1984 Consecration Documents
The Purpose of the Consecration of Russia
Ven. Lucia dos Santos, Letter to Father Gonçalvez, May 18, 1936.
(Our Lord) Because I want my whole Church to acknowledge that consecration as a triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary,
in order to later extend its cult and to place the devotion to this Immaculate Heart alongside the devotion to my Sacred Heart.
Bishop Dom José Alves Correia da Silva of Leiria, Letter to Pope Pius XI, 1937.
Of the three children to whom our Lady appeared, two have died and the one surviving is a religious at the Institute of Saint Dorothy in Spain. This religious asks me to communicate to your Holiness that, according to a heavenly revelation, the good God promises to end the persecution in Russia, should your Holiness deign to make and order that all the bishops of the Catholic World together make a solemn and public act of reparation and consecration of Russia to the most Holy Hearts of Jesus and Mary and approve and recommend the practice of reparatory devotion which consists in receiving Holy Communion, Reciting the Rosary, making fifteen minutes of meditation on the mysteries of the Rosary, all this on the first Saturday of five consecutive months.
DOCUMENTS PRIOR TO 1984 CONSECRATION |
July 13, 1917 Third Apparition of Our Lady of the Rosary of Fátima
Appearing to three little shepherds, Lucia, Jacinta and Francisco, in Fátima, Portugal, the Blessed Virgin promises to "come and ask the consecration of Russia to Her Immaculate Heart"
(God) is about to punish the world with war and with hunger, and by the persecution of the Church and the Holy Father.
To prevent this, I shall come to the world to ask that Russia be consecrated to my Immaculate Heart, and I shall ask that on the First Saturday of every month Communions of reparation be made in atonement for the sins-of the world. If my wishes are fulfilled, Russia will be converted and there will be peace; if not, then Russia will spread her errors throughout the world, bringing new wars and persecution of the Church; the good will be martyred and the Holy Father will have much to suffer; certain nations will be annihilated. But in the end my Immaculate Heart will triumph. The Holy Father will consecrate Russia to me, and she will be converted, and the world will enjoy a period of peace
June 12, 1929 Our Lady's Appears to Sr. Lucia in Tuy, Spain
Our Lady fulfills her promise to return and request the consecration.
The moment has come in which God asks the Holy Father to make, in union with all the bishops of the world, the consecration of Russia to My Immaculate Heart, promising to save it by this means.
So numerous are the souls which the justice of God condemns for sins committed against Me, that I come to ask for reparation. Sacrifice yourself for this intention and pray.
1930 - Interview with Sr. Lucia
On June 6, 1930, Sr. Lucia responded to her spiritual director, Fr. José Bernardo Gonçalves, S.J., who had submitted a number of questions to her in writing.
Fr. Gonçalves. As regards the salvation of poor Russia, what is it that is wanted or desired?
Sr. Lucia. If I am not mistaken, Our Dear Lord God promises to end the persecution of Russia, if the Holy Father condescends to make, and likewise ordains the Bishops of the Catholic World, to make a solemn and public act of reparation and consecration of Russia to the Most Holy Hearts of Jesus and Mary. In response to the end of this persecution, His Holiness is to promise to approve of and recommend the practice of the already mentioned devotion of reparation. [Five First Saturdays]
1936 Letter to Fr. Gonçalvez
Pontevedra, May 18,1936
Reverend Senhor,
... About the other question whether it would be good to insist in order to obtain the consecration of Russia, I answer in almost the same way as I answered the other times. I am sorry that it has not already been done. However, it is the same God who requested it, who has permitted this.
I am going to say what I feel about it, although it is a rather delicate matter to put in a letter due to the danger of it being lost and read, but I entrust it to the same God, because I am afraid I have not treated the matter with enough clarity.
Is it convenient to insist? I don’t know. It seems to me that if the Holy Father were to make it now, Our Lord would accept it, and fulfill His promise. Also there is no doubt that it would please Our Lord and the Immaculate Heart of Mary.
Intimately I have spoken to Our Lord about the subject, and not too long ago I asked Him why He would not convert Russia without the Holy Father making the consecration?
Christ: “Because I want my whole Church to acknowledge that consecration as a triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, in order to later extend its cult and to place the devotion to this Immaculate Heart alongside the devotion to my Sacred Heart.”
Sr. Lucia: But my God, the Holy Father probably won’t believe me, unless You Yourself move him with a special inspiration.
Christ: “The Holy Father. Pray very much for the Holy Father. He will do it, but it will be late. Nevertheless the Immaculate Heart of Mary will save Russia. It has been entrusted to Her.”
. . . Your most humble servant.
Maria Lucia de Jesus, R.S.D.
P.S.—About Mexico, Spain and France, you know that they are not included in the promise. We would have to count on the generosity of the Divine mercy. I don’t think I need to ask you to burn this letter as soon as you have read it. I suppose you do it out of prudence, therefore I will remain calm; I would also thank you for telling me if you have received it.*
The last time I spoke to the Bishop, he promised me that he would take care of this matter, but I don’t know if he did. I leave everything in the hands of God and in the care of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, and I try to work in my field of action, which is sacrifice and prayer. Although these are as poor as I, I hope that the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary will accept them for the conversion of sinners.
I ask you to bless the one who does not forget you close to Jesus and Mary.
Maria Lucia de Jesus
*The Spanish Civil War was underway and the letter might be intercepted.
1937 Letter of the Bishop of Leiria to Pope Pius XI
The Bishop of Leiria, Dom José Alves Correia da Silva, conveyed the request for the Consecration of Russia and for the approval of the devotion of the Five First Saturdays.
Most blessed Father:
Humbly prostrate at the feet of your Holiness, I judge that I must present the following to your Holiness:
There is in this diocese the sanctuary of our Lady of Fatima, which is the major center of piety in Portugal and whose devotion is dispersed through many nations. From the recommendations made by the most blessed Virgin in 1917, especially the devotion to the Holy Rosary, aversion to license, and penitence, it is clear that our Lady was preparing the battle against the communism from which Portugal has been preserved so far, despite its proximity to Spain. We Portuguese bishops pledged in the past year, after the retreat which we made at the sanctuary, to call a great national pilgrimage if until the end of 1937 our country will not be invaded by the terrible calamity of communism. Thanks to the Most Holy Virgin we have been at peace.
Of the three children to whom our Lady appeared, two have died and the one surviving is a religious at the Institute of Saint Dorothy in Spain. This religious asks me to communicate to your Holiness that, according to a heavenly revelation, the good God promises to end the persecution in Russia, should your Holiness deign to make and order that all the bishops of the Catholic World together make a solemn and public act of reparation and consecration of Russia to the most Holy Hearts of Jesus and Mary and approve and recommend the practice of reparatory devotion which consists in receiving Holy Communion, Reciting the Rosary, making fifteen minutes of meditation on the mysteries of the Rosary, all this on the first Saturday of five consecutive months.
This devotion would have as its purposes:
Reparation for the blasphemies against the Immaculate Conception, the Virginity, the Maternity of the most Blessed Virgin and the offenses against the images of our Lady; supplication for our children, in whose hearts has been implanted contempt and even hatred for the Mother of Heaven.
Here, most Holy Father, is the communication which I have received for transmission to your Holiness.
In the pilgrimages to the Sanctuary we pray always for your Holiness.
Finally, I humbly beg your Holiness for your Apostolic Blessing for this diocese, your humble pastor and the pilgrims of the sanctuary of our Lady of Fatima.
1940 Letter of Sr. Lucia to Pope Pius XII
On December 2, 1940, Sr. Lucia wrote to Pope Pius XII requesting the Consecration of Russia to the Immaculate Heart and the Devotion of the Five First Saturdays. Notably, she states regarding the request for the Consecration yet unfulfilled, “our Lord has not stopped insisting on this request, promising lately, to shorten the days of tribulation which He has determined to punish the nations for their crimes, through war, famine and several persecutions of the Holy Church and Your Holiness”.
Most Holy Father,
Humbly prostrated at your feet, I come as the last sheep of the fold entrusted to you to open my heart, by order of my spiritual director.
I am the only survivor of the children to whom our Lady appeared in Fátima (Portugal) from the 13th of May to the 13th of October 1917. The Blessed Virgin has granted me many graces, the greatest of all being my admission to the Institute of Saint Dorothy. (To here this is copy of the sketch the Bishop sent me.)
I come, Most Holy Father, to renew a request that has already been brought to you several times. The request, Most Holy Father, is from our Lord and our good Mother in Heaven.
In 1917, in the portion of the apparitions that we have designated "the secret," the Blessed Virgin revealed the end of the war that was then afflicting Europe, and predicted another forthcoming, saying that to prevent it She would come and ask the consecration of Russia to Her Immaculate Heart as well as the Communion of reparation on the first Saturday. She promised peace and the conversion of that nation if Her request was attended to. She announced that otherwise this nation would spread her errors throughout the world, and there would be wars, persecutions of the Holy Church, martyrdom of many Christians, several persecutions and sufferings reserved for Your Holiness, and the annihilation of several nations.
Most Holy Father, this remained a secret until 1926 according to the express will of our Lady. Then, in a revelation She asked that the Communion of reparation on the first Saturdays of five consecutive months be propagated throughout the world, with its conditions of doing the following with the same purpose; going to confession, meditating for a quarter of an hour on the mysteries of the Rosary and saying the Rosary with the aim of making reparation for the insults, sacrileges and indifferences committed against Her Immaculate Heart. Our good Heavenly Mother promises to assist the persons who practise this devotion, in the hour of their death, with all the necessary graces for their salvation. I exposed the request of our Lady to my confessor, who tried to have it fulfilled, but only on the 13th of September 1939 did His Excellency the Bishop of Leiria make public in Fatima this request of our Lady.
I take this opportunity, Most Holy Father, to ask you to bless and extend this devotion to the whole world. In 1929, through another apparition, our Lady asked for the consecration of Russia to Her Immaculate Heart, promising its conversion through this means and the hindering of the propagation of its errors.
Sometime afterwards I told my confessor of the request of our Lady. He tried to fulfill it by making it known to Pius XI.
In several intimate communications our Lord has not stopped insisting on this request, promising lately, to shorten the days of tribulation which He has determined to punish the nations for their crimes, through war, famine and several persecutions of the Holy Church and Your Holiness, if you will consecrate the world to the Immaculate Heart of Mary, with a special mention for Russia, and order that all the Bishops of the world do the same in union with Your Holiness. I truly feel your sufferings, Most Holy Father! And, at much as I can through my humble prayers and sacrifices, I try to lessen them, close to our Lord and the Immaculate Heart of Mary.
Most Holy Father, if in the union of my soul with God I have not been deceived, our Lord promises a special protection to our country in this war, due to the consecration of the nation by the Portuguese Prelates, to the Immaculate Heart of Mary; as proof of the graces that would have been granted to other nations, had they also consecrated themselves to Her.
Now, Most Holy Father, allow me to make one more request, which is but an ardent wish of my humble heart; that the feast in honour of the Immaculate Heart of Mary be extended throughout the whole world as one of the main feasts of the Holy Church.
With the deepest respect and reverence I ask for the Apostolic Blessing. May God protect Your Holiness.
Tuy, Spain, 2nd of December of 1940.
Maria Lucia de Jesus
1942 Consecration of the World to the Immaculate Heart by Pope Pius XII
On October 31, 1942, Pope Pius XII consecrated the Church and the World to the Immaculate Heart of Mary during a radio broadcast to Portugal, repeated it in Rome on December 8th, the Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception. This was in the midst of World War II, and the war was not going well for the allies. However, within a short time the tide turned, as the Germans were defeated at El Alamein in North Africa on November 11th, the anniversary of the end of World War I, and the following February, in a battle that had raged for 5 months, they were defeated at Stalingrad. The date was February 2nd, the Feast of the Purification of Mary and the Presentation of Our Lord. Many historians consider this victory the decisive turning point of the war.
For further history and the text see: 1942 Consecration of the World to the Immaculate Heart
1952 Consecration of Russia to the Immaculate Heart by Pope Pius XII
On July 7, 1952, Pope Pius XII consecrated Russia to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. In an Apostolic Letter To the Russian People, he included the text of consecration which he used.
We, therefore, so that Ours and your prayers are answered more easily, and to give you a singular attestation of Our particular benevolence, as a few years ago we consecrated the whole world to the Immaculate Heart of the virgin Mother of God, so now, in a way very special, we consecrate all the peoples of Russia to the same Immaculate Heart, in the sure confidence that with the most powerful patronage of the Virgin Mary the vows will happily come true as soon as possible, that We, that you, who all good people form for a true peace, for a fraternal harmony and due freedom to all and in the first place to the church; so that, through the prayer that We raise together with you and with all Christians, the saving kingdom of Christ, which is "the kingdom of truth and life, the kingdom of holiness and grace, the kingdom of justice, love and peace ", (8) triumphs in every part of the earth and is firmly established.
And with suppliant invocation we pray to the same most clement Mother, so that she may assist each one of you in the present calamities and obtain for your divine Son that light that comes from Heaven, and implore for your souls that virtue and that strength, by which, sustained by divine grace, may you victoriously overcome every impiety and error.
For more info see: Pius XII, Consecration of Russia to the Immaculate Heart
1964 Consecration of the World to the Immaculate Heart by Pope Paul VI
On November 21, 1964, at the end of the Third Session of the Second Vatican Council, Pope Paul VI renewed the Consecration of 1942
"Our Predecessor Pius XII of venerated memory, not without inspiration from on high, solemnly consecrated the whole world to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. We hold it fitting to remember this act of consecration today in particular. We intend to entrust to our heavenly Mother the entire human family, with its problems, its anxieties, its legitimate aspirations and ardent hopes."
1967 Pope Paul VI, Fiftieth Anniversary of the Apparitions at Fátima
On May 13, 1967, Pope Paul VI issued his Apostolic Exhortation Signum Magnum (The Great Sign), encouraging all Catholics to consecrate themselves to the Immaculate Heart.
We exhort all the sons of the Church to renew personally their consecration to the Immaculate Heart of the Mother of the Church, and to live personally this noble act of worship through a life increasingly in conformity with the Divine Will, in a spirit of filial service, and devoted imitation of their Heavenly Queen.
Fr. Luigi Ciapi, O.P., theologian of the papal household: Consecration to the Immaculate Heart for the Triumph of the Kingdom of God
1982 Pope John Paul II, Consecration of the World to the Immaculate Heart
On May 13, 1982, a year after the attempt on his life, Pope John Paul II went to Fátima to give thanks for being saved from the assassin's bullets. Following the Mass for the 65th Anniversary of the Apparitions, the Pope consecrated the World to the Immaculate Heart, entrusting especially “those individuals and nations which particularly need to be entrusted and consecrated.” By this means he intended Russia and the other nations fo the Soviet Bloc whose atheistic errors had enslaved millions of people. He did so in union with the college of bishops, of which he is the supreme head, but without a common public act on the part of the bishops.
1. “We have recourse to your protection, holy Mother of God.” As I utter the words of this antiphon with which the Church of Christ has prayed for centuries, I find myself today in this place chosen by you, O Mother, and by you particularly loved.
I am here, united with all the Pastors of the Church in that particular bond whereby we constitute a body and a college, just as Christ desired the Apostles to be in union with Peter.
In the bond of this union, I utter the words of the present Act, in which I wish to include, once more, the hopes and anxieties of the Church in the modern world.
Forty years ago and again ten years later, your servant Pope Pius XII, having before his eyes the painful experience of the human family, entrusted and consecrated to your Immaculate Heart the whole world, especially the peoples for which you had particular love and solicitude.
This world of individuals and nations I too have before my eyes today, as I renew the entrusting and consecration carried out by my Predecessor in the See of Peter: the world of the second millennium that is drawing to a close, the modern world, our world today!
The Church, mindful of the Lord's words: "Go... and make disciples of all nations... and lo, I am with you always, to the close of the age" (Mt 28:19-20), renewed, at the Second Vatican Council, her awareness of her mission in this world.
And therefore, O Mother of individuals and peoples, you who "know all their sufferings-and their hopes", you who have a mother's awareness of all the struggles between good and evil, between light and darkness, which afflict the modern world, accept the cry which we, as though moved by the Holy Spirit, address directly to your Heart.
Embrace, with the love of the Mother and Handmaid, this human world of ours, which we entrust and consecrate to you, for we are full of disquiet for the earthly and eternal destiny of individuals and peoples.
In a special way we entrust and consecrate to you those individuals and nations which particularly need to be entrusted and consecrated.
We have recourse to your protection, holy Mother of God: reject not the prayers we send up to you in our necessities.
Reject them not!
Accept our humble trust-and our act of entrusting!
2. "For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life" (Jn 3:16).
It was precisely by reason of this love that the Son of God consecrated himself for all mankind: "And for their sake I consecrate myself, that they also may be consecrated in truth" (In 17:19).
By reason of that consecration the disciples of all ages are called to spend themselves for the salvation of the world, and to supplement Christ's afflictions for the sake of his body, that is the Church (cf. 2 Cor 12:15; Col 1:24).
Before you, Mother of Christ, before your Immaculate Heart, I today, together with the whole Church, unite myself with our Redeemer in this his consecration for the world and for people, which only in his divine Heart has the power to obtain pardon and to secure reparation.
The power of this consecration lasts for all time and embraces all individuals, peoples and nations. It overcomes every evil that the spirit of darkness is able to awaken, and has in fact awakened in our times, in the heart of man and in his history.
The Church, the Mystical Body of Christ, unites herself, through the service of Peter's successor, to this consecration by our Redeemer.
Oh, how deeply we feel the need for consecration on the part of humanity and of the world-our modern world-in union with Christ himself! The redeeming work of Christ, in fact, must be shared in by the world by means of the Church.
Oh, how pained we are by all the things in the Church and in each one of us that are opposed to holiness and consecration! How pained we are that the invitation to repentance, to conversion, to prayer, has not met with the acceptance that it should have received!
How pained we are that many share so coldly in Christ's work of Redemption! That "what is lacking in Christ's afflictions" is so insufficiently completed in our flesh.
And so, blessed be all those souls that obey the call of eternal Love! Blessed be all those who, day after day, with undiminished generosity accept your invitation, O Mother, to do what your Jesus tells them (cf. Jn 2:5) and give the Church and the world a serene testimony of lives inspired by the Gospel.
Above all blessed be you, the Handmaid of the Lord, who in the fullest way obey the divine call!
Hail to you, who are wholly united to the redeeming consecration of your Son!
Mother of the Church! Enlighten the People of God along the paths of faith, of hope and love! Help us to live with the whole truth of the consecration of Christ for the entire human family of the modern world.
3. In entrusting to you, O Mother, the world, all individuals and peoples, we also entrust to you the consecration itself, for -the world's sake, placing it in your motherly Heart.
Oh, Immaculate Heart! Help us to conquer the menace of evil, which so easily takes root in the hearts of the people of today, and whose immeasurable effects already weigh down upon our modern world and seem to block the paths towards the future!
From famine and war, deliver us.
From nuclear war, from incalculable self-destruction, from every kind of war, deliver us.
From sins against the life of man from its very beginning, deliver us.
From hatred and from the demeaning of the dignity of the children of God, deliver us.
From every kind of injustice in the life of society, both national and international, deliver us.
From readiness to trample on the commandments of God, deliver us.:
From attempts to stifle in human hearts the very truth of God, deliver us.
From sins against the Holy Spirit, deliver us, deliver us.
Accept, O Mother of Christ, this cry laden with the sufferings of all individual human beings, laden with the sufferings of whole societies.
Let there be revealed, once more. in the history of the world your infinite power of merciful Love. May it put a stop to evil. May it transform consciences. May your Immaculate Heart reveal for all the light of Hope.
1983 Pope John Paul II, Renewal of the 1982 Consecration
On 16 October 1983, at the closing Mass of the Synod of Bishops on Penance and Reconciliation, and surrounded by those cardinals and bishops of the world who took part, the Pope renewed the Act of Consecration using the same prayer he offered at the Shrine of Fátima the previous year, saying,
At that time, I asked all my brothers in the episcopate to be with me spiritually. Today, many of you, thanks to the Synod of Bishops, are here, and in your presence and in union with you, I wish to repeat what I said on 13 May 1982.
1984 COLLEGIAL CONSECRATION |
March 25, 1984, Collegial Consecration of Pope St. John Paul II and the College of Bishops
Before the Extraordinary Jubilee year of Redemption's Mass for Families, with the Statue of Our Lady of Fátima brought from Fátima to Rome for this purpose by the Bishop of Leiria-Fátima next to the main altar, the Holy Father gave an introduction, where he said in part:
"....In remembrance of the 'Fiat' uttered by her at the moment of the Annunciation, I will today entrust to her Immaculate Heart—in spiritual union with all the bishops of the world—all individuals and peoples, repeating in substance the act that I made at Fátima on May 13, 1982. ..."
THE ACT OF CONSECRATION
1. "We have recourse to your protection, holy Mother of God".
As we utter the words of this antiphon with which the Church of Christ has prayed for centuries, we find ourselves today before you, Mother, in the Jubilee Year of the Redemption.
We find ourselves united with all the pastors of the Church in a particular bond whereby we constitute a body and a college, just as by Christ’s wish the Apostles constituted a body and college with Peter.
In the bond of this union, we utter the words of the present Act, in which we wish to include, once more, the Church’s hopes and anxieties for the modern world.
Forty years ago and again ten years later, your servant Pope Pius XII, having before his eyes the painful experiences of the human family, entrusted and consecrated to your Immaculate Heart the whole world, especially the peoples for which by reason of their situation you have particular love and solicitude.
This world of individuals and nations we too have before our eyes today: the world of the second millennium that is drawing to a close, the modern world, our world!
The Church, mindful of the Lord’s words: "Go... and make disciples of all nations... and lo, I am with you always, to the close of the age" (Mt 28:19-20), has, at the Second Vatican Council, given fresh life to her awareness of her mission in this world.
And therefore, O Mother of individuals and peoples, you who know all their sufferings and their hopes, you who have a mother’s awareness of all the struggles between good and evil, between light and darkness, which afflict the modern world, accept the cry which we, moved by the Holy Spirit, address directly to your Heart.
Embrace, with the love of the Mother and Handmaid of the Lord, this human world of ours, which we entrust and consecrate to you, for we are full of concern for the earthly and eternal destiny of individuals and peoples.
In a special way we entrust and consecrate to you those individuals and nations which particularly need to be thus entrusted and consecrated.
"We have recourse to your protection, holy Mother of God": despise not our petitions in our necessities.
2. Behold, as we stand before you, Mother of Christ, before your Immaculate Heart, we desire, together with the whole Church, to unite ourselves with the consecration which, for love of us, your Son made of himself to the Father: "For their sake", he said, "I consecrate myself that they also may be consecrated in the truth" (Jn 17:19). We wish to unite ourselves with our Redeemer in this his consecration for the world and for the human race, which, in his divine Heart, has the power to obtain pardon and to secure reparation.
The power of this consecration lasts for all time and embraces all individuals, peoples and nations. It overcomes every evil that the spirit of darkness is able to awaken, and has in fact awakened in our times, in the heart of man and in his history.
How deeply we feel the need for the consecration of humanity and the world—our modern world—in union with Christ himself! For the redeeming work of Christ must be shared in by the world through the Church.
The present year of the Redemption shows this: the special Jubilee of the whole Church.
Above all creatures, may you be blessed, you, the Handmaid of the Lord, who in the fullest way obeyed the divine call!
Hail to you, who are wholly united to the redeeming consecration of your Son!
Mother of the Church! Enlighten the People of God along the paths of faith, hope and love! Enlighten especially the peoples whose consecration and entrustment by us you are awaiting. Help us to live in the truth of the consecration of Christ for the entire human family of the modern world.
3. In entrusting to you, oh Mother, the world, all individuals and peoples, we also entrust to you this very consecration of the world, placing it in your motherly Heart.
Immaculate Heart! Help us to conquer the menace of evil, which so easily takes root in the hearts of the people of today, and whose immeasurable effects already weigh down upon our modern world and seem to block the paths towards the future!
From famine and war, deliver us.
From nuclear war, from incalculable self-destruction, from every kind of war, deliver us.
From sins against the life of man from its very beginning, deliver us.
From hatred and from the demeaning of the dignity of the children of God, deliver us.
From every kind of injustice in the life of society, both national and international, deliver us.
From readiness to trample on the commandments of God, deliver us.
From attempts to stifle in human hearts the very truth of God, deliver us.
From the loss of awareness of good and evil, deliver us.
From sins against the Holy Spirit, deliver us, deliver us.
From sins against the Holy Spirit, deliver us, deliver us.
Accept, Oh Mother of Christ, this cry laden with the sufferings of all individual human beings, laden with the sufferings of whole societies.
Help us with the power of the Holy Spirit to conquer all sin: individual sin and the "sin of the world", in all its manifestations.
Let there be revealed, once more, in the history of the world the infinite saving power of the Redemption: the power of merciful Love! May it put a stop to evil! May it transform consciences! May your Immaculate Heart reveal for all the light of Hope!
Pope’s prayer to Our Lady of Fátima
In the afternoon of March 25, 1984, inside St. Peter's Basilica and before the pilgrim statue of Our Lady of Fátima, the Holy Father prayed as follows:
Brothers and Sisters.
Before this Marian stay in St. Peter’s Basilica comes to an end, allow me to say a word of thanks. I want to thank you, Mother of Christ, Our Lady of Fátima, who have given us this honor today, the third Sunday of Lent, the day of the Jubilee for families; you who have paid us this visit on a day so full of our faith and our hope. As Bishop of Rome I want to than you, Mother of Christ, Our Lady of Fátima, for this visit of yours in St. Peter’s Basilica on a day when this basilica and this square, filled with pilgrims for the Holy Year of the Redemption, have been able to attend a solemn, deeply felt, I would say suffered, act of entrustment, an act addressed to your Immaculate Heart and, in your Immaculate Heart, addressed to your Son, the Redeemer of the world, the Redeemer of man. We rely on this Immaculate Heart of yours, a mother’s Heart, because in this Heart of yours you carried him as his mother. We rely on this mother’s Heart of yours because with this Heart you embrace all his disciples, indeed all individuals.
So today we have wanted to entrust the fate of the world, of individuals, of peoples, to your Immaculate Heart in order to arrive at the very center of the mystery of Redemption, the mystery that is stronger than all the sins of man and of the world, the mystery in which one can conquer sin in its various forms, in which one can begin, can inaugurate, a new world. And we so need this new world because we experience more and more that the old world, the world of sin, oppresses us, frightens us, brings us various forms of injustice; many times under the name of justice it brings us injustice.
So we have wanted to choose this Sunday, the third Sunday of Lent of the year 1984, still within the Holy Year of the Redemption, for the act of entrusting, of consecrating the world, the great human family, all peoples, especially those in such need of this consecration, this entrustment. All this we have been able to do according to our poor human ability, in the dimension of your motherly concern.
Our Lady of Fátima, to whom we are so devoted and so grateful, indeed in the most intimate and personal sense, you had wanted to pay us a visit on this day that is so important here in Rome. How grateful we are for this! How thankful we are for this! What grace you have given us with this presence of yours which I would say is personal. And our gratitude is extended to the guardian of your sanctuary in Fátima, our beloved brother in the episcopate, the bishop of Leiria-Fátima. We are grateful to him for bringing us the statue of Our Lady of Fátima. We are all grateful, all Romans, above all the Bishop of Rome. We are so grateful for this visit of the statue of Fátima here in our own surroundings: first in the Pauline Chapel of the Vatican, then in my private chapel, then in St. Peter’s Square during the great celebration, and finally in this basilica. Now in this basilica there comes to an end the visit of Our Lady of Fátima who, to continue her presence in Rome, will go to the Cathedral of the Bishop of Rome, St. John Lateran, and then, according to what I have learned, to the Sanctuary of Divine Love. Excuse us, O Madonna, excuse us, Oh Mother of Jesus, if we have to meet in this Rome in various places, in different sites. We must open, we want to open, the grace of your presence to the various locales of this large city and diocese of the Pope. I thank you for everything, and I thank you in the name of everyone, especially in the name of the Cardinal Vicar of Rome, of my brothers in the episcopate, of all the priests, of the whole People of God in this city and in this Church.
I kiss your feet for wanting to direct your steps to us.
May I be permitted, Oh Mary, Our Lady of Fátima, to give again in your presence a Blessing to all present and to the whole Church of Rome.
POST MARCH 25, 1984 CONSECRATION |
December 1984 Soviet Defense Minister, mastermind of the invasion plans for Europe, suddenly and mysteriously dies.
March 10, 1985 Soviet Chairman Konstantin Chernenko dies
March 11, 1985 Soviet Chairman Mikhail Gorbachev elected
April 26, 1986 Chernobyl nuclear reactor accident illustrates the folly of nuclear war
May 12, 1988 An explosion wrecked the only factory that made the rocket motors for the Soviets’ deadly SS 24 long-range missiles, which carry ten nuclear bombs each.
29 August 1989, Letter to Sr. Mary of Bethlehem
J.+ M. Pax Christi
Dear Sister Mary of Bethlehem:
Received your letter and, although I have very little time at my disposal I will answer your question which is: Is the Consecration of the world, according to the request of Our Lady, made?
On Oct. 31, 1942, His Holiness Pius XII made the Consecration. I was asked if it was made as Our Lady requested. I answered "NO," because it was not made in union with all the bishops of the world.
Later, on May 13, 1967, His Holiness Paul VI made the Consecration. I was asked if it was made as Our Lady requested. I responded "NO," for the same reason, it was not made in union with all the bishops of the world.
On May 13, 1982, His Holiness John Paul II made the Consecration. I was asked if it was made. I responded "NO." It was not made in union with all the bishops of the world.
Then this same Supreme Pontiff, John Paul II wrote to all the bishops of the world asking them to unite with him. He sent for the statute of Our Lady of Fátima -- the one from the little Chapel to be taken to Rome and on March 25, 1984 - publicly - with the bishops who wanted to unite with His Holiness, made the Consecration as Our Lady requested. They then asked me if it was made as Our Lady requested, and I said, "YES." Now it was made.
Why this urgency of God that this Consecration should be made in union with all the bishops of the world? Because this Consecration is a call for unity of all Christians - The Mystical Body of Christ - whose head is the Pope, the one, true representative of Christ on earth to whom the Lord confided the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and on this union depends the faith in the world and the charity which is the bond that must unite all of us in Christ, as that which He wants, and as He asked the Father: "As You, O Father, are in Me, and I in You; that they also may be one in Us, that the world may believe that You have sent Me. . . I in them, and You in Me; that they be made perfect in one, and the world may know that You have sent Me and have loved them as You have loved Me" (John 17:21-23).
As we see of the union depends the faith and the charity that must be the bond of our union in Christ, whose true representative on earth is the Pope.
A hug to your mother and my greetings to the rest of the family in union with prayers.
Coimbra, August 29,1989
Sr. Lucia
Fr. Robert Fox, commenting on the formula "In a special way we entrust and consecrate to you those individuals and nations which particularly need to be thus entrusted and consecrated":
". . . Fr. Messias Coelho, theologian and editor of the Portuguese journal "Mesagem de Fátima," answered the objection effectively from the philosophical and theological aspect. Sister Lucia, out of respect for the Pope, spoke of it the way our Holy Father did, using the word "world, " which included Russia. In the letter the Pope sent to the world's bishops, the Holy Father clarified that it was to renew both the consecration of the world (1942) and Russia (1952). This time he did so in union with the bishops.]
July 3, 1990, Letter to Fr. Robert Fox, Fatima Family Apostolate
J.+M.
The Peace of Christ
Rev. Father Robert J. Foxx
I come to answer your question, "lf the consecration made by
Pope John Paul II on March 25, 1984 in union with all the bishops of
the World, accomplished the conditions for the conversion of Russia,
according to the request of Our Lady in Thy on June 13 of 1929? Yes,
it was accomplished, and since then I have said that it was made.
And I say that no other person responds for me,
it is I who receive and open all letters and respond to them.
In union of prayers.
Coimbra, July 3, 1990
Sister Lucia
(signature)
November 9, 1989 - Fall of the Berlin Wall
November & December 1989 - Peaceful revolutions in Czechoslovakia, Romania, Bulgaria and Albania
October 3, 1990 - East and West Germany are unified
April 13, 1991 - Pope appoints an apostolic administrator for the Latin Catholics of European Russia, and located in Moscow
December 25, 1991 - Dissolution of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. The nation of Russia is reborn.
March 30, 2017, Interview with Most Rev. Tadeusz Kondrusiewicz
In an article in the Catholic Herald (UK), the former Bishop for Latin Catholics in European Russia (appointed by Pope John Paul II in April 1991) comments on the Collegial Consecration. At the time of the interview he was the archbishop of Minks, Belarus.
People in the former Soviet republic of Belarus have a great devotion to Our Lady of Fatima, and so does the archbishop who leads them. Archbishop Tadeusz Kondrusiewicz of Minsk, Belarus, who served as archbishop of Moscow from 1991 to 2007, speaks passionately about his devotion to Our Lady of Fatima, who appeared to three children in Portugal in 1917.
“The idea of Fatima, the idea of the conversion of Russia – it’s in my heart,” he told Catholic News Service during a late-March visit to Washington. “You will never find a church without a statue of Our Lady of Fatima in my country,” he added.
Archbishop Kondrusiewicz said he met three times with Carmelite Sister Lucia dos Santos, one of the three children who received the visions of Mary.
At the first meeting, in 1991, he told Sister Lucia that he was the Catholic archbishop in Moscow. “She asked several times, ‘Is it true?'” “‘So,’ she said, ‘it means the prophecy of Fatima is fulfilled,'” Archbishop Kondrusiewicz said.
Part of the Fatima message – contained in a vision to Sister Lucia and her cousins – warned of the rise of communism, but also spoke of the ultimate triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, especially in Russia if the country was consecrated to her Immaculate Heart. Although some Fatima devotees have debated whether the consecrations were carried out properly, Popes Pius XII, Paul VI and John Paul II each entrusted the world, and Russia in particular, to Mary. Archbishop Kondrusiewicz said Sister Lucia assured him that it was done correctly. He said Sister Lucia told him to work with the Orthodox, and she sent a statue of Our Lady of Fatima with him to give to Patriarch Alexei II of Moscow, who was patriarch of the Russian Orthodox Church at the time. “Later, I saw the statue on his table several times,” the archbishop said.
In honour of the 100th anniversary of the first time Mary spoke of Russia in the apparitions, he said, two pilgrimages from Belarus will meet in Fatima on July 13.
As far as Sister Lucia’s instructions to work with the Orthodox, the archbishop said the two churches applied to open counselling centres in abortion hospitals and received government permission. “We saved a lot of lives,” he said, adding that the two churches along with some Protestant communities lobbied to change the Belarusian law to limit instances in which abortion is allowed.
October 30, 2003, Interview with Dr. Frederick T. Zugibe
Noted pathologist and Shroud investigator, Dr. Zugibe had been a skeptic regarding the sufficiency of the 1984 Consecration. Invited to the Carmel of Coimbra to talk with Sr. Lucis about his crucifixion studies, he took the opportunity to ask about the Consecration.
