On Consecration and Mary Our Mother

I posted back in April about preparing to make a Total Consecration to Mary using Fr. Michael Gaitley's book, 33 Days to Morning Glory: A Do-It-Yourself Retreat In Preparation for Marian Consecration. I enjoyed the preparation "retreat" featuring a couple of pages of reading each day.



Week One was on St. Louis de Montfort. Week Two featured St. Maximilian Kolbe. Week Three centered on Blessed Mother Teresa and Week Four focused on St. John Paul II. The final week was a review. Yesterday, the Feast of Our Lady of Fatima, was my consecration day. I wanted to post about it yesterday, but I ran out of time in my day! I wrote out the prayer of consecration, dated it, and placed it in my journal. No, I don't feel any different. I didn't really expect to. As I said, this wasn't some radical new direction I was taking in my life, but I am here if Mary wants to use me for good. In the meantime, I'll just keep doing what I'm doing and hope I'm on the right track.

I did especially like one quote in the book by St. John Paul II. "Even when the same woman is the mother of many children, her personal relationship with each one of them is the very essence of motherhood." Fr. Gaitley goes on to say, "Mary is uniquely, particularly, personally your mother and my mother, and she doesn't lose us in the crowd."

I've been teaching my little girl about Mary and how she is her mother up in heaven, always watching over her and loving her. Four-year-old Amy gets so excited about that fact. She already has two mothers who love her and two families of siblings and struggles to wrap her mind around how that works, that her "other mother" gave birth to her, but she is growing up with us. I love her in the same way that I love my biological children. She is as much a part of me as they are, but we share no biological connection. But in Mary, both she and I have the same mother! We are sisters in the Lord - one considerably older than the other! I tell her that she can always ask Mary for help and that someday Mary will welcome her to heaven with open arms.

It's so good to have a heavenly Mother who will never fail us, will always love us, and always wants what is good for us. She will always lead us to her Son. That's what the Total Consecration to Mary is all about. I highly recommend it.