First Saturday Consecration
to the Immaculate Heart of Mary
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
