Ad Honorem Immaculatae Conceptionis Mariae Oblatio

100 Paweł Naumowicz MIC The Oblatio as a complete self-offering (VC, 17). (“I, Stanislaus of Jesus Mary Papczyński [...] offer and consecrate ...”) In its article 17, Vita Consecrata states that God, “the Father, the Cre- ator and Giver of every good thing, who draws His creatures to himself [...] with a special love and for a special mission” of heeding and following the Son of God. “In response to this call and the interior attraction which accompanies it, those who are called entrust themselves to the love of God who wishes them to be exclusively at his service, and they consecrate themselves totally to him and to his plan of salvation (cf. 1 Cor 7:32-34).” The answer to God’s gratuitous love and the calling to the consecrated life, which “is an initiative coming wholly from the Father (cf. Jn 15:16)” can only consist in “unconditionally dedicating his or her life to God,” offering and devoting to Him one’s entire life, one’s past, present, and future. The consecrated person’s offering ought to have a complete character “compa- rable to a genuine holocaust.” 1 The act of the Oblatio , made by Saint Stanislaus Papczyński on Decem- ber 11, 1670, was without a doubt a part of his holocaust offering, a turning point in his life, and also the act of founding the future Congregation of Marians of the Immaculate Conception of the Most Blessed Virgin Mary. Our holy Father Founder recited this Offering in the presence of the same witnesses, before whom he had accepted a moment earlier, the indult of departure from the Piarist Order. In this manner, Fr. Stanislaus publicly entered the path of life, which God Himself had indicated to him. This path led the former Piarist to making solemn vows in an order of clerics reg- ular, which he founded and the Church approved, and ultimately, to the community of Saints in heaven and the glory of the altars in the Pilgrim Church. In the light of the Oblatio, we can read Father Stanislaus’s entire 1 Saint John Paul II, Post-Synodal Apostolic Exhortation Vita Consecrata , March 25, 1996, No. 17.