August is traditionally dedicated to the Immaculate Heart of Mary because the Church has long associated this month with honoring Mary’s interior love for Jesus and responding to her requests for devotion, consecration, and reparation.
Pope Pius XII placed her feast on August 22 and consecrated the world to her Heart, further tying this time of year to her loving role in Christ’s saving work. Even after the feast was moved near the Sacred Heart, August remained full of Marian feasts: St. Mary Major (Aug. 5), the Assumption (Aug. 15), and the Queenship of Mary (Aug. 22).
Scripture shows Mary pondering and treasuring Jesus’ mysteries in her heart, and saints like John Eudes and Bernardine of Siena helped spread explicit devotion to her Heart. At Fatima, Our Lady said Jesus wants devotion to her Immaculate Heart established in the world, promised “my Immaculate Heart will be your refuge and the way which will lead you to God,” and asked for consecration, reparation, and First Saturdays. The Church’s Directory on Popular Piety teaches that her Heart expresses her deep union with Christ’s work of salvation, from
