H
Hopeful_Peter
Guest
I recently purchased St. Louis de Montfort’s True Devotion to Mary. I was deeply troubled by the following words in the Act of Consecration:
Islam teaches that Allah is master and his subjects are slaves. It is a cold and cruel relationship. Yet, if I consecrate myself (and I do not take such things lightly) as a slave, I willingly and willfully change my relationship. My own sons are not my slaves. They are my children, and I would not allow them to declare themselves my slaves, resorting to calling me “Master” rather than “Dad,” no matter what improvement in obedience that change in relationship would effect. I do not understand the above wording in “Total Consecration.” The Virgin Mary, Mother of God, is queen of heaven and earth but she is still a “creature,” albeit the noblest. To consecrate myself to a creature as slave, body and soul, is frightening to me beyond description. I almost feel like I’m being invited into something darkly occult and very dangerous.
Yet, Mother Teresa of Calcutta and Pope John Paul II had no qualms about it, and St. Louis was canonized, so I acknowledge that it must be my lack of understanding that is causing me this serious discomfort. Can you help, or point me in the right direction? I sincerely would like to make my consecration, but I need to have these real fears dispelled or else I cannot dare to take that step.
My understanding of our Catholic faith is that we are all, by baptismal grace, adopted children of God the Father, that Jesus in a sense is our elder brother and that he gifted his mother to us from the cross to be our mother. I always believed that doctrine and found great comfort in it. However, as warm and loving a relationship a child has with its mother, the relationship of slave to master is a whole different matter.
Islam teaches that Allah is master and his subjects are slaves. It is a cold and cruel relationship. Yet, if I consecrate myself (and I do not take such things lightly) as a slave, I willingly and willfully change my relationship. My own sons are not my slaves. They are my children, and I would not allow them to declare themselves my slaves, resorting to calling me “Master” rather than “Dad,” no matter what improvement in obedience that change in relationship would effect. I do not understand the above wording in “Total Consecration.” The Virgin Mary, Mother of God, is queen of heaven and earth but she is still a “creature,” albeit the noblest. To consecrate myself to a creature as slave, body and soul, is frightening to me beyond description. I almost feel like I’m being invited into something darkly occult and very dangerous.
Yet, Mother Teresa of Calcutta and Pope John Paul II had no qualms about it, and St. Louis was canonized, so I acknowledge that it must be my lack of understanding that is causing me this serious discomfort. Can you help, or point me in the right direction? I sincerely would like to make my consecration, but I need to have these real fears dispelled or else I cannot dare to take that step.