Une Minute avec Marie
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On December 8, 1942, Pope Pius XII solemnly renewed the consecration of Russia to the Immaculate Heart of Mary he had first made on October 31, 1942.
The results of this consecration were not long in coming. On October 22, 1940, Our Lord had promised Sister Lucia, in return for this consecration, "to shorten the days of tribulation by which he had decided to punish the world for its crimes”. And indeed, a few days after the consecration, the German armies suffered their first decisive defeats at El Alamein and Stalingrad.
On November 3, at El Alamein, after ten days of terrible fighting, Marshal Rommel had to withdraw his troops. And on the 8th, Anglo-American troops landed in North Africa.
After a long occupation of most of Stalingrad, on November 19, a Russian offensive encircled the forces of General Paulus and despite a counter-attack in mid-December, the Germans surrendered in February 1943.
It was also in November 1942 that the Battle of the Atlantic turned in favor of the Allies. November was the month of the war in which the German U-boats sank the most ships (800,000 tons total). But from January 1943 onwards, Allied losses decreased, and the U-boats suffered such setbacks that the following May, Admiral Dönitz, head of the German Kriegsmarine, decided to pull all submarines from the North Atlantic.
Thus, just after the consecration on October 31, the Germans suffered serious setbacks on the three main fronts, North Africa, Russia and the Atlantic. The next three months marked the real turning point of the war.
Sister Lucia soon made it known that these victories were the fruit of the Holy Father's act of consecration.
On February 28, 1943, she wrote to the Bishop of Gurza in Portugal: "The Good Lord has already shown me his satisfaction with the act, although incomplete according to his desire, carried out by the Holy Father and by several bishops. He promises, in return, to put an end to the war soon. The conversion of Russia is not for now."
Likewise, on May 4, 1943, she wrote to Father Gonçalvès: "He [Our Lord] promises the end of the war soon, in view of the act that His Holiness has deigned to make. But since it was incomplete, the conversion of Russia will be for later."