You could say they were struck to the heart.
Inside the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels on Friday, June 12, some 500 Massgoers did something unusual after the Prayers of the Faithful: they knelt for a special prayer consecrating the United States to the Sacred Heart of Jesus.
“Your heart burns with a love for all people to return to a right relationship with you,” prayed Cathedral pastor Father David Gallardo as he knelt before a statue of Jesus Christ and his Sacred Heart.
“May our hearts be united to yours, so that our families and communities enjoy peace and happiness; may broken relationships be reconciled, injustices repaired, and the wounds of our land be healed.”
The prayer — recited that day in churches around the country — was distributed by the country’s Catholic bishops, who themselves had consecrated the country to the Sacred Heart of Jesus the day before in Orlando, Florida.
For the bishops, the consecration was a special way to pray for the country ahead of next month’s 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence.
For those at the cathedral Mass — among them law-enforcement officers, families, religious sisters, and office workers on their lunch break — it was a chance to do their part, and to reunite with a trusted source of help.
“Ever since I started praying to the Sacred Heart as a child, my prayers have always been heard, and I’ve always been saved,” said cathedral parishioner Mimi Lopez, who came with her husband, Lino. “He will always find me.”
Lopez’s devotion to the Sacred Heart began during childhood in the Philippines, when she prayed for help finding a ring from her mother that seemed impossibly lost. When she found the ring, it was the start of a lifelong relationship that guided her through marriage, motherhood, and a new life in the U.S.
At the cathedral, Lopez prayed for her children and for Lino, with whom she’ll be celebrating 50 years of marriage this year. “And for our country,” she told Angelus. “I think it’s very important.”
In his homily, Gallardo acknowledged that as a devotion, the Sacred Heart of Jesus can be difficult to understand. The words of Christ in the day’s Gospel from John, the priest said, explain it best: “Come to me all of you who labor and are burdened, and I will give you rest.”
“We come here with our own burdens … our own tiredness, and yet Jesus invites us to come rest in him, to rest in his Sacred Heart,” said Gallardo. “Like the people of Israel [in the Old Testament], we are here today not because of any great merits. We are here solely because God loves us.”
The consecration was a call to recognize the need we have “in our own individual lives, in our Church, and in our nation to renew ourselves in the love and mercy of God, especially in light of many modern-day anxieties and fears,” Gallardo said.
Sitting in the second row at the cathedral were several sisters of the Lovers of the Holy Cross of Los Angeles, the local branch of a religious order founded in Vietnam by a French bishop in the 1670s, the same time that French mystic St. Margaret Mary Alacoque received the visions of Christ’s Sacred Heart that inspired the devotion.
The nuns, who came from Gardena, had just finished a nine-day novena to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, praying for world peace, more zealous vocations, and the reconciliation of divisions in the U.S. and within families.
Sister Cecilia Nguyen explained that while “devotion” describes something good directed toward God, the Sacred Heart of Jesus should also be understood the other way around.
“It’s God’s devotion to us from himself,” said Sister Cecilia, a native of Vietnam. “That even though we’re not perfect, he devotes himself to us. The Sacred Heart of Jesus is his own devotion to humanity, his unfailing love.”
Beyond the cathedral, parishes across the archdiocese celebrated similar Masses on June 12. The day before, at Archbishop José H. Gomez’s request, parishes rang their church bells at 3 p.m., known as “the hour of divine mercy.”
In Pasadena, young Catholics from St. Philip the Apostle Church had a head start on the festivities. Inspired by their experience at the 2024 National Eucharistic Congress in Indianapolis and a local Eucharistic revival a year later, they had asked Archbishop Gomez and Auxiliary Bishop Brian Nunes last year for a local consecration to the Sacred Heart. A few months later, the bishops of the U.S. voted to consecrate the entire country.
“The abundance of the Lord is unmatched, and our bishops had a much grander plan,” said Ana Raptis, board chair of the Newman Center Pasadena, based at St. Philip’s.
To prepare for the consecration, youth from the Newman Center organized a First Friday Mass and social event at a different area parish each month beginning last October. This month, the group — many of whom study at nearby Caltech and Pasadena Community College — organized a parish novena to the Sacred Heart June 3-11, an evening Holy Hour and Consecration Mass on July 11, and a “speakeasy” late-night Mass and social the evening of July 12 at a location revealed through clues shared on social media.
Despite coinciding with the USA-Paraguay soccer World Cup match a few miles away in Inglewood, the Mass drew youth from as far as LA’s Westside to Mater Dolorosa Retreat Center’s outdoor amphitheatre.
“I mean, a hundred young adults on the night of the World Cup is pretty crazy to me. I was worried,” said Krista Corbello, director of the Newman Center.
Corbello believes the initiative’s success owes something to the late Bishop David O’Connell and his consecration of Southern California to the Immaculate Heart of Mary in 2017, while serving in the San Gabriel Pastoral Region.
“That was a young adult initiative,” said Corbello of the Marian consecration. “And now, almost 10 years later, it’s a new generation of young adults who are doing this. It was a profoundly moving experience.”
In the weeks leading up to the country’s July 4 birthday, the bishops also invited parishes to contribute to a collective 250 hours of adoration and 250 works of mercy. At St. Philip’s, staff created a “Works of Mercy wall” where parishioners can prayerfully tie pieces of cut ribbon representing their works.
Raptis said the parish’s Sacred Heart activities have given the young people “a safe place, a loving place for people to practice their values.”
“The most important point is to see the young Catholic Church at work,” said Raptis. “They are back, they are here, and they are so filled with love for our Lord.”
