The Link Between Mary and the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus

by Charles M. Mangan


The unbreakable, abiding connection between Jesus Christ and His Mother is evident: He Who is the Son of God is also the Son of this woman who was chosen by Him from all eternity for the unrepeatable mission of bearing and nurturing Him. No one can claim the exact relationship that Mary, the New Eve, has with her Divine Son.

    Was there a bond between the Sacred Heart of Jesus and Mary? Undoubtedly, yes!

    First, the physical Heart of Christ was formed from the chaste flesh of Nazareth’s maiden. Her fiat uttered in faith to the Almighty through the Archangel Gabriel ensured that the Logos (“Word”)—the Second Person of the Most Blessed Trinity—would derive His human Body from Mary’s virginal body. Therefore, the physical Body of Jesus originated in His Mother’s intact womb and came from her sinless flesh.

    Second, the supernatural charity—that virtue which makes us “most like unto God”—that has always animated the Sacred Heart of Jesus is the identical love that lives on (and will forever) in the Immaculate Heart of Mary. All that Jesus thought, desired, said and did was informed by supernatural charity. So too it was with His Mother. Never was authentic love lacking in her Heart. In fact, it is this supernatural charity that unites the two Hearts.

    Third, the Heart of Christ was Our Blessed Mother’s source of strength. She could not have fulfilled God’s mysterious plan for her life if she had not accepted the sanctifying grace—that is, “God’s life”—that only comes from the Messiah. Even today, Mary, as His true Mother, enjoys unsurpassed physical access to her Son in Heaven. Yet, she also possess unparalleled spiritual access to Him because of her incessant, fervent prayer directed towards Jesus. All that Mary accomplished was inspired and completed in the Heart of her Crucified and Risen Son.

    Our Lady continually leads us to worship her Son. Our genuine veneration of the Madonna ends in sincere adoration of Jesus. In his excellent Mary in Our Life (New York: P.J. Kenedy and Sons, 1954), Father William George Most, Ph.D., reminded us that Pope Pius XI (1922-1939) declared in his encyclical Miserentissimus Redemptor (May 8, 1928) the importance of authentic devotion to the Heart of the Master. The underlying sentiments of the Holy Father were captured by Father Most: “True devotion to the Sacred Heart consists in two things, which can readily be reduced to one—consecration and reparation” (page 205). Consecration means, in the phrase of Pope Pius XI, that we “dedicate ourselves and all that we have to the Divine Heart of Jesus” (ibid.); by our love we repay to the Creator the love that He has given to us. Reparation follows from consecration and, according to the Holy Father, is necessary “if that Uncreated Love (that is, God Himself) has been neglected by forgetfulness or violated by offenses” (page 206). The debt owed and the compensation due to the Lord is reparation.

    The essential consecration and reparation are to be made through the Ever-Virgin. Pope Pius XI wrote: “May the most gracious Mother of God smile upon and favor these our prayers and undertakings, she, who since she brought forth Jesus the Redeemer for us, nourished Him, and offered Him as a Victim at the Cross, and is called the Reparatrix, in virtue of her intimate union with Christ, and an altogether singular grace of His” (page 207). And again, His Holiness wrote: “O Loving Jesus, through the intercession of the Blessed Virgin Mary, our model in reparation, deign to receive the voluntary offering we make of this act of expiation . . .” (page 208).

    To approach to the Heart of Christ through Mary is sensible. Father Most exclaimed: “Thus it is clear that our need of Mary will never end; she is the Mediatrix of All Graces; all descend to us through her. And the way for us to ascend to the Sacred Heart of Christ is through the Immaculate Heart of His Mother: ad Cor Jesu per Cor Mariae!” (page 211).

    If the two Hearts are indeed united in reality, then, Father Most contended, they “should also be closely united as objects of our devotion” (ibid.). May we submit that not only are the Son and His Mother yoked but so also are the worship of His Sacred Heart and the honor shown her Immaculate Heart? Surely! But we must leave that subject for another time.

    The unique rapport between the Heart of Emmanuel and the New Daughter of Sion is not surprising, given the Savior’s overwhelming goodness and Mary’s response. Disciples of Christ can only marvel at the wonders God has worked in the one whose Pure Immaculate Heart constantly beats in unison with the Most Sacred Heart.

Father Mangan is a priest of the Diocese of Sioux Falls, South Dakota.

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