One of the world's oldest surviving universities, al-Azhar at Cairo, was originally established by the Fāṭimids, but Saladin (Ṣalāḥ al-Dīn al-Ayyūbī), after ousting the Fāṭimids, consecrated it to Sunni learning in the 12th century.
The Canaanite sanctuary was taken over without hesitation by Abraham, who built an altar there and consecrated it to Yahweh, at least if the Yahwistic tradition in Genesis is to be believed.
But I was always careful to make the Proclamations absolutely indiscriminate, and merely recommendatory; or rather mere designations of a day, on which all who thought proper might unite in consecrating it to religious purposes, according to their own faith & forms.
When the Ivorian government invited Pope John Paul II to consecrate it in 1990, he voiced mild displeasure but agreed to come on one condition: a hospital for the poor was to be built next door.
Women, perhaps, want their marriages not to terminate their status as the prize, but to consecrate it as a continual beginning.
With a roof finally in place, Pope Benedict was able to consecrate it as a basilica last year.
And the Roman Catholic authorities were offended by the church's unusual curved concrete form and refused to consecrate it until 1959.
The novel's appearance under these auspices is, of course, an effort to consecrate it as a classic, but the attempt may have come too late.
In Barcelona, gay activists are calling for a kiss-in outside the Sagrada Familia when the Pope arrives to consecrate it.
We are connected to every Christian who has received Eucharist, every priest and bishop who has consecrated it, and to the sacrifice of Christ who once and for all died for the remission of sins.
