Devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary

Image from "He gently calls us"

On Dec 10th 1925 The Blessed Mother and Christ the Child appeared to Sister Lucia (one of the children of Fatima).  The Christ Child spoke first: "Have pity on the heart of your Most Holy Mother.  It is covered with thorns with which ungrateful men pierce it at every moment, and there is no one to remove them with an act of reparation."

Holding in her hand a heart encircled with sharp thorns, Our Lady then said : "My child, behold my heart surrounded with the thorns which ungrateful men place theirein at every moment by their blasphemies and ingratitude. You at least try to console me.  Announce in my name that I promise to assist at the hour of death with all the graces necessary for salvation, all those who, on the first Saturday of five consecutive months, go to Confession and receive Holy Communion, recite the Rosary, and keep me company for a quarter of an hour while meditating on the mysteries of the Rosary, with the intention of making reparation to me". 

Pope Pius XII, on October 31, 1942, personally consecrated the world to the Immaculate Heart of Mary.  Shortly after, he instituted throughout the universal Church the Feast of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, which is celebrated everywhere in the world  on the Saturday after the Feast of the Sacred Heart of Jesus.