What is Total Consecration?
Total Consecration to Jesus through Mary is a 33-day course that builds on True Devotion to Mary according to St. Louis Marie de Montfort. It’s an amazing way to grow deeper in your faith and draw closer to Jesus through Mary. Each of the 33 days includes a short video, some written reflections, and prayer time. Join us!
Total Consecration: Introduction to the First 12 Days
Welcome back to our series today, and my name is Br. Julian Mary from the community Knights of the Holy Eucharist founded by Mother Angelica presently based in the Diocese of Lincoln. Thank you for watching this second session. Last time we tried to give the shortest and most compelling explanation of why consecration to Our Lady is so important. I hope all of you who are watching right now already have a copy of True Devotion to Our Lady. Now, we move on to our question last time: How to do the consecration? There are four major movements and preparations for Consecration to Our Lady:
1.) The first 12 days preparation: Renouncement of the Spirit of the World
2.) 7 days preparation: Knowledge of Self
3.) 7 days preparation: Knowledge of Mary
4.) And the last 7 days preparation: Knowledge of Jesus (for a total of 33 days)
I would rather choose the number of days rather than weekly format, like the First Week, Second Week, Third Week as most manuals do, for we can clearly perceive this work, an inspiration from God rather than simple writings, or fruits of mental reflections. The numbers 12, three sets of 7, are fascinating for they appeared multiple times in the Sacred Scriptures. Prophet Elijah built an altar with 12 stones on Mt. Carmel; the 12 tribes of Israel; the 12 apostles; the 12-year-old daughter of Jairus being healed by Jesus; Jesus was lost when He was 12; the 12-baskets full of left-over during the multiplication of the bread; and many others. Number 7 is obviously a covenant number a sign of completeness. We also knew the 7 gifts of the Holy Spirit; God rested on the seventh day after creation: the 7 archangels who stand in the presence of the Most High and many others.
Numbers 3 and 33 are also significant numbers. There is no coincidence here, this is truly an inspiration from God and not just simply anticipating a total number of 33 days. This is really fascinating and exciting. So, for today, let’s focus our attention on the first 12 days. Again, our goal here is the renouncement of the spirit of the world. This does not mean that after 12 days you would become master of rejecting the world’s temptations and allurements. No. This is to make us aware the reality of our daily struggles in life, the reality of struggle against the world the flesh and the devil described in the second chapter of St. John’s first letter.
The main obstacle to our union with God is only one thing and that is a sin. The struggle against sin is a constant battle that we must fight until the end. And from this, we learn to fight courageously; to win effectively, and most importantly we learn to have a constant filial recourse to Our Lady and win gloriously with Our Lady. It is a way of life, living in habitual dependence on her, to be victorious with Her and for Her. St. Louis Marie de Montfort explains the spirit of the world is contrary to the spirit of Christ. And we can not love these two spirits at the same time. Scriptures is very clear “No one can serve two masters. Either you will hate the one and love the other, or you will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and mammon.” [Matt. 6:24).
The self-emptying of a worldly spirit, with God’s grace, is the first step so that we can be filled with the spirit of Jesus so that after renouncing the worldly spirit, at the sight of Jesus and Mary in the soul, that spirit will be forced to flee in confusion. Readings for each day are always accompanied with certain prayers. In fact, it is of capital importance to have a spirit of prayer (S.O.P.) in everything we do especially in spiritual matters so that through Mary Most Holy, we may be enlightened always, as we move on towards union with God through this Consecration, and by doing this, we give the greatest glory to God.
After completing this video, go on to the next video for today: Total Consecration: Day 1
