" and 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 Montefort (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."
During our own century, 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." Sister Lucy, the only one of the
three children of Fatima still living, explains that it was the
Consecration of Pope John Paul II on March 25, 1984 at St. Peter’s that
brought about the grace of Russia’s conversion which we witnessed in 1991.
[And Eastern Europe!] As one privileged to have been at St. Peter’s that
day I encourage everyone to render prayerful thanks to Our Lady for the
conversion of Russia. And let us all have a loving devotion to the
Immaculate Heart of Mary Our Mother. |
