First
Saturday Consecration
to the Immaculate Heart of Mary
for World Peace!
First
Saturday Consecration
Our Holy Father, Pope John Paul II has fulfilled one
of the two requests made by Our Blessed Mother for World Peace. He
Consecrated Russia according to the Blessed Virgin Mary's specific
request. It is critical that we laity, those who have not made the
Consecration (according to the Formula given to Sr Lucia) and all
religious complete our part assigned to us. That is Consecrate ourselves,
our families to the Immaculate Heart and pray in reparation for the
offenses committed against Her Immaculate Heart. We meet each First
Saturday to fulfill this request after Mass in the Church.
Origins
The First Saturday Devotion to the Immaculate Heart
of Mary was first requested by Our Lady of Fatima on July 13, 1917.
After showing the three children a vision of hell she said, "You
have seen hell where the souls of poor sinners go. To save them, God
wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart.
If what I say to you is done, many souls will be saved and there will
be peace... I shall come to ask for... the Communion of reparation
on the first Saturdays..."
Eight years later, on December 10, 1925, Mary and the
Child Jesus appeared to Lucia, the sole surviving Fatima visionary,
at a convent in Pontevedra, Spain. Our Lady rested her hand on Lucia's
shoulder, revealing a heart encircled by thorns.
The Child Jesus said: "Have compassion on the heart
of your most holy Mother, covered with thorns with which ungrateful
men pierce it at every moment, and there is no one to make an act
of reparation..."
Conditions
Our Lady spoke next, saying: "Look, my daughter,
at my heart, surrounded with thorns with which ungrateful men pierce
it at every moment by their blasphemies and ingratitude. You at least
try to console me and say that I promise to assist at the hour of
death, with the graces necessary for salvation, all those who, on
the first Saturday of five consecutive months, shall confess, receive
Holy Communion, recite five decades of the Rosary, and keep me company
for fifteen minutes while meditating on the mysteries of the Rosary,
with the intention of making reparation to me."
Why
Five Saturdays?
Christians have always honored the Blessed Virgin on
Saturday because of her constant faith in Jesus on that first Holy
Saturday before the Resurrection.
Five first Saturdays of reparation were requested to
atone for the five ways in which people offend the Immaculate Heart
of Mary:
1. attacks upon Mary's Immaculate Conception
2. attacks against her Perpetual Virginity
3. attacks upon her Divine Maternity and the refusal to accept her
as the Mother of all mankind
4. for those who try to publicly implant in children's hearts indifference,
comtempt and even hatred of this Immaculate Mother
5. for those who insult her directly in her sacred images.
Consecration
Prayer
Most Holy Virgin Mary, tender Mother of men, to fulfill
the desires of the Sacred Heart of Jesus and the request of the Vicar
of Your Son on earth, we consecrate ourselves and our families to
your Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart, O Queen of the Most Holy Rosary,
and we recommend to You, all the people of our country and all the
world.
Please accept our consecration, dearest Mother, and
use us as You wish to accomplish Your designs in the world.
O Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of Mary, Queen of the
Most Holy Rosary, and Queen of the World, rule over us, together with
the Sacred Heart of Jesus Christ, Our King. Save us from the spreading
flood of modern paganism; kindle in our hearts and homes the love
of purity, the practice of a virtuous life, an ardent zeal for souls,
and a desire to pray the Rosary more faithfully.
We come with confidence to You, O Throne of Grace and
Mother of Fair Love. Inflame us with the same Divine Fire which has
inflamed Your own Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart. Make our hearts
and homes Your shrine, and through us, make the Heart of Jesus, together
with your rule, triumph in every heart and home.
Amen.
—Venerable Pope Pius XII
