The Catholic Defender: Our Lady of America Patroness of Our Land

Prayer to Our Lady, the Immaculate Virgin, Patroness of America

Oh Immaculate Mother, Queen of our country, open our hearts, our homes, and our land to the coming of Jesus, your Divine Son. With Him, reign over us, O heavenly Lady, so pure and so bright with the radiance of God’s light shining in and about you. Be our leader against the powers of evil set upon wresting the world of souls, redeemed at such a great cost by the sufferings of your Son and of yourself, in union with Him, from that same Savior, Who loves us with infinite charity.

We gather about you, O chaste and holy Mother, Virgin Immaculate, Patroness of our beloved Land, determined to fight under your banner of holy purity against the wickedness that would make all the world an abyss of evil, without God and without your loving maternal care.

We consecrate our hearts, our homes, our Land to your Most Pure Heart, O great Queen, that the kingdom of your Son, our Redeemer and our God, may be firmly established in us.

We ask no special sign of you, sweet Mother, for we believe in your great love for us, and we place in you our entire confidence. We promise to honor you by faith, love, and the purity of our lives according to your desire.

Reign over us, then, O Virgin Immaculate, with your Son, Jesus Christ. May His Divine Heart and your most chaste Heart be ever enthroned and glorified among us. Use us, your children of America, as your instruments of peace among men and nations. Work your miracles of grace in us, so that we may be a glory to the Blessed Trinity, Who created, redeemed, and sanctifies us.

May your valiant spouse, St. Joseph, with the holy Angels and Saints, assist you and us in “renewing the face of the earth.” Then when our work is over, come, Holy Immaculate Mother, and as our Victorious Queen, lead us to the eternal kingdom, where your Son reigns forever as King.

Amen

The choice of Our Lady in her Immaculate Conception as Patroness of the United States was approved by Pope Pius IX in an audience on Feb. 7, 1847; and this approval was announced in a decree of Propaganda dated July 2, the same year. Both of these decrees of Propaganda have the signature of Cardinal Fransoni.

A reported Vision of our Lady at Rome Indiana.

It was on the eve of the feast of the North American martyrs, September 25, 1956, that Our Lady appeared

to Sister Mary Ephrem.  Beginning in 1938, Sister began to have what seem like mystical spiritual experiences. She thought little of them, presuming all religious have them. As these visits took on the nature of a specific program of devotion to Mary which Sister was asked to propagate, she then turned to Monsignor Paul F. Leibold. Monsignor Leibold, later Archbishop of the Cincinnati, Ohio Archdiocese, would be her spiritual director for many years until 1972, when he suddenly died due to an aneurysm. Archbishop Leibold had become so convinced of the authenticity of this message that he approved Sister’s writings and placed his imprimatur on the design of the medal. Our Lady had asked Sister to have struck a medal that would bear the image of Our Lady of America on the front and the symbol of the Christian Family and the Blessed Trinity on the back.

Our Lady promised that greater miracles than those granted at Lourdes and Fatima would be granted here in America, the United States in particular, if we do as she desires.

Sister Mary Ephrem stated that Our Lady called herself Our Lady of America in response to the love and desire that reached out for this special title in the hearts of her children in America.

For example, Our Lady repeatedly spoke approvingly about the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception in Washington D.C. This new title is a sign of Our Lady’s pleasure in the devotion of her children of America towards her and this visit is a response to the longing, conscious or unconscious, in the hearts of her children in America.

On the evening of the feast of the Most Holy Rosary, October 7, 1957, Our Lady again appeared. Her hands were clasped in an attitude of prayer. Her look was serious, though her countenance retained its usual deep serenity.

Hanging from her right hand was a blue rosary of a glass-like quality, I was conscious of the fact that what she was about to say to me was not only very grave but of the utmost importance. Our Lady reiterated in a similar manner her first warnings:

My beloved daughter, what I am about to tell you concerns in a particular way my children in America. Unless they do penance by mortification and self-denial and thus reform their lives, God will visit them with punishments hitherto unknown to them. My child, there will be peace, as has been promised, but not until my children are purified and cleansed from defilement, and clothed thus with the white garment of grace, are made ready to receive this peace, so long promised and so long held back because of the sins of men. My dear children, either you will do as I desire and reform your lives, or God Himself will need to cleanse you in the fires of untold punishment. You must be prepared to receive His great gift of peace.

If you will not prepare yourselves, God will Himself be forced to do so in His justice and mercy.Making the rosary a family prayer is very pleasing to me. I ask that all families strive to do so. But be careful to say it with great devotion, meditating on each mystery and striving to imitate in your daily lives the virtues depicted therein. Live the mysteries of the rosary as I lived them, and it will become a chain binding you to me forever. They who are found in the circle of my rosary will never be lost.

I myself will lead them at death to the throne of my Son, to be eternally united to Him.Write these words upon your hearts, my dear children, because of the compassion I have for you in my Immaculate Heart. Oh, if you knew the punishments I am holding back from you by my pleading and intercession on your behalf!

Nihil Obstat: Daniel Pilarczyk, S.T.D.Imprimatur: +Paul F. Leibold, V.G.Cincinnati, Jan. 25, 1963