Dr Renu Rita Silvano, OCV –
Divine providence itself has guided the evolution of a powerful prayer method meant for both simple and highly educated people which we call the Rosary. It is, in actual fact, the most popular “life of Christ” available to, and in daily use by, millions of believers!
In early centuries, people started praying what they called the Marian Psalter – in imitation of the 150 psalms of the Bible, devout Christians prayed the first half of the Hail Mary 150 times using prayer beads. Soon, in the 6th century, God led believers to combine the Angelic Salutation (“Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with you!”) with the Evangelical Salutation: “Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb!” (the inspired greeting of Elizabeth to Mary).
These were put together in the Offertory Prayer for the Mass of the last Sunday of Advent, and formed the first half of what would become known as the Ave Maria or Hail Mary. This went on till the 11th century. The Hail Mary did not yet have an explicit intercessory dimension, but was viewed as a preparatory prayer said before formally petitioning God for a particular grace.
The second half of the Hail Mary was introduced in the latter part of the Middle Ages. As explained by Venerable Fulton J. Sheen, “Since it seizes upon the two decisive moments of life: ‘now’ and ‘at the hour of our death,’ it suggests the spontaneous outcry of people in a great calamity.
The Black Death, which ravaged all Europe and wiped out a third of its population, prompted the faithful to cry out to the Mother of our Lord to protect them at a time when the present moment and death were almost one” (The World’s First Love, 1996, p.207). For four years, the Black Plague swept through all of Europe at a rate that affected and devastated every city and town, and wiped out about 25 million people of Europe. The death, chaos, confusion, and turmoil of the era had a devastating effect upon the people’s faith. But in his divine Providence, God grafted onto the existing Hail Mary a new development – an addition to the Hail Mary that emanated from the hearts of God’s afflicted people and that gave the Hail Mary the added dimension of urgent petition and supplication: “Holy Mary, mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death. Amen.”
Next, God gave St. Dominic today’s prayer method (which we call the Rosary) as a weapon to fight against the evils of the Albigensian heresy, which taught that only spiritual realities were good and everything material was evil. According to their doctrine, each person’s soul is imprisoned in an evil body. If a person wants to experience “salvation,” they need to be freed from the material prison of the flesh. Thus, this belief system was a direct attack against the Christian saving mystery that “the Word became flesh,” and the mysteries of Jesus’ Incarnation, Passion and Resurrection.
St Dominic made great efforts to preach against the heresy by his own gifted preaching and knowledge. (He founded the Order of Preachers.) However, after having spent several years preaching in town after town, he realized that he was up against a formidable spiritual power and needed something strong enough to overcome the enemy.
Hence, he retreated into the silence of the forest near the town of Fanjeaux (France, 1208) to pray, begging heaven to come to his aid and give him what he needed. After three days of intense prayer, fasting and penitential acts, the Mother of Jesus appeared to him and suggested that praying the Ave Maria would give his preaching new power. She said to him, “When God willed to renew the face of the earth, he began by sending down on it the fertilizing rain of the Angelic Salutation. Therefore, preach my Psalter.” This was the founding moment of the holy Rosary given to Dominic as a weapon against false doctrine.
Mary also instructed St Dominic how to pray the rosary: to divide the 150 Hail Marys into 10 Hail Marys, with each decade attached to a particular mystery of the life of Christ – the faithful were to recall (and meditate on) the mysteries of Jesus’ life while praying the 10 Hail Marys. This prayer method would provide answers against the heresy promoted by the Albigensians. After this encounter, Dominic continued his preaching with renewed fervour. He gathered the people and preached to them the mysteries of salvation – the Incarnation, the Redemption, and eternal life. As Mary had promised, this recitation and preaching of the Rosary proved to be most fruitful!
LOURDES: In these apparitions, the Blessed Mother held in her hand a golden rosary with white beads. She made the first of the 18 apparitions on February 11, 1858. In preparation for each apparition, Bernadette went to the grotto and prayed the rosary. The apparition became known as a rosary apparition. For the first time in any Marian apparition, Mary prayed parts of the rosary with the visionary. She did not pray the Hail Mary because she is already in heaven and does not pray to herself. During the Our Father and Hail Mary, Our Lady let her fingers glide over the beads as Bernadette prayed them; when it came to pray the Glory Be, she joined her voice to that of St. Bernadette. In 1862, when the apparitions were affirmed by Bl. Pope Pius IX, a worldwide renewal of rosary devotion was sparked. The Feast of Our Lady of the Rosary, held on Oct.7, is one of the largest celebrations at the Shrine of Lourdes every year.
FATIMA: Portugal (1917): The Marian apparitions that took place in Fatima are also essentially rosary apparitions, in which Mary appeared to three little children 6 times (from May to October). Each time she appeared, she held a rosary and asked that the rosary be prayed daily for peace in the world and an end to World War I. She also asked the children to add the following prayer after the Glory Be: “Oh my Jesus, forgive us our sins, save us from the fires of hell, and lead all souls to heaven, especially those in most need of thy mercy.” Eventually, the Servant of God, Fr. Patrick Peyton, initiated a radio program to spread the family rosary and officially launched the Family Rosary apostolate in 1942. He coined the catchy slogan, “The family that prays together stays together.”
THE 1960s and 1970s: The turbulent era of the 1960s and 70s caused many post-conciliar Catholics to incorrectly assume that the Church no longer desired to promote this prayer method, since Vatican II did not specifically mention the rosary, and since the Church was no longer to be described as the Church Militant at war with the forces of darkness, etc.
But Blessed Paul VI in 1966 wrote an encyclical in which he promoted prayer for peace during the month of October, and the rosary was again a prominent theme in the encyclical. He wrote: “Vatican II recommended use of the rosary to all the children of the Church, not in express words, but in unmistakable fashion in this phrase: ‘Let them value highly the pious practices and exercises directed to the Blessed Virgin and approved over the centuries by the Magisterium.” (Christi Matri, 9).
And just two weeks after his election in 1978, St. John Paul II announced to the whole world that the rosary was his favourite prayer. He even took a phrase from the writings of St. Louis de Montfort as his papal motto: Totus Tuus. And in 2002, St. John Paul II added a new set of mysteries to the rosary, namely the Luminous Mysteries, thus making it an Apostolic Rosary. He wrote, “To recite the rosary is nothing other than to contemplate with Mary the face of Christ… Through prayer and meditation on the mysteries of the life of Christ, Mary leads you safely towards her Son! Do not be ashamed to recite the rosary alone, while you walk along the streets to school, to the university or to work, or as you commute by public transport… This prayer will help you to be strong in your faith, constant in charity, joyful and persevering in hope.”
And his efforts, and those of succeeding Popes, and the example of saints like Mother Teresa and others, have brought back to new popularity this method of recalling and praying about the whole “Life of Christ.” Perhaps it has never before been more needed! Today’s world has more heresies prevailing than that of the Albigensians of old, and these are taking people away from God, from Christ, and from the Church, So only personal prayer, and prayer methods which enable us to dwell on the whole life of Christ, can strengthen our faith and our spiritual well-being!
Dr. Renu Rita Silvano (age 63) is a member of the Order of Consecrated Virgins since 1992. She earned a Doctorate in Sacred Theology from the Pontifical University Angelicum, Rome 1991. She was nominated by Pope Benedict XVI to participate in the 2005 Synod of Bishops in Rome on The Eucharist in the life and mission of the Church. She is the Director of the Catholic Bible Institute, Mumbai, since 1997. She has authored several books including The Mother of Jesus and God’s Word is Spirit and Life, and is the Editor of Bible Aglow magazine. She was Vice-President of the National Service Team of the Catholic Charismatic Renewal in India, and member of the Executive Committee of the worldwide Catholic Biblical Federation.