Today everything which concerns the Sacred Heart of Jesus has become familiar and doubly dear to me. My life seems destined to be spent in the light irradiating from the tabernacle, and it is to the heart of Jesus that I must look for a solution of all my troubles. I feel as if I would be ready to shed my blood for the cause of the Sacred Heart. My fondest wish is to be able to do something for that precious object of my love. At times the thought of my arrogance, of my unbelievable self-love and of my great worthlessness alarms and dismays me and robs me of my courage, but I soon find reason for comfort in the words spoken by Jesus to Blessed Margaret Alacoque: 'I have chosen you to reveal the marvels of my heart, because you are such an abyss of ignorance and insufficiency.'

Ah! I wish to serve the Sacred Heart of Jesus, today and always. I want the devotion to his Heart, concealed within the sacrament of love, to be the measure of all my spiritual progress. The conclusion of my resolutions during the holy exercises is in my desire henceforth to do all that I have been trying to do till now in intimate union with the Sacred Heart of Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament.

Journal of a Soul
Pope John XXIII