Q&A: If We Are Already Baptized, Why the Need for Consecration Formulas?
Father J. Patrick Gaffney, SMM
G. MacB, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Aren’t We Baptized In The Lord?
Yes, we do belong to the Lord through baptism. The consecration proposed by Saint Louis de Montfort is the perfect renewal of our fundamental consecration in baptism. Since we are prone to take our baptism for granted or even to ignore it, how important that we personally, repeatedly, responsibly, rekindle our baptismal life. This is the object of the formula of consecration.
Moreover, the personal renewal of our baptismal commitment to God through Mary results in a new depth of “belonging-to” the Lord. The power of the redemption, the intensity of our oneness in Christ through Mary is more firmly implemented in our lives by the perfect consecration. The act of consecration is not so much the pronouncement of a formula but the
pronouncement of the self; a total and perpetual “pouring-out” of the self into the All Holy, God.
In Montfort’s act of consecration a human person finds identity not in the pride of posing as “being-in-itself” but in the realistic humility of a loving, lived out relationship with the awesome yet so close “Other,” Love itself, our God. Especially in difficult times, at turning points in our life and also on the great feasts; it is important that we revive this basic baptismal reality.
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