Theology by the Slice: True Devotion to Mary

On March 11, 2015, Sisters Magdalene Marie and Marie-Jean, MICM shared with us a thought provoking presentation on the practice of Total Consecration, or Holy Slavery to Jesus through Mary. The sisters came to us from their community as part of Saint Benedict Abbey in Still River, MA. There, along with the Benedictian brothers, the sisters teach elementary school, produce Catholic educational material, work on the abbey farm, and assist at the Traditional Latin Mass.

Total Consecration is a process of submission of self to Mary so that through her we might draw closer to God. Sister Marie-Jean explained that the process was introduced by Saint Louis de Montfort, a priest and itinerant preacher in 18th century France. The process consists of a 33 day period of reflection, reading, and prayer at the end of which the act of consecration is said. The member then commits to living a life completely with, by, in, and for Mary.

Sister Marie-Jean started her talk by outlining reasons why an individual might take on such a devotion. The sister reminds us that as a participant in the world, we are all a slave to something. She spoke of money, power, lust, or our own self-image as possible traps. Even those who claim to worship nothing, or nothing besides God, more often simply worship something else unconsciously. By explicitly declaring oneself a slave to Mary and consciously undertaking every action for her we make our slavery and our devotions a conscious decision rather than an unknown habit. She suggested that by explicitly choosing this path we might take control of our lives precisely because we give up all control.

The sisters’ devotion to Our Lady was clear. She spoke with passion about the personal attraction Mary holds for her as a figure of perfect submission. She beautifully described Our Lady as The Undoer of Knots who reverses the disobedience of Eve with her acceptance of all that was asked of her. She also spoke of the power Mary holds as the connecting link between God and man. She pointed out the strangeness of the miracle associated with Mary coming from our most powerful God: a virgin birth. God himself chose to become dependent on a human womb to be born fully man. The sisters spoke with reverence of the beauty of a woman who could deserve this gift and the possibilities that having this woman behind our cause might bring.

Sister Jean-Marie gave us some tips for praying a rosary in the Monfortian Method, that after saying the Holy Name (Jesus) in the "Hail Mary" parayer, add in a word that reflects the mystery being meditated on (for example, "risen" for the first glorious mystery of the Resurrection). They also gave us some helpful mnemonics for prayer, and closed with an analogy explaining their devotion to Mary. When we try to form ourselves in God’s image we are like a sculptor trying to hammer away at ourselves, chipping away the undesirable places to more closely resemble our best guess of what God wants. We are working from an imperfect picture, and we are using a hard and imperfect method which depends on our own skill. Total devotion to Mary, however, resembles formation with a mold. It is a softer and more fluid method which relies not on our own skill but on the help of our mother. By entrusting ourselves to her we allow ourselves to be formed by her more perfect knowledge of God’s will.

We are very grateful for the time and thoughts that the sisters shared with us last Wednesday and hope to visit them at Still River in the near future!