Consecration of the world to the Immaculate Heart of Mary

"I consecrate myself for them, so that they also may be consecrated in truth" (John 17:19).

Saint Peter Square, March 25, 1984, feast day of the Annunciation: Pope St John Paul II, in spiritual union with all the bishops of the world, consecrated all individuals and peoples of the world to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. In remembrance of the ‘fiat’ pronounced by Mary at the time of the Annunciation, and following the consecration of Christ the Redeemer (Jn 17:19), the Holy Father made this consecration:

O Mother of individuals and peoples, you who know all their sufferings and their hopes, you who have a mother’s awareness of all the struggles between good and evil, between light and darkness, which afflict the modern world, accept the cry which we, moved by the Holy Spirit, address directly to your Heart. Embrace, with the love of the Mother and Handmaid of the Lord, this human world of ours, which we entrust and consecrate to you, for we are full of concern for the earthly and eternal destiny of individuals and peoples. 

In a special way we entrust and consecrate to you those individuals and nations which particularly need to be thus entrusted and consecrated.

We have recourse to your protection, holy Mother of God: despise not our petitions in our necessities.

"For their sake," he said, "I consecrate myself that they also may be consecrated in the truth" (Jn 17:19).

We wish to unite ourselves with our Redeemer in this his consecration for the world and for the human race, which, in his divine Heart, has the power to obtain pardon and to secure reparation.

The power of this consecration lasts for all time and embraces all individuals, peoples and nations. It overcomes every evil that the spirit of darkness is able to awaken, and has in fact awakened in our times, in the heart of man and in his history.

How deeply we feel the need for the consecration of humanity and the world—our modern world—in union with Christ himself! For the redeeming work of Christ must be shared in by the world through the Church.

The present year of the Redemption shows this: the special Jubilee of the whole Church.

Pope’s prayer to Our Lady of Fátima

Above all creatures, may you be blessed, you, the Handmaid of the Lord, who in the fullest way obeyed the divine call!

Hail to you, who are wholly united to the redeeming consecration of your Son!

Mother of the Church! Enlighten the People of God along the paths of faith, hope and love! Enlighten especially the peoples whose consecration and entrustment by us you are awaiting. Help us to live in the truth of the consecration of Christ for the entire human family of the modern world.

In entrusting to you, oh Mother, the world, all individuals and peoples, we also entrust to you this very consecration of the world, placing it in your motherly Heart.

Immaculate Heart! Help us to conquer the menace of evil, which so easily takes root in the hearts of the people of today, and whose immeasurable effects already weigh down upon our modern world and seem to block the paths towards the future!

From famine and war, deliver us.

From nuclear war, from incalculable self-destruction, from every kind of war, deliver us.

From sins against the life of man from its very beginning, deliver us.

From hatred and from the demeaning of the dignity of the children of God, deliver us.

From every kind of injustice in the life of society, both national and international, deliver us.

From readiness to trample on the commandments of God, deliver us.

From attempts to stifle in human hearts the very truth of God, deliver us.

From the loss of awareness of good and evil, deliver us.

From sins against the Holy Spirit, deliver us, deliver us.

Accept, Oh Mother of Christ, this cry laden with the sufferings of all individual human beings, laden with the sufferings of whole societies.

Help us with the power of the Holy Spirit to conquer all sin: individual sin and the "sin of the world," in all its manifestations.

Let there be revealed, once more, in the history of the world the infinite saving power of the Redemption: the power of merciful Love! May it put a stop to evil! May it transform consciences! May your Immaculate Heart reveal for all the light of Hope!

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Saint John Paul II, March 25, 1984

N.B. Sister Lucia personally confirmed that this solemn and universal act of consecration corresponded to what Our Lady of Fatima wanted. ("Sim, esta feita, tal como Nossa Senhora a pediu, desde dia 25 de Março de 1984": "Yes, the consecration was made, as Our Lady had requested, on March 25, 1984." Lucia, Letter dated November 8, 1989).