Why did Saint Maximilian choose the Miraculous Medal for the Militia Immaculata? The second condition for belonging to the M.I. is very clear: ”To wear the Miraculous Medal”.

What’s more, the M.I.’s first required intention is ”If possible, to pray the following ejaculatory prayer at least once a day: ‘O Mary, conceived without sin, pray for us who have recourse to thee, and for all those who do not have recourse to thee, especially for the Freemasons and for those who are commended to thy care.’" So, we have the expanded prayer from the Miraculous Medal. Why? The answer can be found in the story of the medal, told many times by Saint Maximilian: “The so-called Miraculous Medal is universally known. Its origin dates back to the 27th of November 1830, and the fortunate soul to whom the Most Blessed Immaculate Virgin Mary showed it was Catherine Laboure, at that time a novice of the Sisters of Mercy, in Rue du Bac, Paris. (…)

Amazing miracles of conversion started to occur immediately, and demand for the medal became so high that as many as 80 million of them were struck in the first ten years. Is it not fitting, therefore, that as we consecrate ourselves to the Immaculata without reservation, we should grace our breast with the Miraculous Medal? This medal, then, is the external sign of consecration to the Immaculata: it is the second condition.”

St. Maximilian Kolbe therefore, as he explains in his letter to Brother Paolo Moaratti dated the 26th of January 1926, was conscious that the inner devotion to the Immaculata is crucial if one wants to belong to the M.I. and that the Miraculous Medal is its important external expression: “Strictly speaking, the essence of the M.I. is consecration, even by an internal act, to the Immaculata; a consecration that makes us her unconditional and total instruments in life, death, and eternity; a consecration that makes us her property. Her medal is the external sign of one’s consecration and the source of the many graces that she promises. It is therefore an integral, yet not essential, part. So, if there are no medals, we can do without them, without immediately diminishing the M.I.”

It is indeed the grace of Ratisbonne’s conversion that contributed to the inception of the M.I.: “Ratisbonne, an intelligent and wealthy young Jew from Strasbourg, had been raised away from religion. ‘I did not even believe in God,’ he writes of himself. ‘I had never opened a book about religion.’ With obvious reluctance, he accepted the Miraculous Medal from Baron de Bussieres. Shortly afterward, on the 20th of January 1842, Monsieur de Bussieres came with him into the church of Sant’ Andrea delle Fratte, to the sacristy, to deal with the matters of the service in the memory of the late Monsieur Laferronnays, whose body had been already laid on the catafalque. Here the Immaculata appears to him and converts him in an instant.”

On the 75th anniversary of Ratisbonne’s conversion, on the 20th of January 1917, during his morning meditation, Saint Maximilian received an inspiration to establish the Militia Immaculata.

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