Every June, many parishes quietly mark the Feast of the Sacred Heart, formally the Solemnity of the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus. It comes without the crowds of Christmas or Easter, so it can slip by if you don't know to look for it.
If you've never celebrated it on purpose, this is a good year to start. Here's when the feast falls, how it came to be, and a few simple ways to make the day count.
When is the Feast of the Sacred Heart?
The Solemnity of the Sacred Heart is celebrated on the Friday after the second Sunday after Pentecost. Because it depends on the date of Easter, it moves every year. In 2026, it fell on Friday, June 12.
Most years it lands in June, which is one reason the whole month is dedicated to the Sacred Heart. Occasionally, when Easter comes very early or very late, it falls at the end of May or the start of July.
A simple way to find it: look up the date of Corpus Christi in your diocese's calendar, then find the second Friday after it. The day right after the Solemnity, the Church celebrates the Immaculate Heart of Mary, which we cover in the Sacred Heart and the Immaculate Heart.
Where the feast came from
The idea of a feast honoring the Heart of Jesus is older than the Solemnity itself. St. John Eudes celebrated a liturgical feast of the Heart of Jesus in his French seminaries around 1670.
The feast as we know it comes from a specific request. On June 16, 1675, during the octave of Corpus Christi, Jesus appeared to St. Margaret Mary Alacoque at Paray-le-Monial and asked that the Friday after that octave be set apart as a feast in honor of His Heart. That timing is still visible in today's calendar. Her full story is in St. Margaret Mary Alacoque and the history of the Sacred Heart.
The Church adopted the feast step by step:
- 1765: Rome first approved a feast of the Sacred Heart for particular places.
- 1856: Blessed Pius IX extended the feast to the universal Church.
- 1889: Pope Leo XIII raised its rank.
- 1928: Pope Pius XI raised it again and asked that an Act of Reparation be prayed in churches on the feast each year.
Today it holds the rank of a solemnity, the highest rank of celebration in the Church's calendar. It isn't a holy day of obligation in the United States, so Mass that day is a free gift you can choose to give.
Why June is the month of the Sacred Heart
Because the Solemnity so often falls in June, Catholic tradition dedicates the whole month to the Sacred Heart, much as May is dedicated to Our Lady. Many parishes add extra devotions in June, and families often display their Sacred Heart image more prominently.
We wrote about living the devotion through the month in an earlier post, Heart of Devotion: Timeless Faith in a Changing World, which pairs well with this one.
The Act of Reparation
In his 1928 encyclical Miserentissimus Redemptor, Pope Pius XI asked that an Act of Reparation to the Sacred Heart be recited in churches on the feast each year. The prayer expresses sorrow for the ways Christ's love is ignored and offended, and it offers love in return.
Reparation sits at the center of this devotion. In the 1675 apparition, Jesus told St. Margaret Mary that in return for His great love He received mostly ingratitude and coldness. The Act of Reparation answers that with a simple message: we notice, we're sorry, and we want to love You better.
You can find the full prayer through EWTN or in many parish prayer books. Praying it together as a family on the feast is a meaningful way to keep the day.
The Litany of the Sacred Heart
Pope Leo XIII approved the Litany of the Sacred Heart of Jesus for public use in 1899, the same year he consecrated the world to the Sacred Heart.
It has 33 invocations, one for each year of Christ's life on earth. Each one names an aspect of His Heart, such as its patience, its mercy, or its role as the source of all consolation, and each is followed by the response "have mercy on us." The litany grew out of earlier versions written in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, including one by a Jesuit, Fr. Jean Croiset, and another by a Visitation nun.
The litany takes about ten minutes to pray, which makes it a good fit for a family prayer time on the feast. EWTN publishes the full text.
A day of prayer for priests
The Solemnity of the Sacred Heart is also the World Day of Prayer for the Sanctification of Priests, observed since 2002. The connection makes sense: priests offer the Eucharist and the mercy of Confession, both of which flow from the pierced Heart of Christ.
Consider praying for your pastor by name on the feast. A short note thanking him for his ministry is a kind way to mark the day too.
Simple ways to celebrate the feast
Here are a few ideas, from small to larger. Pick one or two that fit your household.
- Go to Mass. If your schedule allows, attend Mass on the Solemnity. Offer your Communion in reparation, the way Jesus asked.
- Pray the Litany or the Act of Reparation. Gather everyone after dinner and pray it together.
- Renew or begin an enthronement. The feast is a natural day to enthrone the Sacred Heart in your home or renew a past enthronement. Our guide to enthronement of the Sacred Heart in the home explains how.
- Finish your nine First Fridays. If you've been keeping the First Fridays, plan to complete them on or near the feast. Here's how to make the nine First Fridays.
- Pray the Sorrowful Mysteries. Take your rosary and pray the fifth Sorrowful Mystery, the Crucifixion, slowly. Picture the lance opening Christ's side.
- Make it a family feast. Some families cook a favorite meal, use a red tablecloth, or bake a heart-shaped dessert. Little traditions like these help children remember the day.
- Read what the popes wrote. Spend a few minutes with a passage from Pope Pius XII or Pope Francis on the Sacred Heart. We gathered the highlights in Dilexit Nos and the popes on the Sacred Heart.
Bringing the feast into everyday prayer
A feast is meant to send you back into ordinary days with something new. After the Solemnity, try keeping one practice going: a short morning offering to the Sacred Heart, a decade of the Rosary each Friday, or a monthly First Friday.
If you'd like a rosary that keeps the devotion in front of you, our Sacred Heart Rosary carries a silver color Sacred Heart centerpiece and a St. Benedict crucifix on red paracord. It's built to last for generations, so it can be part of your family's June traditions for years to come.
