Elizabeth received this request from Our Lady in the early part of 1962. She brought the request to the bishop on February 2, and his response to Elizabeth was, “Why the very old Hail Mary should be recited differently?” It is not recorded in her diary what Elizabeth’s response to the bishop was, but she obviously must have spoken to Jesus about her conversation with the bishop. Our Lord reassured Elizabeth by saying: “It is exclusively thanks to the efficacious pleas of the Most Holy Virgin that the Most Holy Trinity granted the effusion of the Flame of Love. By it, ask in the prayer with which you greet My Most Holy Mother: ‘Spread the effect of grace of thy Flame of Love over all of humanity, now and at the hour of our death. Amen.’ So that, by its effect, humanity is converted.”
Although Elizabeth had been obedient in bringing the petition to the bishop, she waited eight months to record it in her diary. It seems clear from Elizabeth’s hesitation to even record Our Lady’s request, that she was uncomfortable or surprised by the added petition to the Hail Mary.
Elizabeth and the bishop’s response were not much different than our own, when we hear about the petition added to the age old prayer. Why in the world would Our Lady want to change something that we learned as a child at our mother’s knees? Why isn't it fine, just the way it is? Why this request from heaven? Before we answer those questions, let’s look at the history of the Hail Mary.
Unlike the Our Father, which Jesus taught to His apostles, the Hail Mary was not given to us by Our Lord or Our Lady. The prayer evolved within the Church over the centuries.
The prayer is divided into three parts. The first being the Angel Gabriel’s greeting to Mary: Hail (Mary) full of grace! The Lord is with you” (Lk. 1 vs. 28)! The second are the words spoken to Mary by St. Elizabeth at the time of their Visitation: “Most blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb” (Jesus) (Lk. 1 vs. 42). The third part: “Holy Mary, mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death. Amen,” was noted in the Catechism of the Council of Trent, 1566, as framed by the Church.
The first two parts of the Hail Mary were the first to be adopted by the faithful, as Marian devotion manifested itself in the early Church. The last section was added by the Church at some later date.
In 1072, St. Peter Damien is the first to testify that the Ave Maria had become a favorite prayer of the people. The Synod Statues of Paris around 1210 expressed the desire for the faithful to learn the Ave Maria, in addition to the Lord’s Prayer and the Creed. Religious and laity both embraced this prayer to Mary and in time, with the addition of the Creed, the Our Father and the Glory Be, it evolved into what we now know as the rosary.
The Catechism of the Catholic Church (par. 2678) states: Medieval piety in the West developed the prayer of the rosary as a popular substitute for the Liturgy of the Hours. Tradition attributes the spread of the Rosary to St. Dominic, in the thirteenth century.
The rosary became a vital prayer of the Church. In 1571, Pope Pius V asked the faithful to pray the rosary, under the title of Our Lady of Victory, to defeat the Muslims who were ravaging Europe. Although outnumbered in both vessels and sailors, they won the battle on October 7. The following year the feast to Our Lady of the Rosary was established.
When Our Lady appeared to St. Bernadette in Lourdes, France she was holding the rosary in her hands and fingered the beads as Bernadette prayed. At Fatima, Mary told the children to pray the rosary every day. After showing them a vision of hell, she taught them a prayer to pray after each mystery: “O my Jesus, forgive us our sins, save us from the fire of hell. Lead all souls to heaven, especially those who are most in need of Thy mercy.” Although we are all quite familiar and comfortable with that addition to the rosary, it was something new to the people of those times. There may have been some who were hesitant to respond to Mary’s request. Our Lady knowing the state of the world saw the need for this petition to be added to the rosary.
The times in which we live have worsened greatly since the Fatima apparitions. Humanity has not responded to the requests of Our Lady to pray and sacrifice to bring peace to the world. Our Mother has come once again, this time through locutions to Elizabeth Kindelmann, and has asked for prayers, sacrifices, fasting, night vigils, and praying the rosary with the Flame of Love petition inserted into the Hail Mary. We must listen and respond to our Mother. Mama is pleading with us, to storm heaven with the battle cry of her Cause: “Spread the effect of grace of thy Flame of Love to all humanity.” Her heart breaks for her children who are falling into hell. Like little children, let us unceasingly beg the heavenly Father for the effusion of the Flame of Love to be poured upon mankind by praying our Lady’s petition.
Responding to Mary’s request may seem foreign at first, and you may “trip up” as you pray it. But in time, it falls beautifully into the rhythm of the Hail Mary. As you grow comfortable with it, you will accept that this addition is part of the evolution of the prayer. See the Hail Mary as a rose that continues to open.
“Yes, my little one, we will put out fire with fire: the fire of hatred with the fire of love. The fire of Satan’s hatred hurls its flames so high that he believes his victory is at hand. But my Flame of Love will blind Satan. I have placed this Flame of Love in your hands, and soon it will reach its destination, and the flames which spring from my love will quench the fire of hell. My flame of Love, with its unimaginable light and beneficent warmth, will wrap the earth. To accomplish this, my little one, I need sacrifice, your sacrifice and the sacrifice of many such that the minds and hearts where the infernal hatred is burning may receive the soft light of my Flame of Love” (Our Lady to Elizabeth Kindelmann - Dec. 6, 1964).
Cardinal Peter Erdo, the local and Archbishop of Budapest Hungary and one of the highest ranking Princes in the Church stated this when giving the Imprimatur for the Flame of Love messages: “I personally believe the completion…of the Spiritual Diary of Elizabeth Kindelmann…is a sign of the life giving Spirit…We have found it brings an authentic Catholic spirituality and devotion toward the Virgin Mary that is in total conformity with the Catholic Faith…at a given moment in history, there appears in the Church something beautiful, a new possibility for the Church. I believe that this is true of the Flame of Love Movement.”
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The Flame of Love was posted on Avia Joy on April 17, 2015. It gives an explanation of the Movement.
To receive an abridged version of The Flame of Love click on www.myconsecration.org.
For more information about The Flame of Love click on www.flameoflove.us and divineantidote.wordpress.com.
I too am having difficulty understanding why we should add more to a prayer that we have been reciting as a church for a very long time. I must say that the example you use is very good and one that I will definitely contemplate. We certainly have to do something! Thank you for opening the rose for us Avia Joy!
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