"Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners"

"Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the conversion of sinners?"

Mary's words to three Portuguese children on May 13th, 1917—and all that she said throughout that summer, and the miraculous events that followed—are being remembered this year, and especially this weekend, at a time in human history when darkness closes ever tighter around us.

There can be no misunderstanding this truth: the ecological harms we suffer are rooted in the sin and error that brought Mary to us with her warnings and her hope.

This, then, is a time for Catholics to embrace the words of the Immaculate One. It is a time to pick up our Rosaries and fall to our knees as we go about our political and scientific endeavors to save the world.

Because without the grace of God, we cannot win the battles that loom ahead.

And so, as I did in January, I urge that we all consecrate our eco-activities to the Blessed Mother.

I urge that we ponder the world's corruption through the eyes of Our Lady, and with her trust in her son. And that we understand ecological protection as inherently Marian.

And, of course, I urge that we say the Rosary, which is one of our greatest weapons in the battles ahead to save the world and to save souls.

Mary, Mother of Life, pray for us.

Photo: Flickr/Our Lady of Fatima International Pilgrim Statue