Day 8: Mary and the Heart of Jesus

The eighth day of the Sacred Heart Novena turns to the relationship between the Sacred Heart of Jesus and the Immaculate Heart of Mary. The Catholic tradition has always understood that the two Hearts are inseparable: the Heart of Jesus was formed in the Heart of Mary, was nourished by her love, was crowned at Calvary by the sword that pierced her own soul, and is honored in heaven in eternal communion with hers.

Today's invocation

O most Holy Heart of Jesus, fountain of every blessing... (the full opening prayer)

Today's meditation

The Catholic devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary developed alongside the Sacred Heart devotion. Saint John Eudes (1601-1680), the French priest who founded the Eudist Fathers, was the principal seventeenth-century theologian of the joint Catholic devotion to the Two Hearts. He composed the offices, the Mass propers, and the devotional manuals that united the contemplation of the Heart of Jesus and the Heart of Mary in the Catholic spiritual life.

The decisive modern moment for the devotion was the Fatima apparitions of 1917, in which the Blessed Virgin Mary asked for the consecration of the world to her Immaculate Heart and promised that "in the end, my Immaculate Heart will triumph." Pope Pius XII consecrated the world to the Immaculate Heart of Mary in 1942 and again in 1952. Pope Saint John Paul II made the consecration once more in 1984, fulfilling the specific request of the Fatima apparitions concerning Russia. The Catholic faithful pray the Act of Consecration to the Immaculate Heart of Mary in many of the same circumstances in which they pray the consecration to the Sacred Heart of Jesus.

Today's intention

Today, in addition to your principal intention to the Sacred Heart, place that intention also under the protection of the Immaculate Heart of Mary. The traditional Catholic invocation:

Immaculate Heart of Mary, pray for us who have recourse to thee.

A traditional brief Act of Consecration to the Immaculate Heart of Mary:

O Immaculate Heart of Mary, full of goodness, show your love towards us. Let the flame of your Heart, O Mary, descend on all peoples. We love you immensely. Impress on our hearts true love so that we may have a constant desire for you. O Mary, gentle and humble of heart, remember us when we sin. You know that all men sin. Grant that through your most pure and motherly Heart, we may be healed from every spiritual sickness. Grant that we may always experience the goodness of your motherly Heart, and that through the flame of your Heart we may be converted. Amen.

Reflection

The Catholic theology of the Two Hearts is a particular instance of the broader Catholic doctrine of Mary's cooperation with Christ in the work of redemption. "This motherhood of Mary in the order of grace continues uninterruptedly from the consent which she loyally gave at the Annunciation and which she sustained without wavering beneath the cross, until the eternal fulfillment of all the elect" (CCC 969). The Heart of Mary is not separate from the Heart of Jesus; the love of the Mother is not in competition with the love of the Son; the soul that turns to one is led by that very turning to the other.

The Catholic First Saturday devotion (asked for by the Blessed Virgin Mary at Fatima) parallels the First Friday devotion of the Sacred Heart: five consecutive First Saturdays of confession, Holy Communion, the rosary, and a fifteen-minute meditation on the mysteries of the rosary, in reparation to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. Many Catholics keep both devotions, the First Fridays and the First Saturdays, as a joint Catholic discipline of devotion to the Two Hearts.

Closing prayers

Pray three times each: the Our Father, the Hail Mary, and the Glory Be.

Most Sacred Heart of Jesus, have mercy on us. Immaculate Heart of Mary, pray for us.