Third Revelation to St Margaret Mary: First Friday Devotion, 1674

On one occasion, during the Eucharistic Exposition…my sweet Master, presented Himself to me, all resplendent with glory, His Five Wounds shining like so many suns. From every part of His Sacred Humanity there issued flames but especially from His Adorable Bosom, which was like an open furnace. He disclosed to me His most loving and amiable Heart, which was the living source of those flames. At that point He made known to me the unspeakable marvels of His pure love, and showed me to what an excess He had loved everyone, from whom He received only ingratitude and contempt. Jesus: “I feel this more than all that I suffered in my Passion. If they would only give Me some return for My love, I should think little of all I have done for them, and would wish to suffer more if possible. But they only return Me with rejection and treat Me with coldness for all My eagerness to do them good. You, at least, can give Me the consolation to make up for their ingratitude, as much as you can…First, you are to receive me in Holy Communion as often as obedience will allow, no matter what mortification or humiliation it may cause you...Moreover, you are to receive the Eucharist on the First Friday of each month. Every night between Thursday and Friday I will make you share that sorrow unto death which I was pleased to feel in the Garden of Olives…To join with Me in the humble prayer which I then offered to My Father, in the midst of My agony, you should arise between eleven o’clock and midnight, and stay prostrate with Me for an hour, not only to appease the Divine anger by begging mercy for sinners, but also in some way to soothe the bitterness I felt when finding My apostles abandoned Me and I was constrained to reproach them that they could not watch one hour with Me…”

(Excerpts from St Margaret Mary Alacoque’s autobiography)