Consecration of Russia
The consecration of Russia to the Immaculate Heart of the Blessed Virgin Mary by a reigning Pope was ordered in a Marian apparition by Our Lady of Fátima on 13 July 1917. Sister Lúcia, one of the three visionaries (those who saw the apparition), publicly stated that at different times the Blessed Virgin Mary had given her a message of promise, that the consecration of Russia (as a country) would usher in a period of world peace. Pope Pius XII, Pope Paul VI and Pope John Paul II have consecrated Russia to the Immaculate Heart of Mary , albeit without directly referencing Russia or the USSR. On March 25, 2022, Pope Francis consecrated Russia to the Immaculate Heart alongside Ukraine, with both countries explicitly mentioned, amid the Russo-Ukrainian War. Background. Consecration of Russia. According to Sister Lúcia, the Virgin Mary requested the consecration of Russia to her Immaculate Heart on several occasions. Lúcia lived in Spain from 1925 to 1946, during the time of the Second Spanish Republic and the Spanish Civil War. Her first mention of the Blessed Virgin's request for the consecration of Russia is in the autumn of 1929. In 1929 Lúcia Santos  was a novice at the Sisters of Saint Dorothy convent in Tuy, Spain. Sister Lúcia reported that on the night of 13 June 1929, while she was praying in chapel, that she experienced a vision in which the Blessed Virgin Mary said that it was God's will that the Pope, in union with all the Bishops of the world, consecrate Russia to her Immaculate Heart. Sister Lúcia reported this to her confessor who asked her to write it down. In two letters she sent in May 1930 to Father Gonçalves, her confessor, Sister Lúcia linked the consecration of Russia  with the Devotion of the Five First Saturdays, which she had first discussed in context of the apparitions she had purportedly experienced previously as a postulant at Pontevedra in 1925. The Church has issued no decision regarding the reported visions at either Pontevedra or Tuy. In August 1941, Sister Lúcia wrote her memoir in which she described the apparition of 13 July 1917. She said that the Blessed Virgin Mary told them: Some Catholics who support the position of the Catholic Church claim that the apparitions at Fátima took place after the February Revolution of 1917 that deposed Tsar Nicholas  II from power and the April 16 return of Vladimir Lenin to Russia. Categorised as private revelation. The alleged message given by the Virgin Mary at Fatima is considered a private revelation. The teaching of the Roman Catholic Church distinguishes between "public Revelation" and "private revelations". The term "public Revelation" finds its literary expression in the Bible and "reached its fulfilment in the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ". In this regard, "Catechism of the Catholic Church" quotes Saint John of the Cross:"In giving us his Son, his only Word (for he possesses no other), he spoke everything to  us at once in this sole Word—and he has no more to say... Any person questioning God or desiring some vision or revelation would be guilty not only of foolish behavior but also of offending him, by not fixing his eyes entirely upon Christ and by living with the desire for some other novelty." Consecrations. 20th century. In 1942, Pope Pius XII consecrated the whole humanity, implicitly including Russia, to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. This consecration was made in the context of the reported messages from Jesus and the Virgin Mary received by Blessed Alexandrina of Balazar and  communicated to her spiritual director, the jesuit priest Mariano Pinho. In 1952, he consecrated "the peoples of Russia" to the Immaculate Heart in "Sacro vergente anno". In 1964, Pope Paul VI also consecrated humanity, and thus Russia, to the Immaculate Heart of Mary at the end of the third session of Vatican II. In 1981 and 1982, Pope John Paul II also consecrated the whole human race to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. All those previous consecrations were done not in communion and coordination with the Catholic bishops of the world. In 1984, Pope John Paul II decided to consecrate  Russia in communion and coordination with the Catholic Bishops of the world. John Paul II thus asked all the Catholic Bishops of the world to join him in his consecration. Before doing the consecration, the pope consulted Sister Lúcia so as to make sure the consecration of Russia would be valid. After John Paul II's consecrations, Sister Lúcia stated numerous times that the 1984 consecration had been done the way the Virgin Mary wanted it to be. In all those consecrations, the popes made no explicit references to Russia or the USSR, for political reasons. 21st century. At the  formal request of the Episcopal Conference of Ukrainian Catholic Bishops, the Holy See announced on 15 March 2022 that Pope Francis would consecrate Russia and Ukraine to the Immaculate Heart of Mary on 25 March 2022 at Saint Peter's Basilica in Rome. The 25 March is the same date as when John Paul II consecrated Russia to the Immaculate Heart in 1984. A consecration ceremony was also scheduled in Fátima, Portugal by the Papal almoner, Cardinal Konrad Krajewski. Accordingly, the Pope sent a letter to invite all the Catholic Bishops to join with him in the consecration, by their  own volition, at the same designated time the consecration by the pope was to take place. He also invited all Catholic communities and all the faithful to join him in the consecration. The text of the consecration contains explicit mentions of "Russia and Ukraine" in the consecration formula. The text of the consecration contains the title "Earth of Heaven" to refer to Virgin Mary in some of its versions. This title raised concerns among some Catholics. The Holy See explained the origin of the title was "taken from a Byzantine-Slavic monastic hymn, and it poetically signifies the union of  heaven and earth that we can contemplate in Virgin Mary assumed bodily into Heaven". On 25 March 2022 the consecration by Francis took place in Saint Peter's Basilica in conjunction with a penitential service, with Francis stating: "Mother of God and our mother, to your Immaculate Heart we solemnly entrust and consecrate ourselves, the church and all humanity, especially Russia and Ukraine". Konrad Krajewski also made a similar consecration in Portugal. Conversion of Russia. In 1946, during a gathering of youth at Fátima, Sister Lucia was asked by a young Russian girl, Natacha Derfelden as to how the conversion  of Russia would be accomplished. Sister Lucia responded that the conversion of Russia would come through the Eastern Orthodox Church and "the Oriental rite", seemingly meaning the conversion implied reconciliation and reunion between the Russian Orthodox Church and the Roman Catholic Church. A theological commentary written by Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger on the Fátima secret cites it as a "conversion of the heart".