The month of May

by G. Cantaluppi

Once a prayer for the whole family, in the post-Council period a certain Catholic intelligentsia wanted it abolished; today, also thanks to John Paul II, the Rosary has taken great revenge

Are you bored because of repetitive prayer? Is spontaneous prayer better? But a distinction should be made between "reciting" and "praying": we start from reciting and end up praying: reciting is the external manifestation of prayer, praying is the internal attitude of the spirit that seeks communion with God.

it is true, however, that the Rosary, in the succession of Hail Marys, can lead to distraction and repetition without reflection, to reciting while forgetting to pray. But thinking that a spontaneous prayer is worth more is not realizing that only God creates from nothing. A sculptor can make a wonderful ceramic figure, but he needs clay; the Rosary represents this clay that we can transform into authentic prayer.

Saint Louis Grignion de Montfort observes that «the salvation of the world began with the Hail Mary and the salvation of everyone is linked to this prayer. It was this prayer that brought the Fruit of life to the dry sterile earth, and it is still this prayer, recited well, that makes the word of God germinate in our souls and brings the Fruit of life, Jesus Christ" (Treatise on true devotion to Mary , no. 249).

When we pray the Rosary we experience a particular communion with our Savior Jesus Christ, because it is not simply a series of Hail Marys recited with devotion; it is Jesus who comes back to live in the soul through Mary's maternal action. It should be underlined that the specific element of the Rosary consists in the contemplation of the mystery, otherwise it would no longer be the Gospel transmitted to our lives.

With it the Christian people put themselves at the school of Mary, to be introduced to the contemplation of the beauty of the face of Christ and to the experience of the depth of his love. «Through the Rosary the believer draws an abundance of grace, almost receiving it from the very hands of the Mother of the Redeemer» (John Paul II).

When we pray with the Rosary our gaze turns first of all towards Christ whose saving event is mentioned. In that moment it is as if we opened the door to him and allowed him to enter our lives to do, with each of us, what the good Samaritan did towards the one who had ended up in the hands of the bandits who had robbed him and left him half dead: «He came near him, bandaged his wounds, poured oil and wine; he put him on his horse, took him to an inn and took care of him" (Luke 10:34).

A preface of the Eucharistic Prayer praises Jesus with these words: «Even today, as a Good Samaritan, he comes alongside every man wounded in body and spirit and pours on his wounds the oil of consolation and the wine of hope». He pours the wine, symbol of his blood which atones and purifies. He soothes with oil, a symbol of the grace and consolation of the Holy Spirit that he brings into our soul. Jesus does all this while we are with him with the feelings of Mary. This is why the Rosary is the medicine for our ills. Without us realizing it we are being cured.

Saint John Paul II testifies again: «The Rosary has accompanied me in moments of joy and in those of trial. I have handed over many worries to it, I have always found comfort in it."

It is a prayer that saves us from loneliness and discouragement because it allows us to live a wonderful experience of union with the Lord, our Savior, with the Madonna, with the inhabitants of heaven, with the whole world.

In particular, together with the saving presence of the Lord, the Rosary brings Our Lady into our lives, who never sits idle. She enters with the attitude assumed in the event of the Annunciation, which marks the beginning of the defeat of our adversary.

For this reason the Rosary has also been called a weapon of salvation. In the letter Inclytam et perillustrem addressed in 1934 to the Master General of the Dominicans, Pius from the Blessed Virgin herself, has spread so much throughout the Catholic world."

Generally it is noted that those who pray with the Rosary are also faithful to the Sunday Eucharist and sometimes also to the daily Eucharist, they go to confession, they practice the penances established by the Church, they are obedient to the Shepherds whom the Spirit has placed to feed the flock. It is significant that all the young saints that the Spirit is raising up in the Church today have based their commitment on the Eucharist and the Rosary: ​​let's think of Blessed Chiara Luce, Blessed Carlo Acutis, just to mention two well-known names.

Borrowing an expression from Isaiah (11,12), it can be said that the prayer of the Rosary is "a banner raised for the nations... which gathers from the four corners of the earth" and makes visible a mark of fidelity. Furthermore, the Rosary is a particularly necessary prayer in our time.

It will not have escaped anyone's attention that in recent centuries, in all the Marian apparitions, Heaven has recommended the prayer of the Holy Rosary, and with such insistence that there was nothing similar in previous history.

In Lourdes, Our Lady, in the various apparitions, always held the rosary crown in her hand.

In Fatima, in all six apparitions, not only did she hold the Rosary in her hand, but she asked to recite it every day: mind you, not sometimes but every day.

And the reason seems easy to understand: men today risk being overwhelmed by the noise and frenzy of life. This prayer gently forces you to take a certain amount of time to stop, reflect, rethink your life from the perspective of the life of Christ.

Even all the Popes of the 900th century, starting from Leo XIII, have insistently asked to pray with the Rosary. Above all, Saint Paul VI in the Apostolic Exhortation Marialis cultus underlined, in harmony with the pastoral lines of the Second Vatican Ecumenical Council, the evangelical character of the Rosary and its Christological orientation.

In this regard, John Paul II wrote: «The Rosary... is a distinctly contemplative prayer». Deprived of this dimension, it would be distorted, as Paul VI underlined: «Without contemplation, the Rosary is a body without a soul, and its recitation risks becoming a mechanical repetition of formulas and contradicting Jesus' warning: "When you pray, do not be talkative like the pagans, who believe that they will be heard because of their loquacity" (Mt 6, 7)".

In contemplating the mysteries three things must essentially be done: the re-presentation of the event of salvation (mystery), thanksgiving for the event accomplished by our Lord, supplication to God by virtue of the event accomplished. In the letter Rosarium Virginis Mariae, John Paul II focuses on the meaning of the re-presentation of the event. He says that the events of Jesus' life "are not just a 'yesterday'; they are also the 'today' of salvation." For this reason it is not just a question of remembering, but much more of actualising the event of salvation, of making it present, indeed contemporary with our lives.

This is achieved in a marvelous and perfect way in the celebration of the Liturgy of the Church, but it is not exhausted there.

«If the Liturgy, the action of Christ and the Church, is a salvific action par excellence, the Rosary, as a meditation on Christ with Mary, is healthy contemplation. In fact, immersing oneself, from mystery to mystery, in the life of the Redeemer, ensures that what He has done, and what the liturgy actualizes, is profoundly assimilated and shapes existence". Contemplation is essential for the Rosary, but it can be done in many ways: starting, as we have seen, from the feelings of Jesus, or from Mary's point of view.

But these starting points are not exclusive. A third, equally fruitful one can be indicated, and it consists in starting from the problems of our life, into which we try to project the light of Christ, especially that which comes from the light of the mystery enunciated. It is not being distracted if you think about your problems in the Rosary, as long as you try to illuminate them with the light of the Gospel.

It is beautiful to bring into the heart of this prayer the problems of our families, of some loved ones, of society, of the Church, of the whole world. This is why the Rosary is a very broad prayer, because it takes the breath of our entire life.

That it is right to pray like this was also recalled by John Paul II: «At the same time our heart can enclose in these tens of the Rosary all the facts that make up the life of the individual, of the family, of the nation, of the Church and of 'humanity. Personal events and events of others and, in particular, of those who are closest to us, who are closest to our hearts. Thus the simple prayer of the Rosary beats the rhythm of human life" (Rosarium Virginis Mariae, 2).

How beautiful the Supplication to the Madonna of Pompeii sounds: «O blessed Rosary of Mary, sweet chain that binds us to God, bond of love that unites us to the Angels, tower of salvation in the assaults of hell, safe harbor in the common shipwreck, we will never leave you again. You will be our comfort in the hour of agony, to you the last kiss of life that is extinguished."