Pope Benedict XVI in Portugal – Discourse No. 4.1 Pope Entrusts and Consecrates Priests
to Our Lady of Fatima
(12 May 10 – RV) Below we publish the act of Act of Entrustment and Consecration of
Priests and Religious to Our Lady of Fatima:
Immaculate Mother, in this
place of grace, called together by the love of your Son Jesus the Eternal High
Priest, we, sons in the Son and his priests, consecrate ourselves to your maternal
Heart, in order to carry out faithfully the Father’s Will.
We are mindful
that, without Jesus, we can do nothing good (cf. Jn 15:5) and that only through
him, with him and in him, will we be instruments of salvation for the world.
Bride
of the Holy Spirit, obtain for us the inestimable gift of transformation in
Christ. Through the same power of the Spirit that overshadowed you, making
you the Mother of the Saviour, help us to bring Christ your Son to birth in
ourselves too. May the Church be thus renewed by priests who are holy, priests
transfigured by the grace of him who makes all things new.
Mother of Mercy, it
was your Son Jesus who called us to become like him: light of the world and
salt of the earth (cf. Mt 5:13-14).
Help us, through your powerful intercession, never
to fall short of this sublime vocation, nor to give way to our selfishness, to
the allurements of the world and to the wiles of the Evil One.
Preserve
us with your purity, guard us with your humility and enfold us with your maternal
love that is reflected in so many souls consecrated to you, who have become
for us true spiritual mothers.
Mother of the Church, we priests want
to be pastors who do not feed themselves but rather give themselves to God for
their brethren, finding their happiness in this. Not only with words, but with
our lives, we want to repeat humbly, day after day, Our “here I am”.
Guided
by you, we want to be Apostles of Divine Mercy, glad to celebrate every
day the Holy Sacrifice of the Altar and to offer to those who request it the
sacrament of Reconciliation.
Advocate and Mediatrix of grace, you who are
fully immersed in the one universal mediation of Christ, invoke upon us, from
God, a heart completely renewed that loves God with all its strength and
serves mankind as you did.
Repeat to the Lord your efficacious word: “They
have no wine” (Jn 2:3), so that the Father and the Son will send upon us a new
outpouring of the Holy Spirit. Full of wonder and gratitude at your continuing
presence in our midst, in the name of all priests I too want to cry out: “Why
is this granted me, that the mother of my Lord should come to me?” (Lk 1:43).
Our
Mother for all time, do not tire of “visiting us”, consoling us, sustaining
us. Come to our aid and deliver us from every danger that threatens us. With
this act of entrustment and consecration, we wish to welcome you more deeply,
more radically, for ever and totally into our human and priestly lives.
Let
your presence cause new blooms to burst forth in the desert of our loneliness,
let it cause the sun to shine on our darkness, let it restore calm after the
tempest, so that all mankind shall see the salvation of the Lord, who has
the name and the face of Jesus, who is reflected in our hearts, for ever united
to yours! Amen!