OUR LADY: SPECIAL DEVOTIONS

OUR LADY OF MENTAL PIECE IN TEXTURED FRAME

Devotions
Treasury of Prayer
Fr. Lawrence Lovasik, S.V.D.,
With Nihil Obstat, Imprimi Potest, and Imprimatur, 1954

Total Consecration to Mary

I. Nature

Jesus, my Savior, I give myself entirely to Thee through Mary. That the gift of myself may be most pleasing to Thee and more nearly complete, I consecrate myself entirely to Thy dear Mother Mary, and I wish to live and act in perfect dependence on her for the remainder of my life. May she, in turn, make me wholly Thine Own!

FLOWER

II. Extent
Mary, my dearest Mother, I give myself over to thee and through thee to Jesus.

1. I give you my body with all its senses, pledging myself not to use them except in accordance with thy good pleasure and that of Jesus. Moreover, I accept beforehand whatever God may have in store for me as regards sickness and health, life and death.
  2. I give thee all the possessions I have in the world. I wish to use them only in dependence on thee and for thy honor and the glory of God.
  3. I give thee my soul with all its faculties, dedicating them under thy guidance to the service of God and the good of souls. At the same time I renounce whatever may stand in the way of my sanctification or endanger my salvation.
  4. I give thee all my interior and spiritual treasures. I surrender to thee:
     (a) The meritorious value of my acts.
             The merits by which I procure for myself an increase of grace and glory and which I cannot give away, I present to thee, not in order to apply them to others, but that thou mayest hold them in trust for me and give them increase.
     (b) The satisfactory value of my acts.
             The satisfactory value of my acts, which supplies for the punishment due to my sins, as well as the indulgences I may gain, thou mayest dispose of and freely apply to whomsoever thou willest since I can give all this to others.
     (c) The impetratory value of my acts.
             Even the impetratory value of my acts and prayers, by which I can intercede for others, I give to thee.

Mary, I beg thee to favor according to thy good pleasure those to whom I am bound by ties of affection or relationship and to whom I am under special obligation. Loving Mother, I entrust to thee all those who are near and dear to me. I am all thine and thou art mine! All mine is thine! Draw on what I have given thee, but more still on the treasury of thine own merits and those of thy dear Son, in order to help those I have entrusted to thy motherly care.

FLOWER

III. Excellence

Accept, dearest Mother, my consecration as an act of childlike abandonment and self-surrender to thy motherly care.

1. I wish that my consecration may be an act of religion toward God, the Word-Made-Flesh, and toward thee, Mary, Mother of God. By it I wish to acknowledge God's absolute dominion and my own nothingness, and proclaim at the same time, with heart and soul, those rights over me which God hast given to thee.
2. I wish that my consecration may be an act of humility, for by it I want to acknowledge my nothingness and helplessness. I divest myself of everything that I have received from God and restore all to the Giver through thy hands, Mary, for through thy Divine Son and thee I have obtained every good gift from God. 3. I wish that my consecration may be an act of confiding love for thee, because love consists in the gift of self, and to give myself entirely and unreservedly presupposes firm confidence and living faith.

FLOWER

IV. Fruit

<> 1. My dearest Mother Mary, by my consecration I wish to glorify God and thee in the highest possible manner, for I give myself to God forever with all that I am and all that I have, without measure or selfishness. I do so after the manner of Divine Wisdom, that is, returning to God in the very way He chose to come to me, and hence in the way that is most pleasing to Him.
2. By my consecration I wish to secure my own sanctification. I know, dearest Mother, that thou art most willing to help sanctify one who, having disposed of his person and goods in thy behalf, is, so to speak, thine own property. I trust that thou willest most assuredly secure for me choice graces to safeguard my little spiritual treasure, and that thou willest make it grow and have it bring forth fruit until the the hour of my death. I am sure that thou willest help me by means of thy own rich merits and satisfaction and through thy powerful intercession with God.
3. By my consecration I wish to insure the sanctification of my neighbor. I know that, having left the apportioning of my merits to thy good pleasure, everything will be done with greater wisdom, for thou art by far more prudent, thoughtful and devoted than I can ever be.

Mother, I put all my trust in thee. I rely entirely upon thee because I love thee sincerely. Amen.