Catholic Hermit: Vow of Consecration of Suffering

I've prayed and pondered about sharing my own Consecration of Suffering.  I do not have a definitive answer, other than a sense of the Lord protecting me when my heart and intentions are pure and desirous of serving His Real Presence with my body, mind, heart, and soul.  

If my sharing anonymously what is so personal, written spontaneously nearly 20 years ago, and offered in the presence of my spiritual director, my dearest Spiritual Da as witness, then the Holy Spirit or my angel will let me know, and I can remove this post.  In part, by sharing it, I will expose part of myself--that part that nearly two decades ago had come to a point of such urgency and desire to give all of me fully to the Lord for His Church.

This includes all aspects of my life that have been and could be filled with much suffering especially when I no longer was a child and began my sojourn in the adult world, and then discovering how very human and imperfect we are within His Holy Church.  Yes, out of the increasing sufferings, welled up in me a tremendous desire to make an offering of myself, and this before I had read of such offerings.  So the Lord knows my heart; He knew then and now and in future.

Part of my sharing this is also, for me, a humorous reminder of my intensity at the time, and how a far simpler offering had been and continues to be made from time to time:  Lord, use me in whatever ways You want.  This simple offering--a consecration of suffering--is sufficient!  However, in writing out, in pouring out my mind and heart such as I did, I have found benefit even now in my time of greater physical suffering and in a way, a sense of greater knowledge of the sufferings of the world and of all souls.  

In re-reading and renewing the detailed wording of this Consecration of Suffering, I am strengthened, reminded, and raised up in the Lord to continue onward through this painful journey, with a sense of purpose and mission, of knowing that no matter what, the Lord is with me.  He loves me, He accepts me, He accepts my ineptness in suffering and perhaps loves me all the more for my naivete in just how painful yet fully sweet and victorious is His suffering for our salvation.  Praise God Almighty!

[My] Vow of Consecration of Suffering

"I [full name including confirmation name], as a lowly bride of Christ, offer as sacred all my suffering:  past, present, and future--pains of rejection, humiliations, insults, physical ailments and injuries, emotional distress, mental depressions, spiritual torments and doubts, remorse due to sins, loss of self-identity, ignorance, pride, and human failings.  I offer all pain I have knowingly and unknowingly cause or will cause to the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, the Virgin Mary, the angels and the saints, and any holy creatures or holy creation.

"I resolve to offer myself--body, mind, heart, and spirit--as an immolation for Holy Mother Church, to consciously accept God's declaration that 'my suffering and the suffering of Holy Mother Church shall be made one.'  I offer to suffer now and forever, if this be the will of God, as reparation for the pain of infidelities, assaults, dissensions, and indignities caused to Holy Mother Church by myself and any laity and religious persons in the past, present, and future.

"Henceforth, I shall choose whichever course of action in thought, word, or deed will provide greater self-mortification, including that which would prolong my life of suffering , as as approved by my spiritual father, for the greater fulfillment of my vow of consecration.  I offer my hands, tongue, head, and heart in seeking and responding to physical and spiritual opportunities to use my God-given talents and gifts in order to strengthen the foundation of the True Church in Teachings, Traditions, and Spirit.

"By the grace of God, the love of Christ, the power of the Holy Spirit, and the maternal protection of the Blessed Virgin Mary, I make this vow of consecration, to be an immolation, to suffer exclusively for the sake of the Holy Catholic Church as established by Jesus Christ and set forth in sacred Scripture, doctrines, creeds, tradition, and authority.  I pray to respond and react to all suffering with Jesus' love, and to inspire with love, those who may be the cause of my sufferings.

"I make this vow of consecration to suffer for Holy Mother Church in the presence of God the Father, Son, Holy Spirit, the Blessed Virgin Mary, St. Joseph, the Apostles, St. Teresa of Avila, St. John of the Cross, St. Catherine of Siena, St. Therese of Lisieux, Sr. Josefa Menendez, Sr. Mary of the Holy Trinity, Bl. Charles de Foucald, Bl. [now St.] Faustina Kowalska, Bl. [now St.] Padre Pio, My Guardian Angel Beth, my Spiritual Father [name], and any angels, saints, and deceased relatives and friends who love, support, and strengthen me by being holy witnesses.  May the Lord be pleased to crush me in all my infirmities.

"(As a small token of my sincerity and devotion, I openly admit my unworthiness and fill this small heart with the blood of my loving but sinful self)

"[Signed and witnessed by myself and my Spiritual Father] February 15, 2000"

So this is my lengthy and seemingly all-inclusive Consecration of Suffering, an offering that the Lord has accepted all these years since, and in the renewal each year I was able to renew it, and usually at the altar of a church or cathedral with various priests witnessing as I'd read it, being on my knees.  I  listed, with dates of renewal, the priests and monsignor at the bottom of the page of this consecration, and I also mentioned the few times I was in solitude on the date I renewed mostly since 2002, which is on the Feast Day of St. Padre Pio.  I've also added, hand-written, various saints and blesseds, and the names of holy souls each year that I spiritually acknowledged and consciously invited to be in attendance.

For anyone brought from within one's mind, heart, and soul, who is inspired to make such an offering of suffering, of course must recognize that the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit will allow or accept or not allow or not accept in various ways and earthly time.  That is why such an act of consecration is totally at the will of God.  I offer, He determines what He wills and allows.  There is no intentional inflicting of suffering upon oneself; one's life, one's existence in the temporal world, and what God allows of suffering as it is consequence of circumstances and sin of self and others brings suffering enough.

Such a consecration of suffering is a quite serious undertaking.  Yet the Lord has blessed me for my offering, as it was a response, an act of acceptance, of His allowing me suffering and calling me to suffer, in asking me into suffering.  God has declared to me that my suffering and the suffering of Holy Mother Church shall be made one, has shown and advised "MORTIFICATION," has had St. Michael command me "Love to suffer, and suffer to love!"  

In various visions and locutions over the years and in an amazing amount of the varieties of suffering, the Lord has invited me to union with Him through and in suffering.  I do not nor have ever taken this lightly.  Suffering is real; it hurts and is painful to endure except by God's grace and one's willingness to accept and embrace.

I personally, recently and especially retyping this Consecration of Suffering, of baring my heart, so to speak in anonymous transparency, have opened myself to criticism, misunderstanding, and judging by others.  However, repeating and revealing this is also far more forceful as to reminding me and empowering me to desire to live this consecration in deeper loving, temporal, spiritual, and mystical ways.  There is more meaning to the various aspects which give my current sufferings more purpose and usefulness.  I realize all the more the good of suffering, the salvific aspects, and the union with and in Christ as tremendous blessing and joy.

God bless His Real Presence in us!

Catholic Hermit: This Time St. Irenaeus Helps

A bit of written thought from St. Irenaeus of Lyons (2nd c.) provides this hermit help. This time, this day, I read across the centuries what  helps my mind, heart, and soul formation in current unknowing of on-going, spinal pain predicament.  The saint's words are a reminder to me of what the Lord in the past has asked, among other short locutions:  Be an immolation....Let go, let go, my poor gray dove....

"Man is a combination of soul and body, a body formed in the likeness of God and fashioned with both his hands, that is to say the Son and the spirit. It was to them that he said: 'Let us make man' (Genesis 1:26)....

"But how are you to become divinized in the future if you have not yet become man?  How are you going to be perfect when you have barely been created?  How are you to become immortal when you have not obeyed your Creator in your mortal nature?....Since you are God's handiwork, wait patiently for your Artist's Hand bringing all things to pass at their proper time.  Offer him a malleable and docile form this Artist has given you, having that water in you that comes from him and without which, by becoming hardened, you would reject the imprint of his fingers.

"By letting yourself be formed by him, you will rise up to perfection in that, through his art of God's, the clay in you will be concealed; His hand created your substance....But if, being hardened, you reject his skill and show yourself displeased with what has made you man, you will have rejected, through your ingratitude to God, not simply his handiwork but life itself.  For to fashion belongs to God's goodness and to be fashioned is proper to man's nature.  If, then, you abandon yourself to Him by giving Him your faith in him and submission to him, you will receive the benefit of his skill and will become God's perfect work.  But if, to the contrary, you resist him and flee his Hands, then the cause of your incompletion will remain, not in him, but in you who have not obeyed." 

(Against the Heresies IV, Pr4; 39, 2 (cf. SC 100 rev.)

I turn to my Artist who is forming my body and soul in on-going fashion.  I accept His Handiwork in humility--in that malleable and docile form God has given me and desires of me--full and actually effortless cooperation.  Abandon myself to God, trust in Him, submit myself to Him.  I will be and will become what God wants of my body and soul.

It is a process, after all, the formation of our bodies and souls throughout this earthly life and far into eternity.  We are God's to make of us as He wills--but we must let go, in full abandonment of our will and designs, to His.  

I bent the legs, keeping back straight, and picked up a notebook that had been unpacked from some box when I was able to do such unpacking.  It was on a pile of paperwork on the coffee table in living room.  It opened in the process, to a page in which I'd written an "Act of Oblation."  I think it is taken from a book titled Guide for Victim Souls of the Sacred Heart, compiled by a Fr. Kreuter, OSB (1939), for on the notebook page prior to the oblation I'd written out, this is the citation.

I will share this oblation in another post.  For some readers, it will seem too much, perhaps repugnant.  I'd offered myself in this oblation years ago.  I tend to make offerings to the Lord--either of one or other I've come across in reading Catholic books or write out or offer myself of my volition, to be for God whatever He wills.  Then, of course, when the formation comes, also comes the suffering involved when the Lord is merely shaping me in the way He desires--as Artist, such as St. Irenaeus so positively states the process.

Already today, after a third night of decent, blessed sleep, I rose after resting and writing some this morning, and headed out into the lovely sunshine of this day.  I took the shovel that is propped by the house--not a large one, but one with long blade, and used it as a cane to walk out where some grass had been growing into the tree and shrub beds.  I dared push that shovel blade, into the soft soil and loosened with careful movement of my arms, some of the encroaching grass and a few weeds.

What a victory it seems!  What encouragement, for this morning I decided to adopt the attitude of not giving in to pain, of trying to do what tiny aspects of movement, brace cinched tight, that could be a declaration of my intention to persevere even in miniscule and nonessential ways.  The bit of exercise invigorated this body and encouraged the mind.

I decided to text the man whom God had sent to help with the Costco food run, and I stated that if he'd only do so by accepting payment, would he consider helping me get even some of the remaining small tree and shrubs in the ground?  I emphasized that I am fine if he is not interested, for my detachment has been that if they survive the winter fine, and if not, that is all right, as well. I will slide them into the garage for attempted over-wintering if unable to get them in the ground.

I did not mention that the joy I've received from time spent in the glorious landscape nursery has been sheer give from God and worth whatever spent monetarily, as money does not have the same grip--probably also influenced by the fact I did not spend much and also had no inkling that I'd be in for such a long and limiting recovery.  

I've not heard back from the one whom God sent, and I may not.  But the giving over of my self to God's Hands in handling whatever my body can do or not do, is liberating and invigorating.  Such small and limited little movements in releasing weed roots from the soft earth has lifted my spirit.  Tomorrow, if the pain is unbearable, I'll praise God for my ceasing the pain med martyrdom.  

God has provided, and the good of more physical movement counters what is available to temper resultant pain.  As long as I do not make wrong movements--twist, bend, or to lift much weight--the exercise is beyond bounteous potential.  He is yet forming my body until time for the body to die to this world and my soul to take over fully for eternity.  Rejoice in whatever He allows in His Artistry.

God bless His Real Presence in us!