After the de Montfort Consecration: Is the Offering of Mass for Someone Considered WORKS or PRAYERS?

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pureDzire

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Hello…

QUESTION: When we wish to pray for someone after our Consecration has been made and All our Works have been given to Our Lady to be used for the greater glory of God…
Is the Offering of a Mass, or saying the Rosary for that person we are praying for considered in the category of WORKS, or PRAYERS? Which is it?

Thank you!
 
Isn 't praying for the living and the dead considered one of the spiritual WORKS of mercy?
 
Prayers are a type of work. What are you trying to get at? Is the distinction important in terms of the consecration?

I guess I’m trying to figure out the underlying question you are trying to answer so I can respond.
 
In the Consecration, one gives to Our Lord, through Our Lady, all one’s Works thereafter for the Glory of God, etc.

Then, it adds that if after having done so, one wishes to Pray for a particular person, one must ask it of Our Lady, trusting her to answer it or not, since one has given All one’s Works for Her to use as She knows best.

But, THEN it adds that She Will highly regard the Prayer for that particular person made by one of Her Slaves of Love, making it sound like She Will answer it…

Just not sure how once having given ALL, this all comes together. If one IS encouraged STILL to Pray for others, as the Consecration states, then how does that add up to having All one’s Works being given over to Her as a Slave of Love for Jesus???
 
I‘ve been wondering about that too, and I wonder why the question is so seldom discussed, or spelled out by theologians for the benefit of us confused Catholics who can‘t ffigure out for ourselves all the practical implications of our consecration. If I knew more, it would make the Marian consecration more real and concrete for me.

A few months after making it, I discovered that the traditional practice of adding on to my daily Rosary an Our Father and Hail Mary for this person and that, in thanksgiving for something, or in honour of specific saints or my guardian angel is an especially fruitful prayer practice for me. Prayer intentions and the desire to pray just keep flowing and flowing. The same with sacrifices - things I don‘t want to do or bad things that happen; if I can say OK, this is for … , it‘s a powerful source of motivation and courage. And the concept of fixing an intention at the offertory of Holy Mass, a heart‘s desire to lay on the altar with the gifts in order to „anchor“ myself there – I can‘t help but think Our Lady understands. She has, of course, my standing permission to use my works in any way she sees fit. Maybe these are among the things she would have me accomplish as her slave, and maybe the urge to pray in this way is in some sense a fruit of the consecration. As I say, I wish I understood it better intellectually. In the meantime I just figure it‘s good to pray and offer in any way one feels prompted to, for oneself, for others or for God‘s glory. The Blessed Mother will know how to use it.
 
Our Lady’s will is always in perfect conformity with God’s will. Therefore even after making the Consecration you can pray in perfect liberty for whatever intentions are on your mind. Know that they are on Mary’s heart, too, as long as your prayers are in line with God’s will.

Years ago I asked the same question of a priest who is devoted to Our Lady and had made the de Montfort consecration. He told me that if you feel the desire to pray for someone, in all likelihood Mary wants you to pray for that person too, and she probably placed that desire on your heart.

I still offer each Mass I attend for a particular intention, with the understanding that if Jesus and Mary want to apply the merits and graces of that Mass to a different intention they always have my permission to do so. I don’t specifically say that each time I offer prayers for a specific intention; it’s just a little “understanding” we have when I renew my consecration each day (using the “short form” of the Consecration: “I am all Thine, and all that I have is Thine, most loving Jesus, through Mary, Thy most holy mother.”).

Mary would never want the Consecration to restrict you from praying the way the Holy Spirit leads you to pray.
 
PhilotheaZ said:
Years ago I asked the same question of a priest who is devoted to Our Lady and had made the de Montfort consecration. He told me that if you feel the desire to pray for someone, in all likelihood Mary wants you to pray for that person too, and she probably placed that desire on your heart.
Mary would never want the Consecration to restrict you from praying the way the Holy Spirit leads you to pray.
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Thank you so much for your reply! Perhaps it IS Our Lady telling us to listen to the Inspirations of the Spirit more sensitively.
Maybe for all of us, at first, the total surrender has to be more total to help us to expand our hearts and prayer intentions beyond the scope of our own small circle of friends and personal needs.
So, after some growth and faithfulness to our Consecration, Our Lady then calls more deeply to us by laying on our hearts Herself, persons or causes that she wishes to have us offer prayer for. What a humbling yet wonderous thought! Thanks be to God!
 
Hlafdige said:
I‘ve been wondering about that too, and I wonder why the question is so seldom discussed, or spelled out by theologians for the benefit of us confused Catholics who can‘t ffigure out for ourselves all the practical implications of our consecration. If I knew more, it would make the Marian consecration more real and concrete for me.
Click to expand...
I agree with you completely!
 
I wrote to a man named Tom Lloyd who is a Representative for Our Lady Queen of All Hearts and whose name and e-mail address is given on-line for anyone interested in the Consecration to write to with their questions. He replied in regard to this one being now discussed. This is what he said…

For now, take it on faith that by Consecrating yourself, all of your prayers, needs, wants, intentions, will be known by Our Lady and taken to her son Jesus. Better than going to any other saint or devotion. The Secret of Mary that Montfort explains to you is the shortest and easiest road to Jesus Christ and the Trinity. Pray for the grace of advamced faith to see what Montfort is saying here and then the light will go on. Don’t let these questions distract you from your firm purpose of making the Consecration, knowing that it will take years of living it everday to completely understand the great gift you have been given in the Consecration.

He also said, thinking I had not made the Consecration yet…

I think St. Louis de Montfort explains it very clearly. I don’t think I could explain it any better. I suggest you keep praying over it and meditating on it. After all St. Louis de Montfort spent his whole life doing this before he took pen to paper. He was a saint and a mystic. It may take us some time to catch up with him and where he is at on the journey. The problem people have in reading Montfort, including learned theologians, is that he was a saint, very advanced in his spiritual life and in union with the Trinity through Mary. We could spend our whole lives following in Montfort’s footsteps and not get there. If I gave this to one of my grandchildren, he could read it but he would not understand it. After you do the Consecration, Our Lady will give you the grace to understand what Montfort is
saying here. If that does not happen, write me again and I think we will be able to work through it so you understand.

If you wish to write him with your own questions, here is his e-mail

tomlloyd@queenofallhearts.com

Bless you All!
 
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