St. Margaret Mary Alacoque

Their story

Margaret Mary Alacoque was born in 1647 in Burgundy, France. Her father died when she was eight, and soon afterward she fell ill with a painful disease that kept her bedridden for about four years. She was healed after promising to give her life to God. As a young woman she endured years of hardship at home, where relatives controlled the household and treated her family harshly. At 24 Margaret Mary entered the convent of the Visitation Sisters at Paray-le-Monial. There, beginning in 1673, she experienced a series of visions in which Jesus showed her His Heart, burning with love for humanity yet wounded by ingratitude and indifference. He asked her to spread devotion to His Sacred Heart: to receive Holy Communion on the first Friday of each month, to spend an hour in prayer on Thursday nights in memory of His agony in the garden, and to establish a feast in honor of His Heart. Many of Margaret Mary's sisters doubted her and treated her with suspicion. But the Jesuit St. Claude de la Colombière, who became her confessor, believed her and helped spread the devotion. She bore misunderstanding and illness with humility. She died on October 17, 1690, and was canonized in 1920. Devotion to the Sacred Heart, including the First Friday devotion and the solemnity of the Sacred Heart, spread throughout the Church.