Placing Our Home in His Sacred Heart

Margaret Dwyer Hogan explains how enthroning her home to the Sacred Heart of Jesus has been a gift to her whole family.

How do you quantify grace? How do you explain to people who don’t share your faith the “before” and the “after?” 

On Mother’s Day, 2020, when the entire world was still in a lockdown due to Covid-19, I asked for one thing. Like everyone else, we were riddled with anxiety. Even my Winnie-the-Pooh-like trust in the Lord was not abating my fears about what was next. I read on Catholic Mom about the Welcome His Heart kit and sent away for it.  

I told my husband it was all I wanted for Mother’s Day: to gather the kids and consecrate our home. 

The Enthronement of Our Home Changed Me 

Honestly, my kids think I am a bit too “Catholic” with a big C. I think a few of them might describe themselves as “spiritual but not religious” — the cursed phrase of our time. What exactly does THAT mean? A life without consequences for choices? Do you hear the judgmental tone in this on my part? This was very much where my head was: not good.  

So we gathered. And prayed. And consecrated our home and family that afternoon. I placed ALL of my children and my concerns about them individually and our family collectively that day in His Sacred Heart. I gave up my worries and concerns to Him.  

And the Lord reminded me of myself in my 20s: full of questions, dubious choices, and not attending Mass regularly.  And the Lord told me to stop judging and simply walk with them.   

This consecration definitely changed me. First, I volunteered to be the DRE at our Parish the next month — while we were still in lockdown. I also had our pastor recruit another mom to help at our parish to keep the program open and going. Together as a team, we kept religious education going not only in our own parish but also in the other Catholic parish in our town that had shut down sacraments and religious education during Covid.

The Sacred Heart Taught Me

It also fundamentally changed my relationship with my husband and children. I learned to walk with them, stop judging them, and simply model fidelity to the Lord and the Sacraments of our Catholic Church. 

Today that picture of the Sacred Heart hangs in a space I use every day to pray and a space all can be found hanging out on the couch. Five years after that Enthronement I am working for the International Director of Holy Cross Family Ministries and with the wonderful team at Catholic Mom.   

Our children are not allowed to live a life without hardships, addictions, broken relationships or even pandemics. I have learned to really place all of these worries and anxieties in His Sacred Heart. When I am gone, and my kids are struggling with their own anxieties or fears for themselves or their own children, I pray that they will remember that Mother’s Day during Covid. And this devotion. And discover His beating Heart for them. Saint Margaret Mary, pray for us! Sacred Heart of Jesus, have mercy on us. 

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Copyright 2025 Margaret Dwyer Hogan
Images: (top, center) iStock, licensed for use by Holy Cross Family Ministries; (bottom) Canva