Pilgrims process with a statue of Mary during the annual procession to the Basilica of Our Lady, Queen of Ireland in Knock. Photo: OSV News/Cillian Kelly. Bishop Cullinan encourages return to Mary and the Rosary
Ireland’s bishops should formally consecrate the country to Our Lady as part of a renewal of the Catholic faith, leading Mariologist Dr Mark Miravalle has said.
Speaking to The Irish Catholic, Dr Miravalle said the Irish people have “Marian DNA” which has endured even as religious practice has declined. “I think the Irish people have a Marian DNA in them,” he said. “Over 15 centuries… the Irish people almost instinctively have a great love of Our Lady.”
However, he said that this inheritance now needs to be “restored” and become “more authentically formative” for the country.
Dr Miravalle, who holds the St John Paul II Chair of Mariology at Franciscan University of Steubenville, during his visit to Ireland called on the bishops to make a formal consecration to Our Lady Of Knock and her Immaculate Heart.
Such an act, he said, would amount to the Church saying: “Mother, we need your help to restore our country in Catholic faith.”
His comments echo Bishop of Waterford and Lismore Alphonsus Cullinan, who separately told The Irish Catholic: “We need to reconsecrate to Mary.”
Bishop Cullinan encouraged families and friends to visit Knock, receive Confession and Mass, pray the Rosary and seek Our Lady’s protection. “To go to Mary and to experience her real protection, which we all need because we all battle through life,” was hugely significant, he said.
The bishop has since renewed his Marian appeal for October, encouraging Catholics throughout his diocese to take up the Rosary in response to Pope Leo’s call for prayer for peace.
In a recent podcast, the bishop said praying the Rosary was like taking “Our Lady’s hand in yours”, urging for peace “in our hearts, in our homes, in our country, and in the world.”
Dr Miravalle said a renewed Marian devotion should go alongside Eucharistic Adoration, arguing that parishes which prayed the Rosary before the Blessed Sacrament for the renewal of the faith could see “tangible results almost immediately”.
He said history repeatedly showed the Church turning to Mary in periods of crisis: “At times of challenge, you go to Our Lady,” he said, adding that “God does have a remedy.”