Marian consecration

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News Briefs

Live updates: Pope Francis’ Consecration of Russia and Ukraine to the Immaculate Heart of Mary

March 25, 2022 Catholic News Agency 1
An image of the Immaculate Heart of Mary at St. Peter’s Church, Vienna, Austria. / Diana Ringo via Wikimedia (CC BY-SA 3.0 at).

Vatican City, Mar 25, 2022 / 09:55 am (CNA).

11:04 a.m.
Pope Francis goes to confession, then hears confessions

Pope Francis prays during the penitential service. Vatican Pool.
Pope Francis prays during the penitential service. Vatican Pool.

After Pope Francis preached his homily, there was a moment of total silence in the basilica. Following the recitation of the Confiteor, the prayer beginning “I confess to almighty God…”, the pope walked across the basilica to the area with the confessionals. There, he made his confession while standing. He then walked over to a confessional and began to hear confessions himself.

10:54 a.m.
An act followed in Russia and Ukraine

The Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception in Moscow, Russia. Maxim Apryatin via Shutterstock.
The Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception in Moscow, Russia. Maxim Apryatin via Shutterstock.

Catholics in the Russian capital Moscow are gathering today to pray and follow the live feed of the act of consecration. They are meeting at Immaculate Conception Cathedral, a building with a turbulent history.

Ukrainian Catholics will also be praying the act of consecration, which has been shared on the website of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church, based in the Ukrainian capital Kyiv.

Andrii Yurash, Ukraine’s ambassador to the Holy See, has tweeted this:

10:44 a.m.
The ‘sacrament of joy’

Confessors arrive for the penitential service inside St. Peter’s Basilica. Hannah Brockhaus/CNA.
Confessors arrive for the penitential service inside St. Peter’s Basilica. Hannah Brockhaus/CNA.

The penitential service includes the opportunity for individual confession. Here are the confessors arriving in the basilica.

Confessors in St. Peter’s Basilica. Courtney Mares/CNA.
Confessors in St. Peter’s Basilica. Courtney Mares/CNA.

In his homily, Pope Francis spoke about confession, describing it as “the sacrament of joy.”

10:34 a.m.
The meaning of the act of consecration

Pope Francis attends the penitential service. Courtney Mares/CNA.
Pope Francis attends the penitential service. Courtney Mares/CNA.

The act of consecration is long and theologically rich. Here are five things to know about it.

Some commentators have raised questions about a phrase found in some non-English versions of the text. The phrase, “Earth of Heaven,” is present in the Spanish text (“tierra del Cielo”) and the Italian translation (“terra del Cielo”).

The Vatican has issued an explanation of the phrase. You can find it here.

10:24 a.m.
The statue of Mary inside St. Peter’s Basilica

The statue of the Virgin Mary in St. Peter’s Basilica. Vatican Pool.
The statue of the Virgin Mary in St. Peter’s Basilica. Vatican Pool.

Pope Francis is expected to stand before this statue of the Blessed Virgin Mary as he reads the act of consecration. The act is available on the Vatican website in an impressive 36 languages, including Ukrainian and Russian. The pope is expected to make the act of consecration in Italian.

10:14 a.m.
A guide to the penitential service

The booklet for the penitential service and act of consecration. Courtney Mares/CNA.
The booklet for the penitential service and act of consecration. Courtney Mares/CNA.

Here is the booklet for the penitential service and act of consecration given to members of the congregation inside St. Peter’s Basilica. You can see the contents here.

10:12 a.m.
How to watch live

Cardinal Luis Antonio Tagle arrives for the penitential service and act of consecration. Courtney Mares/CNA.
Cardinal Luis Antonio Tagle arrives for the penitential service and act of consecration. Courtney Mares/CNA.

If you’d like to watch the consecration live, we encourage you to tune in via EWTN.

The pope is expected to recite the act of consecration at around 6:30 p.m. local time.

When is 6:30 p.m. Rome time for you? There’s a handy cheat sheet here.

10:08 a.m.
Inside the basilica

Inside St Peter’s Basilica ahead of the consecration of Ukraine and Russia. Courtney Mares/CNA.
Inside St Peter’s Basilica ahead of the consecration of Ukraine and Russia. Courtney Mares/CNA.

This was the scene inside the basilica ahead of the penitential service and act of consecration.

Here are the preparations, as seen by our reporters at the basilica:

09:55 a.m.
Welcome to readers

People gather in St Peter’s Square ahead of the consecration of Ukraine and Russia. Courtney Mares/CNA.
People gather in St Peter’s Square ahead of the consecration of Ukraine and Russia. Courtney Mares/CNA.

Welcome to CNA’s live coverage of the momentous global act of consecration of Ukraine and Russia to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. Our reporters are inside St. Peter’s Basilica, where a penitential service will begin shortly, followed by the consecration.

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News Briefs

What time is the consecration of Russia and Ukraine? Find out here

March 24, 2022 Catholic News Agency 3
An image of the Immaculate Heart of Mary at St. Peter’s Church, Vienna, Austria. | Pope Francis / Diana Ringo via Wikimedia (CC BY-SA 3.0 at) | Vatican Media

Denver Newsroom, Mar 24, 2022 / 15:25 pm (CNA).

Pope Francis will consecrate Russia and Ukraine to the Immaculate Heart of Mary on the evening of Friday, March 25, entrusting the nations to Mary’s help and protection amid the ongoing conflict there. The pope has asked everyone in the world to join him.

The consecration itself will take the form of a prayer that Pope Francis will recite during a penitential service in Rome. 

Here’s the prayer. Your diocese or parish is likely organizing a gathering to pray it together.

If you want to join the pope at the beginning of the penitential service, the service will start at 5 p.m. Rome time. EWTN will broadcast the service on cable and online. CNA will also be carrying the livestream on our Facebook page. 

If you want to join in praying with Pope Francis at the exact moment he is praying the prayer of consecration, that will likely happen closer to 6:30 p.m. Rome time, according to the pope.

When is 6:30 p.m. Rome time for you? Here’s a handy cheat sheet:

6:30 p.m. Rome

6:30 p.m. — West Africa Standard Time (Nigeria)

5:30 p.m. — GMT (London)

1:30 p.m. — Eastern Time (New York, Washington, Miami)

12:30 p.m. — Central Time (Chicago, St. Louis, Dallas)

11:30 a.m. — Mountain Time (Denver, Salt Lake City)

10:30 a.m. — Pacific Time (Los Angeles, Seattle)

9:30 a.m. — Alaska Daylight Time (Anchorage, Juneau)

7:30 a.m. — Hawaii-Aleutian Standard Time (Honolulu)

04:30 a.m. (Saturday) — Sydney, Melbourne

02:30 a.m. (Saturday) — Japan

01:30 a.m. (Saturday) — Perth; China

8:30 p.m. — Moscow

7:30 p.m. — Helsinki, Kyiv

[…]

The Dispatch

BREAKING: Vatican releases text for March 25 consecration prayer for Ukraine, Russia

March 22, 2022 Catholic News Agency 8
An image of the Immaculate Heart of Mary at St. Peter’s Church, Vienna, Austria. | Pope Francis / Diana Ringo via Wikimedia (CC BY-SA 3.0 at) | Vatican Media

Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Mar 22, 2022 / 10:41 am (CNA).

The Vatican has sent bishops around the world the text of the prayer that Pope Francis will lead on March 25 for the consecration of Ukraine and Russia to the Immaculate Heart of Mary.

Here is the full text of the prayer obtained by CNA:

O Mary, Mother of God and our Mother, in this time of trial we turn to you. As our Mother, you love us and know us: no concern of our hearts is hidden from you. Mother of mercy, how often we have experienced your watchful care and your peaceful presence! You never cease to guide us to Jesus, the Prince of Peace.

Yet we have strayed from that path of peace. We have forgotten the lesson learned from the tragedies of the last century, the sacrifice of the millions who fell in two world wars. We have disregarded the commitments we made as a community of nations. We have betrayed peoples’ dreams of peace and the hopes of the young. We grew sick with greed, we thought only of our own nations and their interests, we grew indifferent and caught up in our selfish needs and concerns. We chose to ignore God, to be satisfied with our illusions, to grow arrogant and aggressive, to suppress innocent lives and to stockpile weapons. We stopped being our neighbour’s keepers and stewards of our common home. We have ravaged the garden of the earth with war and by our sins we have broken the heart of our heavenly Father, who desires us to be brothers and sisters. We grew indifferent to everyone and everything except ourselves. Now with shame we cry out: Forgive us, Lord!

Holy Mother, amid the misery of our sinfulness, amid our struggles and weaknesses, amid the mystery of iniquity that is evil and war, you remind us that God never abandons us, but continues to look upon us with love, ever ready to forgive us and raise us up to new life. He has given you to us and made your Immaculate Heart a refuge for the Church and for all humanity. By God’s gracious will, you are ever with us; even in the most troubled moments of our history, you are there to guide us with tender love.

We now turn to you and knock at the door of your heart. We are your beloved children. In every age you make yourself known to us, calling us to conversion. At this dark hour, help us and grant us your comfort. Say to us once more: “Am I not here, I who am your Mother?” You are able to untie the knots of our hearts and of our times. In you we place our trust. We are confident that, especially in moments of trial, you will not be deaf to our supplication and will come to our aid.

That is what you did at Cana in Galilee, when you interceded with Jesus and he worked the first of his signs. To preserve the joy of the wedding feast, you said to him: “They have no wine” (Jn 2:3). Now, O Mother, repeat those words and that prayer, for in our own day we have run out of the wine of hope, joy has fled, fraternity has faded. We have forgotten our humanity and squandered the gift of peace. We opened our hearts to violence and destructiveness. How greatly we need your maternal help!

Therefore, O Mother, hear our prayer.

Star of the Sea, do not let us be shipwrecked in the tempest of war.

Ark of the New Covenant, inspire projects and paths of reconciliation.

Queen of Heaven, restore God’s peace to the world.

Eliminate hatred and the thirst for revenge, and teach us forgiveness.

Free us from war, protect our world from the menace of nuclear weapons.

Queen of the Rosary, make us realize our need to pray and to love.

Queen of the Human Family, show people the path of fraternity.

Queen of Peace, obtain peace for our world.

O Mother, may your sorrowful plea stir our hardened hearts. May the tears you shed for us make this valley parched by our hatred blossom anew. Amid the thunder of weapons, may your prayer turn our thoughts to peace. May your maternal touch soothe those who suffer and flee from the rain of bombs. May your motherly embrace comfort those forced to leave their homes and their native land. May your Sorrowful Heart move us to compassion and inspire us to open our doors and to care for our brothers and sisters who are injured and cast aside.

Holy Mother of God, as you stood beneath the cross, Jesus, seeing the disciple at your side, said: “Behold your son” (Jn 19:26.) In this way he entrusted each of us to you. To the disciple, and to each of us, he said: “Behold, your Mother” (v. 27). Mother Mary, we now desire to welcome you into our lives and our history. At this hour, a weary and distraught humanity stands with you beneath the cross, needing to entrust itself to you and, through you, to consecrate itself to Christ. The people of Ukraine and Russia, who venerate you with great love, now turn to you, even as your heart beats with compassion for them and for all those peoples decimated by war, hunger, injustice and poverty.

Therefore, Mother of God and our Mother, to your Immaculate Heart we solemnly entrust and consecrate ourselves, the Church and all humanity, especially Russia and Ukraine. Accept this act that we carry out with confidence and love. Grant that war may end and peace spread throughout the world. The “Fiat” that arose from your heart opened the doors of history to the Prince of Peace. We trust that, through your heart, peace will dawn once more. To you we consecrate the future of the whole human family, the needs and expectations of every people, the anxieties and hopes of the world.

Through your intercession, may God’s mercy be poured out on the earth and the gentle rhythm of peace return to mark our days. Our Lady of the “Fiat,” on whom the Holy Spirit descended, restore among us the harmony that comes from God. May you, our “living fountain of hope,” water the dryness of our hearts. In your womb Jesus took flesh; help us to foster the growth of communion. You once trod the streets of our world; lead us now on the paths of peace. Amen.

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News Briefs

Could Pope Francis visit Ukraine? Here’s what his representative in Kyiv said

March 18, 2022 Catholic News Agency 2
This photograph taken on March 18, 2022 shows smoke rising after an explosion in Kyiv. – Authorities in Kyiv said one person was killed early on March 18, 2022 when a downed Russian rocket struck a residential building in the capital’s northern suburbs. They said a school and playground were also hit. / Fadel Senna/AFP via Getty Images

Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Mar 18, 2022 / 12:21 pm (CNA).

While it is logistically feasible for Pope Francis to travel to Kyiv, as the city’s mayor has invited him to do, the danger associated with holding any gatherings with him once he got there makes such a visit unlikely, according to the Vatican’s apostolic nuncio to Ukraine, Archbishop Visvaldas Kulbokas.

“Yesterday, three prime ministers arrived to Kyiv — the prime ministers of Poland, Czech Republic, and Slovenia. So, logistically speaking, yes, it is possible to come to Kyiv,” Kulbokas, the pope’s representative in Ukraine, told Raymond Arroyo, host of EWTN’s “The World Over,” on March 17.

“I know that Pope Francis wants to do all that is possible for him in order to contribute for peace, so I know for sure that he is evaluating, he is thinking about all the possibilities,” he added.

However, Kulbokas explained, the hope is that a papal visit could involve more than simply a discussion, as can happen readily enough through conventional or online means. Catholics and church leaders would want to pray with him, as would members of the Orthodox Church and other faiths.

While it is certainly something to hope for, he said, the situation is “too dangerous in Kyiv.”

KYIV, UKRAINE - MARCH 18: A woman sheltering in a metro station brushes her daughter's hair on March 18, 2022 in Kyiv, Ukraine. Russian forces remain on the outskirts of the Ukrainian capital, but their advance has stalled in recent days, even while Russian strikes - and pieces of intercepted missiles - have hit residential areas in the north of Kyiv. An estimated half of Kyiv's population has fled to other parts of the country, or abroad, since Russia invaded on February 24. Chris McGrath/Getty Images
KYIV, UKRAINE – MARCH 18: A woman sheltering in a metro station brushes her daughter’s hair on March 18, 2022 in Kyiv, Ukraine. Russian forces remain on the outskirts of the Ukrainian capital, but their advance has stalled in recent days, even while Russian strikes – and pieces of intercepted missiles – have hit residential areas in the north of Kyiv. An estimated half of Kyiv’s population has fled to other parts of the country, or abroad, since Russia invaded on February 24. Chris McGrath/Getty Images

Unable to leave nunciature

Kulbokas, 47, who is from Lithuania, is currently bunkering in the nunciature in a residential area of the Ukraine capital.

He told Arroyo that because of the danger of missiles, the upper levels of the building cannot be used. Authorities have asked residents to reduce their movements to only essential ones, he said.

Sleep, prayer, and the celebration of Mass are all held in the same rooms with no windows, he said, adding that the situation is “dramatic.” The government has ordered some of the local shops to stay open, he said, in order that food and other necessities may be available to the people. He said that he has assistants who make the trip to the shops to buy food and other supplies.

Kulbokas also revealed to Arroyo that he has not left his residence for 21 days, because of the frequent attacks on the city. You can watch the full interview in the video below.

‘I will try to get them out’

In the interview, Kulbokas spoke about the solidarity he feels with the pope and the wider Church during this ordeal.

He shared a conversation he had with Polish Cardinal Konrad Krajewski about the difficulties authorities were having evacuating children from an orphanage in the city, Kulbokas said. Such an undertaking is extremely complicated and risky because of ongoing Russian missile and artillery attacks and the damage that these have done to the city’s infrastructure.

Cardinal Konrad Krajewski and Major Archbishop Sviatoslav Shevchuk greet children in Lviv, Ukraine. Screenshot from zhyve.tv YouTube channel.
Cardinal Konrad Krajewski and Major Archbishop Sviatoslav Shevchuk greet children in Lviv, Ukraine. Screenshot from zhyve.tv YouTube channel.

Moved by the dire predicament, Krajewski pledged to take action himself, if necessary.

“Look, Visvalda, if you will see that the situation remains as difficult as it is now for some more hours, then I will come. I will take a car and I will try. I will try to get them out,” the nuncio said the Polish prelate told him. “Even under bombing. Even under shelling. If I die, I die. But at least I will try.” 

The exchange made an enormous impression on the nuncio.

Even though he was speaking with a special envoy of Pope Francis, not the pope himself, “I felt his presence,” Kulbokas said.

“He was some 500 or 600 kilometers away from Kyiv, but I was feeling his presence so strongly that it [gave me] courage also.”

Krajewski, who is in charge of the pope’s charitable efforts as papal almoner, will play a prominent role in Pope Francis’ upcoming consecration of Russia and Ukraine to the Immaculate Heart of Mary on March 25.

That day, while the pope leads the act of consecration at St. Peter’s Basilica at the Vatican, Krajewski will do the same in Fatima, Portugal, where the Blessed Virgin Mary first requested Russia’s consecration during her appearances to three children in 1917.

Asked for his thoughts on the consecration, Kulbokas told Arroyo that the war does not just have political and military aspects, but spiritual ones, as well. 

The nuncio said he believes that “God wants to tell us something” by allowing this war to occur.

The Blessed Virgin Mary “is the one able to face these satanic deeds,” he said.

Kulbokas added that it is not enough for the pope to consecrate Russia and Ukraine; “all the believers” should join him in consecrating themselves to the Immaculate Heart of Mary, he said.

[…]

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News Briefs

Catholic bishops of England and Wales to join Pope Francis in Ukraine-Russia consecration

March 18, 2022 Catholic News Agency 2
An image of the Immaculate Heart of Mary at St. Peter’s Church, Vienna, Austria. / Diana Ringo via Wikimedia (CC BY-SA 3.0 at).

London, England, Mar 18, 2022 / 05:30 am (CNA).

The Catholic bishops of England and Wales will join Pope Francis in consecrating Russia and Ukraine to the Immaculate Heart of Mary.

The bishops announced on March 17 that they will participate in the act of consecration, which will take place at St. Peter’s Basilica at 5 p.m. local time on March 25, the Solemnity of the Annunciation of the Lord.

Bishop Mark O’Toole of Plymouth, southern England, will lead the rosary at his Cathedral Church of St. Mary and St. Boniface on the morning of the consecration.

He said: “I have been touched by the Holy Father’s initiative and look forward to uniting with him, my brother bishops, and Catholics in England and Wales in this act of consecration.”

“We know that there is a great need for the gift of peace and reconciliation, and we will be commending all those who are suffering at this time to Our Lady, knowing that she will present all her suffering children to Our Lord.”

Bishop Mark O’Toole of Plymouth, England. Mazur/catholicnews.org.uk
Bishop Mark O’Toole of Plymouth, England. Mazur/catholicnews.org.uk

Ukraine’s Latin Rite Catholic bishops asked Pope Francis to consecrate their homeland and Russia to the Immaculate Heart of Mary following the full-scale Russian invasion on Feb. 24.

The pope will carry out the consecration during a penitential service on March 25. On the same day, Cardinal Konrad Krajewski, the papal almoner, will recite the act of consecration at the Sanctuary of Our Lady of Fatima in Portugal.

Archbishop Christophe Pierre, the apostolic nuncio to the United States, said in a March 17 letter to U.S. bishops that Pope Francis intends to invite all Catholic bishops and priests around the world to join the act of consecration.

Catholic bishops in Latin America and the Caribbean have already indicated that they will take part.

The Episcopal Conference of Latin America (CELAM) said on March 15 that it had invited Catholics, church organizations, and 22 bishops’ conferences to “join the intentions of the Holy Father.”

The Catholic bishops of the Philippines have also signaled their intention to join in the act of consecration.

[…]