Immaculate Heart of Mary

Every year, the Solemnity of the Sacred Heart of Jesus is celebrated 19 days after Pentecost Sunday, and the following day, the Feast of the Immaculate Heart of Mary. Devotees pay homage and honor the “Twin Hearts” on the two successive days, by hearing Mass, saying the Rosary, going to confession, receiving communion, and performing spiritual acts of mercy.

Honoring the Immaculate Heart of Mary is honoring the Mother of God, recognizing her extraordinary holiness and the immense love and protection she bestowed on Jesus as His mother, and her sharing in her son’s redemptive suffering and death on the cross.

The devotional name Immaculate Heart of Mary refers to the interior life of the Virgin Mary, her joys and sorrows, her virtues and hidden perfections, and, above all, her love for God the Father, her maternal love for her son Jesus, and her compassionate love for all the faithful.

The five first Saturdays are a widespread Marian devotion; Catholics go to Confession, receive Holy Communion, recite five decades of the Rosary, and meditate for 15 minutes on the joyful, sorrowful, glorious, or luminous mystery of the Rosary. The Immaculate Heart promises, according to Catholic belief, that whoever would do this will be given at the hour of death the graces necessary for salvation.

Filipinos attach great significance to the devotion to the Blessed Mother, especially to her Immaculate Heart. They venerate her through many names – Immaculate Conception, Lady of Manaoag, Lady of the Snows, Virgin of Mt. Carmel, Miraculous Medal, Mother of Perpetual Help, Virgin of Antipolo, Ina Poong Bato, Mediatrix of all Graces, Queen of Peace, Lady of Guadalupe, and Lady of Lourdes. Every Marian festivity is a special day of prayer, floral offering, and rosary hour.

Devotion to the Twin Hearts began in the 17th century by St. Jean Eudes who organized its scriptural, theological, and liturgical sources, prior to St. Marguerite Alaconque’s vision of the Sacred Heart. In the 18th and 19th centuries, the devotions grew through the efforts of St. Louis de Montfort who promoted Catholic Mariology and St. Catherine Laboure who received the Miraculous Medal, showing the Heart of Jesus crowned with thorns and the Heart of Mary pierced with a sword. Devotions and associated prayers continued into the 20th century. The devotion to the Immaculate Heart became widely known when Our Lady of Fatima appeared six times (May 13-Oct. 16, 1917) to three children Francisco, Jacinta, and Lucia, and asked them to propagate the devotion to the Blessed Mother and the Rosary.