"France's consecration to the Mother of God is irrevocable"

France is not the only Kingdom that belongs to Our Lady, but it is the country that, more than any other, has made a solemn commitment of fidelity to Our Lady, which will last as long as this country lasts (...). As I write this, I am reminded of the prophetic words of Paul Valéry shortly after the First World War: "We civilizations now know that we are mortal." 

Will France die before the world dies? I mean the France that we love (...), composed of modesty and greatness, which inspired the German saying: "Happy as God in France", and the Polish saying: "The sky is too high and France is too far." Who could say that this France is eternal? Or that it is now a thing of the past? I refuse to believe it.

Through the worst circumstances, France's centuries-old commitment to the Mother of God cannot be revoked. Her love for this Mother has always been consubstantial with her, since the solemn vow made "in perpetuity" by King Louis XIII on February 10, 1638. 

I believe that no other country was the object of such an absolute and solemn consecration to Our Lady, extending to the entire future. This consecration, in which the successor of Louis XIII, the hoped-for Dauphin, Louis-Dieudonné, who became Louis XIV, took a great part, extended to the whole of France, which, on the day designated for its commemoration, August 15, the solemnity of the Assumption, organized, first in each church, then in the streets of the towns and villages, the famous procession, whose tradition was so happily taken up again in Paris by Cardinal Lustiger (and later by his successors).

In 1922, the first year of his pontificate, Pope Pius XI proclaimed Our Lady of the Assumption the principal patroness of France. In his apostolic letter "Galliam, Ecclesiae filiam primogenitam", he states: "We declare and confirm that the Virgin Mary Mother of God, under the title of her Assumption into heaven, has been regularly chosen as the principal patroness of all France before God."

Dominique Ponnau

Art historian, honorary general curator of heritage

Excerpts from : Notre Histoire avec Marie