OCTOBER THE MONTH OF THE ROSARY

October is the month of the Rosary. This year the first day of the month falls on a Sunday. As we await the beginning of those thirty one days of prayer, meditation and leading us to contemplation through the recitation of the rosary, let us refresh our minds about the rosary.

When answering a question about the rosary, Fr. William Saunders says: “The rosary is one of the most cherished prayers of our Catholic Church. Introduced by the Creed, the Our Father, three Hail Marys and the Doxology ("Glory Be"), and concluded with the Salve Regina, the rosary involves the recitation of five decades consisting of the Our Father, 10 Hail Marys and the Doxology. During this recitation, the individual meditates on the saving mysteries of our Lord's life and the faithful witness of our Blessed Mother” (The Arlington Catholic Herald, Notre Dame, October 6, 1994).

That is what all who pray the rosary regularly do. Common knowledge as it may be, a good number of faithful ‘reciters’ of the rosary, tend to forget the part about meditation on the mysteries of  our Lord's life and the faithful witness of our Blessed Mother. They simply rush through the hail Marys as if someone was running after them with some sort of weapon with shouts of: “If you don’t finish this rosary in the next seven minutes, I will shoot”. Some times even some words of the Hail Mary are either ‘eaten’, half-way pronounced or completely omitted in the process. Oh, how we mess up Our Lady’s beautiful prayer!

As we recite the rosary, we are supposed to meditatively journey through the Joyful, Luminous, Sorrowful and Glorious mysteries of the rosary. We should bring to mind our Lord's incarnation, Public life, His passion and death and His resurrection from the dead. That way, again to quote Fr. William Saunders “the rosary assists us in growing in a deeper appreciation of these mysteries, in uniting our life more closely to our Lord and in imploring His graced assistance to live the faith. We also ask for the prayers of our Blessed Mother, who leads all believers to her Son”.

Tue 10, Oct 2017 09:10 am