Holy Hill Cross
Rosarium Virginis Mariae
The Rosary of the Virgin Mary
Our Lady of the Rosary of
Apostolic Letter Rosarium Virginis Mariae of the Supreme
Pontiff John Paul II to the Bishops, Clergy and Faithful on the the Most Holy
Rosary
The 16th day of October in the year
2002
(Bold emphasis provided by Holy Hill Cross Website)
INTRODUCTION
1. The
Rosary
of the
Virgin Mary,
which gradually took form in the second millennium under the guidance of the
Spirit of God,
is a
prayer
loved by countless
Saints and encouraged by the
Magisterium.
Simple yet profound, it still remains, at the dawn of this third millennium, a
prayer
of great significance, destined to bring forth a harvest of
holiness.
It blends easily into the spiritual journey of the
Christian
life, which, after two thousand years, has lost none of the
freshness of its beginnings and feels drawn by the
Spirit of God
to "set out into the deep" (duc in
altum!) in order once more to proclaim, and even cry out, before the
world that
Jesus Christ is Lord and Saviour, "the way, and
the truth and the life" (Jn
14:6),
"the goal of human history and the point on which the desires of history
and civilization turn".1
The
Rosary,
though clearly Marian in character, is at heart a Christocentric
prayer.
In the sobriety of its elements, it has all the depth of the Gospel message in its entirety,
of which it can be said to be a compendium.2 It is an echo of the
prayer
of
Mary,
her perennial
Magnificat for the work of the
redemptive
Incarnation which began in her virginal womb.
With the Rosary, the Christian people sit at the
The Popes and the Rosary
2. Numerous predecessors of mine
attributed great importance to this
prayer.
Worthy of special note in this regard is
Pope Leo XIII
who on 1 September 1883 promulgated the Encyclical
Supremi Apostolatus Officio,3 a document
of great worth, the first of his many statements about this
prayer,
in which he proposed the
Rosary as an effective spiritual weapon against the
evils afflicting society. Among the more recent
Popes
who, from the time of the Second Vatican Council, have distinguished themselves
in promoting the
Rosary I would mention Blessed John XXIII4 and
above all Pope Paul VI, who in his Apostolic Exhortation
Marialis Cultus emphasized, in the spirit of
the Second Vatican Council, the
Rosary's
evangelical character and its Christocentric inspiration. I myself have often
encouraged the frequent recitation of the
Rosary.
From my youthful years this
prayer has held an important place in my spiritual
life. I was powerfully reminded of this during my recent visit to
With these words, dear brothers and
sisters, I set the first year of my
Pontificate within the daily rhythm of the
Rosary.
Today, as I begin the twenty-fifth year of
my service as the
Successor of Peter, I wish to do the same.
How many graces have I received in these years from the
Blessed
Virgin through the
Rosary:
Magnificat anima mea Dominum!
I
wish to lift up my thanks to the
Lord
in the words of his
Most Holy Mother, under whose protection I have placed
my Petrine ministry: Totus Tuus!
October 2002 – October 2003: The Year of the Rosary
3. Therefore, in continuity with my
reflection in the Apostolic Letter
Novo
Millennio Ineunte, in which, after the experience of the Jubilee, I invited
the people of God to "start afresh from
Christ",6
I have felt drawn to offer a reflection on the
Rosary,
as a kind of Marian complement to that Letter and an exhortation to
contemplate
the face of
Christ in union with, and at the school of, his
Most Holy
Mother. To recite the Rosary
is nothing other than to contemplate
with Mary
the face of Christ. As a way of highlighting
this invitation, prompted by the forthcoming 120th anniversary of the
aforementioned
Encyclical of Leo XIII, I desire that during the course
of this year the
Rosary should be especially emphasized and promoted in
the various
Christian communities. I therefore proclaim the year
from October 2002 to October 2003
the Year
of the Rosary.
I leave this pastoral proposal to the
initiative of each ecclesial community. It is not my intention to encumber but
rather to complete and consolidate pastoral programs of the Particular
Churches. I am confident that the proposal will find a ready and generous
reception. The Rosary,
reclaimed in its full meaning, goes to the very heart of Christian
life; it offers a familiar yet fruitful spiritual and educational
opportunity for personal
contemplation, the formation of the People of God, and
the new evangelization. I am pleased to reaffirm this also in the joyful
remembrance of another anniversary: the fortieth anniversary of the opening of
the Second Vatican Ecumenical Council on
Objections to the Rosary
4. The timeliness of this proposal is
evident from a number of considerations. First, the urgent need to
counter a certain crisis of the Rosary,
which in the present historical and theological context can risk being wrongly
devalued, and therefore no longer taught to the younger generation.
There are some who think that the centrality of the
Liturgy,
rightly stressed by the Second Vatican Ecumenical Council, necessarily entails
giving lesser importance to the
Rosary.
Yet, as Pope
Paul VI made clear, not only does this prayer
not conflict with the Liturgy, it sustains
it, since it
serves as an excellent introduction and a faithful echo of the
Liturgy,
enabling people to participate fully and interiorly in it and to reap its
fruits in their daily lives.
Perhaps too, there are some who fear
that the
Rosary is somehow not ecumenical because of its
distinctly Marian character. Yet the
Rosary
clearly belongs to the kind of veneration of the Mother of God described by the
Council: a
devotion directed to the
Christological
centre of the Christian faith, in such a way that "when
the Mother
is honoured, the Son ... is duly known, loved and glorified".8
If properly revitalized, the
Rosary
is an aid and certainly not a hindrance to ecumenism!
A path of contemplation
5. But the most important reason for
strongly encouraging the practice of the
Rosary
is that it represents a most effective means of fostering among the
faithful
that commitment to the contemplation
of the Christian
mystery which I have proposed in the Apostolic Letter
Novo Millennio Ineunte as a genuine
"training in
holiness": "What is needed is a
Christian
life distinguished above all in the art of
prayer".9
Inasmuch as contemporary culture, even amid so many indications to the contrary,
has witnessed the flowering of a new call for spirituality, due also to the
influence of other religions, it is more urgent than ever that our
Christian
communities should become "genuine schools of
prayer".10
The Rosary
belongs among the finest and most praiseworthy traditions of Christian
contemplation. Developed in the West, it is a typically
meditative prayer, corresponding in some way to the "prayer
of the heart" or "Jesus prayer" which took root in the soil of
the Christian East.
Prayer for peace and for the family
6. A number of historical
circumstances also make a revival of the Rosary
quite timely. First of all, the need to implore from God
the gift of peace. The Rosary
has many times been proposed by my predecessors and myself as a prayer
for peace. At the start of a millennium which began with the terrifying attacks
of 11 September 2001, a millennium which witnesses every day innumerous parts
of the world fresh scenes of bloodshed and violence,
to rediscover the Rosary as a means to immerse oneself in contemplation
of the mystery of Christ who "is our peace", since he made
"the two of us one, and broke down the dividing wall of hostility" (Eph 2:14). Consequently, one cannot recite
the Rosary
without feeling caught up in a clear commitment to advancing peace, especially
in the
A similar need
for commitment and prayer arises in relation to another critical
contemporary issue: the family,
the primary cell of society, increasingly menaced by forces of disintegration
on both the ideological and practical planes, so as to make us fear for the
future of this fundamental and indispensable institution and, with it, for the
future of society as a whole. The revival of the
Rosary
in
Christian families, within the context of a broader
pastoral ministry to the family, will be an effective aid to countering the devastating
effects of this crisis typical of our age.
"Behold, your Mother!" (Jn 19:27)
7. Many signs indicate that
still today the Blessed Virgin desires to exercise through this same prayer
that maternal concern to which the dying Redeemer
entrusted, in the person of the beloved disciple, all the sons and daughters of
the Church:
"Woman, behold your son!" (Jn19:26).
Well-known are the occasions in the nineteenth and the twentieth centuries on
which the Mother of Christ made her presence felt and her voice heard, in order
to exhort the People of God to this form of contemplative
prayer. I would mention in particular, on account
of their great influence on the lives of Christians and the authoritative
recognition they have received from the
Church,
the
apparitions
of
Lourdes
and of Fatima;11 these shrines continue to be visited by great
numbers of pilgrims seeking comfort and hope.
Following the witnesses
8. It would be impossible to name all
the many
Saints who discovered in the
Rosary
a genuine path to growth in
holiness. We need but mention
Saint Louis
Marie Grignion de Montfort, the author of an excellent work
on the
Rosary,12
and, closer to ourselves, Padre Pio of Pietrelcina, whom I recently had the joy
of canonizing. As a true apostle of the
Rosary,
Blessed Bartolo Longo had a special charism. His path to
holiness
rested on an inspiration heard in the depths of his heart: "Whoever
spreads the
Rosary is saved!".13 As a result, he
felt called to build a Church dedicated to Our Lady of the Holy Rosary in
Pompei, against the background of the ruins of the ancient city, which scarcely
heard the proclamation of Christ before being buried in 79 A.D. during an
eruption of Mount Vesuvius, only to emerge centuries later from its ashes as a
witness to the lights and shadows of classical civilization. By his whole
life's work and especially by the practice of the "Fifteen
Saturdays", Bartolo Longo promoted the Christocentric and
contemplative
heart of the
Rosary, and received great encouragement and support
from
Leo XIII,
the "Pope of the Rosary".
CHAPTER I
CONTEMPLATING CHRIST WITH MARY
A face radiant as the sun
9. "And he was transfigured before
them, and his face shone like the sun" (Mt
17:2). The Gospel scene of
Christ's transfiguration, in which the three
Apostles
Peter,
James
and
John
appear entranced by the beauty of the
Redeemer,
can be seen as an icon of
Christian
contemplation. To look upon the face of
Christ,
to recognize its mystery amid the daily events and the sufferings of his human
life, and then to grasp the divine splendor definitively revealed in the Risen
Lord, seated in glory at the right hand of the
Father:
this is the task of every follower of
Christ
and therefore the task of each one of us. In contemplating
Christ's face we become open to receiving the mystery of Trinitarian life,
experiencing ever anew the love of the Father
and delighting in the joy of the Holy Spirit.
Saint Paul's
words can then be applied to us: "Beholding the glory of the Lord, we are
being changed into his likeness, from one degree of glory to another; for this
comes from the Lord who is the
Spirit"
(2Cor
Mary, model of contemplation
10. The
contemplation
of
Christ
has an incomparable model
in
Mary.
In a unique way the face of the Son belongs to
Mary.
It was in her womb that
Christ was formed, receiving from her a human
resemblance which points to an even greater spiritual closeness. No one has ever devoted himself to the contemplation
of the face of Christ as faithfully as Mary.
The eyes of her
heart already turned to him at the
Annunciation,
when she conceived him by the power of the
Holy Spirit.
In the months that followed she began to sense his presence and to picture his
features. When at last she gave birth to him in
Bethlehem,
her eyes were able to gaze tenderly on the face of her Son, as she
"wrapped him in swaddling cloths, and laid him in a manger" (Lk2:7).
Thereafter Mary's
gaze, ever filled with adoration and wonder, would never leave him.
At times it would be a questioning look,
as in the episode of the finding in the
Temple:
"Son, why have you treated us so?" (Lk
2:48); it would always be a penetrating gaze,
one capable of deeply understanding
Jesus,
even to the point of perceiving his hidden feelings and anticipating his
decisions, as at
Cana (cf.
Jn 2:5).
At other times it would be a look of sorrow,
especially beneath the Cross, where her vision would still be that of a mother
giving birth, for
Mary not only shared the passion and death of her Son,
she also received the new son given to her in the beloved disciple (cf.
Jn 19:26-27). On the morning of Easter
hers would be a gaze radiant with the joy of
the
Resurrection,
and finally, on the day of
Pentecost,
a gaze
afire with the outpouring of the
Spirit
(cf. Acts
Mary's memories
11.
Mary
lived with her eyes fixed on
Christ,
treasuring his every word: "She kept all these things, pondering them in
her
heart"
(Lk
Even now, amid the joyful songs of the
heavenly
Jerusalem, the reasons for her thanksgiving and praise remain
unchanged. They inspire her maternal concern for the
The Rosary, a contemplative prayer
12. The Rosary,
precisely because it starts with Mary's
own experience, is an exquisitely contemplative
prayer. Without this contemplative
dimension, it would lose its meaning, as Pope Paul VI clearly pointed out:
"Without contemplation, the Rosary
is a body without a soul, and its recitation runs the risk of becoming a
mechanical repetition of formulas, in violation of the admonition of Christ:
'In praying do not heap up empty phrases as the Gentiles do; for they think
they will be heard for their many words' (Mt
6:7). By its nature the recitation of the Rosary
calls for a quiet rhythm and a lingering pace, helping the individual to
meditate on the mysteries of the Lord's life
as seen through the eyes of her who was closest to the Lord. In this way the
unfathomable riches of these mysteries are disclosed".14
It is worth pausing to consider this
profound insight of Paul VI, in order to bring out certain aspects of the
Rosary
which show that it is really a form of Christocentric
contemplation.
Remembering Christ with Mary
13.
Mary's
contemplation
is above all a remembering. We
need to understand this word in the biblical sense of remembrance (zakar) as a making present of the works
brought about by
God in the history of salvation. The
Bible
is an account of saving events culminating in
Christ
himself. These events not only belong to "yesterday";
they are also part of the "today" of
salvation. This making present comes about above all in the
Liturgy:
what
God
accomplished centuries ago did not only affect the direct witnesses of those
events; it continues to affect people in every age with its gift of grace. To
some extent this is also true of every other devout approach to those events:
to "remember" them in a spirit of faith and love is to be open to the
grace which
Christ won for us by the mysteries of his
life,
death and
resurrection.
Consequently, while it must be
reaffirmed with the Second Vatican Council that the
Liturgy,
as the exercise of the priestly office of
Christ
and an act of public worship, is "the summit to which the activity of the
Church
is directed and the font from which all its power flows",15 it is also necessary to recall that the spiritual life "is not
limited solely to participation in the liturgy.
Christians, while they are called to prayer
in common, must also go to their own rooms to pray to their Father
in secret (cf. Mt 6:6); indeed,
according to the teaching of the Apostle,
they must pray without ceasing (cf.1 Thes 5:17)".16
The Rosary, in its own particular way, is part of this
varied panorama of "ceaseless" prayer.
If the
Liturgy,
as the activity of
Christ and the
Church,
is a saving action par excellence,
the
Rosary
too, as a "meditation" with
Mary
on
Christ,
is a salutary
contemplation.
By immersing us in the mysteries of the
Redeemer's
life, it ensures that what he has done and what the
liturgy
makes present is profoundly assimilated and shapes our existence.
Learning Christ from Mary
14.
Christ
is the supreme Teacher, the revealer and the one revealed. It is not just a
question of learning what he taught but of "learning him". In this regard could we have any better
teacher than
Mary? From the divine
standpoint, the Spirit is the interior teacher who leads us to the full
truth of Christ (cf. Jn
The
first of the "signs" worked by
Jesus
– the changing of water into wine at the marriage in
Cana
– clearly presents Mary in the guise of a teacher, as she urges the servants to do what Jesus
commands (cf. Jn 2:5). We can
imagine that she would have done likewise for the disciples after Jesus'
Ascension, when she joined them in awaiting the
Holy Spirit
and supported them in their first mission.
Contemplating
the scenes of the
Rosary in union with
Mary
is a means of learning from her to "read"
Christ,
to discover his secrets and to understand his message.
This school of Mary
is all the more effective if we consider that she teaches by obtaining for us
in abundance the gifts of the Holy Spirit,
even as she offers us the incomparable example of her own "pilgrimage of
faith".17 As we contemplate
each mystery of her Son's life, she invites us to do as she did at the Annunciation:
to ask humbly the questions which open us to the light, in order to end with
the obedience of faith: "Behold I am the handmaid of the Lord; be it done
to me according to your word" (Lk
1:38).
Being conformed to Christ with Mary
15. Christian spirituality is
distinguished by the disciple's commitment to become conformed ever more fully
to his Master (cf. Rom
In the spiritual journey of the
Rosary,
based on the constant
contemplation – in
Mary's
company – of the face of
Christ, this demanding ideal of being conformed to him
is pursued through an association which could be described in terms of
friendship. We are thereby enabled to enter naturally into
Christ's life
and as it were to share his deepest feelings. In this regard Blessed Bartolo
Longo has written: "Just as two friends, frequently in each other's
company, tend to develop similar habits, so too, by holding familiar converse
with
Jesus
and the
Blessed
Virgin, by meditating on the mysteries of the
Rosary
and by living the same life in
Holy
Communion, we can become, to the extent of our lowliness,
similar to them and can learn from these supreme models a life of humility,
poverty, hiddenness, patience and perfection".18
In this process of being conformed to
Christ
in the
Rosary,
we entrust ourselves in a special way to the maternal care of the
Blessed
Virgin. She who is both the Mother
of Christ and a member of the Church,
indeed her "pre-eminent and altogether singular member",19 is
at the same time the "Mother of the Church".
As such, she continually brings to birth children for the mystical Body of her
Son. She does so through her intercession,
imploring upon them the inexhaustible outpouring of the Spirit.
Mary
is the perfect icon of the motherhood of the
Church.
The
Rosary
mystically transports us to
Mary's side as she is busy watching over the human
growth of
Christ in the home of
Nazareth.
This enables her to train us and to mold us with the same care, until
Christ
is "fully formed" in us (cf.
Gal
Praying to Christ with Mary
16.
Jesus
invited us to turn to
God with insistence and the confidence that we will be
heard: "Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock,
and it will be opened to you" (Mt
7:7). The basis for this power of
prayer
is the goodness of the
Father, but also the mediation of
Christ
himself (cf. 1Jn 2:1) and the
working of the
Holy Spirit who "intercedes for us" according
to the will of
God (cf.
Rom 8:26-27).
For "we do not know how to pray as we ought" (Rom
In support of the
prayer
which
Christ
and the
Spirit
cause to rise in our hearts,
Mary
intervenes with her maternal
intercession.
"The
prayer of the
Church
is sustained by the
prayer of
Mary".23
If
Jesus, the one Mediator, is the Way of our
prayer,
then
Mary,
his purest and most transparent reflection, shows us the Way. "Beginning with Mary's
unique cooperation with the working of the Holy Spirit,
the Churches
developed their prayer to the Holy Mother of God, centering it on the
person of Christ manifested in his mysteries".24 At
the wedding of Cana the Gospel clearly shows the power of Mary's
intercession
as she makes known to Jesus the needs of others: "They have no
wine" (Jn 2:3).
The Rosary
is both meditation and supplication. Insistent prayer
to the Mother of God is based on confidence that her maternal intercession
can obtain all things from the heart of her
Son.
She
is "all-powerful by grace", to use the bold expression, which needs
to be properly understood, of Blessed Bartolo Longo in his Supplication to Our Lady.25 This
is a conviction which, beginning with the Gospel, has grown ever more firm in
the experience of the Christian people. The supreme poet
Dante
expresses it marvellously in the lines sung by
Saint Bernard:
"Lady, thou art so great and so powerful, that whoever desires grace yet
does not turn to thee, would have his desire fly without wings".26 When
in the
Rosary
we plead with
Mary, the sanctuary of the
Holy Spirit
(cf. Lk 1:35), she intercedes for
us before the
Father who filled her with grace and before the Son born
of her womb, praying with us and for us.
Proclaiming Christ with Mary
17. The Rosary
is also a path of proclamation and
increasing knowledge, in which the mystery of Christ
is presented again and again at different levels of the Christian experience.
Its form is that of a prayerful and contemplative
presentation, capable of forming Christians according to the heart of
Christ. When the recitation of the
Rosary
combines all the elements needed for an effective meditation, especially in its
communal celebration in parishes and shrines, it can present
a significant catechetical opportunity
which
pastors should use to advantage. In this way too Our Lady of the Rosary
continues her work of proclaiming
Christ.
The history of the
Rosary shows how this
prayer
was used in particular by the Dominicans at a difficult time for the
Church
due to the spread of
heresy. Today we are facing new challenges. Why should
we not once more have recourse to the
Rosary,
with the same faith as those who have gone before us? The
Rosary
retains all its power and continues to be a valuable pastoral resource for
every good evangelizer.
CHAPTER II
MYSTERIES OF CHRIST –
MYSTERIES OF HIS MOTHER
The Rosary, "a compendium of the Gospel"
18. The only way to approach the
contemplation
of
Christ's
face is by listening in the
Spirit to the
Father's
voice, since "no one knows the Son except the
Father"
(Mt
The
Rosary
is one of the traditional paths of Christian prayer directed to the
contemplation
of
Christ's
face. Pope Paul VI described it in these words: "As a Gospel prayer,
centered on the mystery of the redemptive
Incarnation,
the Rosary
is a prayer
with a clearly Christological orientation. Its most characteristic element,
in fact, the litany-like succession of Hail Marys,
becomes in itself an unceasing praise of Christ,
who is the ultimate object both of the Angel's announcement and of the greeting
of the Mother of
John the Baptist: 'Blessed is the fruit of your womb' (Lk 1:42). We would go further
and say that the succession of
Hail Marys
constitutes the warp on which is woven the
contemplation
of the mysteries. The Jesus
that each Hail Mary
recalls is the same Jesus
whom the succession of mysteries proposes to us now as the Son of God, now as the
Son of the Virgin".28
A proposed addition to the traditional pattern
19. Of the many mysteries of
Christ's life,
only a few are indicated by the
Rosary
in the form that has become generally established with the seal of the
Church's
approval. The selection was determined by the origin of the prayer,
which was based on the number 150, the number of the Psalms in the Psalter.
I believe, however, that to bring out
fully the
Christological depth of the
Rosary
it would be suitable to make
an addition to the
traditional pattern which, while left to the freedom of individuals
and communities,
could broaden it to include the mysteries of Christ's
public ministry between his Baptism and his Passion. In the course
of those mysteries we
contemplate important aspects of the person of
Christ
as the definitive revelation of
God.
Declared the beloved Son of the Father at the
Baptism
in the
Jordan,
Christ
is the one who announces the coming of the
Kingdom,
bears witness to it in his works and proclaims its demands. It is
during the years of his public ministry that the
mystery of Christ is most evidently a mystery of light: "While
I am in the world, I am the light of the world" (Jn 9:5).
Consequently, for the
Rosary
to become more fully a "compendium of the Gospel", it is fitting to
add, following reflection on the
Incarnation
and the hidden
life of Christ (the
joyful mysteries) and before focusing on the sufferings of his
Passion (the sorrowful mysteries)
and the triumph of his
Resurrection (the
glorious mysteries), a meditation on certain particularly
significant moments in his public ministry (the
mysteries of light). This addition of these new mysteries, without
prejudice to any essential aspect of the
prayer's
traditional format, is meant to give it fresh life and to enkindle renewed
interest in the Rosary's
place within Christian spirituality as a true doorway to the depths of the Heart of
Christ, ocean of joy and of light, of suffering and of glory.
The Joyful Mysteries
20. The first five decades, the
"joyful mysteries", are marked by
the
joy radiating from the event of the
Incarnation.
This is clear from the very first mystery, the
Annunciation,
where Gabriel's
greeting to the Virgin of Nazareth is linked to an invitation to messianic joy:
"Rejoice, Mary". The whole of salvation history, in some sense the
entire history of the world, has led up to this greeting. If it is the Father's plan to unite all things in Christ
(cf. Eph 1:10), then the whole of
the universe
is in some way touched by the divine favour with which the Father
looks upon Mary and makes her the Mother of his Son. The whole of
humanity, in turn, is embraced by the fiat
with which she readily agrees to the will of God.
Exultation is the keynote of the
encounter with
Elizabeth, where the sound of Mary's
voice and the presence of Christ in her womb cause John
to "leap for joy" (cf.
Lk
1:44). Gladness also fills the scene in
Bethlehem,
when the birth of the divine Child, the Saviour of the world, is announced by
the song of the
angels and proclaimed to the shepherds as "news of
great joy" (Lk 2:10).
The final two
mysteries, while preserving this climate of joy, already point to the drama yet
to come. The Presentation in the Temple not only expresses the joy of the
Child's consecration and the ecstasy of the aged Simeon; it also records the
prophecy that Christ will be a "sign of contradiction" for
Israel and that a sword will pierce his mother's
heart (cf Lk 2:34-35). Joy mixed with drama marks the fifth mystery, the finding
of the twelve-year-old
Jesus in the
Temple.
Here he appears in his divine wisdom as
he listens and raises questions, already in effect one who "teaches".
The revelation of his mystery as the Son wholly dedicated to his
Father's
affairs proclaims the radical nature of the Gospel, in which even the closest
of human relationships are challenged by the absolute demands of the
Kingdom.
Mary
and
Joseph,
fearful and anxious, "did not understand" his words (Lk 2:50).
To meditate upon the "joyful"
mysteries, then, is to enter into the ultimate causes and the deepest meaning
of Christian joy. It is to focus on the realism of the mystery of the
Incarnation
and on the obscure foreshadowing of the mystery of the saving Passion.
Mary
leads us to discover the secret of Christian joy, reminding us that Christianity is, first and foremost, euangelion,
"good news", which has as its heart and
its whole content the person of Jesus Christ,
the Word made flesh, the one Saviour of the world.
The Mysteries of Light
21. Moving on from the infancy and the
hidden life in
Nazareth to the public life of Jesus, our
contemplation
brings us to those mysteries which may be called in a special way
"mysteries of light". Certainly the whole
mystery of Christ is a mystery of light. He is the
"light of the world" (Jn
8:12). Yet this truth emerges in a special way during the years of his public
life, when he proclaims the Gospel of the
Kingdom.
In proposing to the Christian community five significant moments –
"luminous" mysteries – during this phase of
Christ's life,
I think that the following can be fittingly singled out: (1) his
Baptism
in the
Jordan,
(2) his self-manifestation at the wedding of
Cana,
(3) his proclamation of the
Kingdom of God, with his call to conversion, (4) his
Transfiguration,
and finally, (5) his institution of the
Eucharist,
as the
sacramental
expression of the Paschal Mystery.
Each of these mysteries is a revelation of the
Kingdom
now present in the very person of
Jesus.
The
Baptism in the
Jordan
is first of all a mystery of light. Here, as
Christ
descends into the waters, the innocent one who became "sin" for our
sake (cf. 2Cor 5:21), the heavens
open wide and the voice of the
Father
declares him the beloved Son (cf.
Mt 3:17
and parallels), while the
Spirit descends on him to invest him with the mission
which he is to carry out. Another mystery of light is the first of the signs,
given at
Cana (cf.
Jn 2:1-12),
when Christ
changes water into wine and opens the hearts of the disciples to faith, thanks
to the intervention of Mary, the first among believers. Another
mystery of light is the preaching by which
Jesus
proclaims the coming of the
Kingdom of God, calls to conversion (cf.
Mk 1:15) and forgives the sins of all who
draw near to him in humble trust (cf.
Mk 2:3-13;
Lk 7:47-48): the inauguration of
that ministry of mercy which he continues to exercise until the end of the
world, particularly through the
Sacrament of
Reconciliation which he has entrusted to his
Church
(cf. Jn 20:22-23). The mystery of
light par excellence is the
Transfiguration,
traditionally believed to have taken place on
Mount Tabor.
The glory of the Godhead shines forth from the
face of Christ
as the Father
commands the astonished Apostles to "listen to him" (cf.
Lk 9:35 and parallels) and to prepare to
experience with him the agony of the Passion, so as to come with him to the joy
of the
Resurrection
and a life transfigured by the
Holy Spirit.
A final mystery of light is the institution of the
Eucharist,
in which Christ offers his body and blood as food under the
signs of bread and wine, and testifies "to the end" his love for
humanity (Jn 13:1),
for whose salvation he will offer himself in sacrifice.
In these mysteries, apart from the
miracle
at
Cana,
the presence of
Mary
remains in the background. The Gospels make only the briefest
reference to her occasional presence at one moment or other during the
preaching of
Jesus (cf.
Mk 3:31-5;
Jn 2:12), and they give no
indication that she was present at the
Last Supper
and the institution of the
Eucharist. Yet the role she assumed at
Cana
in some way accompanies
Christ throughout his ministry. The revelation made
directly by the
Father at the
Baptism
in the
Jordan
and echoed by
John the Baptist is placed upon
Mary's
lips at
Cana,
and it becomes the great maternal counsel which Mary
addresses to the Church of every age: "Do whatever he tells you"
(Jn 2:5). This counsel is a
fitting introduction to the words and signs of
Christ's
public ministry and it forms the Marian foundation of all the "mysteries
of light".
The Sorrowful Mysteries
22. The Gospels give great prominence
to the sorrowful mysteries of
Christ.
From the beginning Christian piety, especially during the Lenten
devotion
of the Way of the Cross, has
focused on the individual moments of the Passion, realizing that here is found
the culmination of the revelation of God's love
and
the source of our salvation. The
Rosary
selects certain moments from the Passion, inviting the
faithful
to
contemplate
them in their hearts and to relive them. The sequence of meditations begins
with Gethsemane, where
Christ experiences a moment of great anguish before the
will of the
Father, against which the weakness of the flesh would
be tempted to rebel. There
Jesus encounters all the temptations and confronts all
the sins of humanity, in order to say to the
Father:
"Not my will but yours be done" (Lk
22:42 and parallels). This "Yes" of
Christ
reverses the "No" of our first parents in the
Garden of
Eden. And the cost of this faithfulness to the
Father's
will is made clear in the following mysteries; by his scourging, his crowning
with thorns, his carrying the Cross and his death on the Cross, the
Lord
is cast into the most abject suffering:
Ecce
homo! This abject
suffering reveals not only the love of God
but also the meaning of man himself.
Ecce
homo: the meaning,
origin and fulfillment of man is to be found in Christ,
the God
who humbles himself out of love "even unto death, death on a cross" (Phil 2:8). The sorrowful mysteries
help the believer to relive the death of Jesus, to stand at the foot of the
Cross beside Mary, to enter with her into the depths of God's
love for man and to experience all its life-giving power.
The Glorious Mysteries
23. "The contemplation
of Christ's
face cannot stop at the image of the Crucified One. He is the Risen One!"29
The
Rosary has always expressed this knowledge born of
faith and invited the believer to pass beyond the darkness of the Passion in
order to gaze upon
Christ's glory in the
Resurrection
and
Ascension.
Contemplating
the Risen One, Christians rediscover the
reasons for their own faith (cf.
1Cor
15:14) and relive the joy not only of those to whom
Christ
appeared – the
Apostles,
Mary
Magdalene and the disciples on the road to Emmaus – but also
the joy of
Mary,
who must have had an equally intense experience of the new life of her
glorified Son. In the
Ascension,
Christ
was raised in glory to the right hand of the
Father,
while Mary
herself would be raised to that same glory in the Assumption,
enjoying beforehand, by a unique privilege, the destiny reserved for all the
just at the resurrection of the dead. Crowned in glory –
as she appears in the last glorious mystery – Mary
shines forth as Queen of the Angels and Saints,
the anticipation and the supreme realization of the eschatological state of the
Church.
At the centre of this unfolding
sequence of the glory of the Son and the Mother, the
Rosary
sets before us the third glorious mystery,
Pentecost,
which reveals the face of the
Church
as a family gathered together with
Mary,
enlivened by the powerful outpouring of the
Spirit
and ready for the mission of evangelization. The
contemplation
of this scene, like that of the other glorious mysteries, ought to lead the
faithful
to an ever greater appreciation of their new life in
Christ,
lived in the heart of the
Church, a life of which the scene of
Pentecost
itself is the great "icon". The glorious mysteries thus lead the
faithful
to greater hope for the eschatological goal
towards
which they journey as members of the pilgrim People of God in history. This can
only impel them to bear courageous witness to that "good news" which
gives meaning to their entire existence.
From "mysteries" to the "Mystery":
Mary's way
24. The cycles of meditation proposed
by the
Holy Rosary
are by no means exhaustive, but they do bring to mind what is essential and
they awaken in the
soul a thirst for a knowledge of
Christ
continually nourished by the pure source of the Gospel. Every individual event
in the
life of
Christ, as narrated by the Evangelists, is resplendent with
the Mystery that surpasses all understanding (cf.
Eph 3:19): the Mystery of the Word made flesh, in whom
"all the fullness of
God dwells bodily" (Col 2:9). For this reason the Catechism of the Catholic Church places great emphasis on
the mysteries of
Christ, pointing out that "everything in the
life of Jesus
is a sign of his Mystery".30 The "duc in altum"
("set out into the deep") of the Church of the third millennium will be determined by
the ability of Christians to enter into the "perfect knowledge of God's
mystery, of Christ, in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom
and knowledge" (Col 2:2-3).
The
Letter to the Ephesians makes this heartfelt
prayer
for all the baptized: "May
Christ
dwell in your hearts through faith, so that you, being rooted and grounded in
love, may have power... to know the love of
Christ
which surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of
God"
(3:17-19).
The
Rosary
is at the service of this ideal; it offers the "secret" which leads
easily to a profound and inward knowledge of
Christ.
We might call it
Mary's
way. It is the way of the example of the Virgin of
Nazareth,
a woman of faith, of silence, of attentive listening. It is also the way of a
Marian
devotion inspired by knowledge of the
inseparable bond between Christ
and his Blessed
Mother: the mysteries of Christ
are also in some sense the
mysteries of his Mother, even when they do not involve her directly,
for she lives from him and through him. By making our own the words
of the
Angel Gabriel
and
Saint
Elizabeth contained in the Hail Mary, we find ourselves constantly
drawn to seek out afresh in Mary, in her arms and in her heart,
the "blessed fruit of her womb" (cf Lk
1:42).
Mystery of Christ, mystery of man
25. In my testimony of 1978 mentioned
above, where I described the
Rosary
as my favorite
prayer, I used an idea to which I would like to return.
I said then that "the simple
prayer
of the
Rosary
marks the rhythm of human life".31
In the light of what has been said so
far on the mysteries of
Christ, it is not difficult to go deeper into this
anthropological significance of the
Rosary,
which is far deeper than may appear at first sight. Anyone who
contemplates
Christ
through the various
stages of his life cannot fail to perceive in him
the truth about man. This is the great
affirmation of the Second Vatican Council which I have so often discussed in my
own teaching since the
Encyclical Letter
Redemptor
Hominis: "it is only in the mystery of the Word made flesh that
the mystery of man is seen in its true light".32 The
Rosary
helps to open up the way to this light. Following in the path of
Christ,
in whom man's path is "recapitulated",33 revealed and
redeemed, believers come face to face with the image of the true man.
Contemplating
Christ's birth, they learn of the sanctity of life; seeing the household of
Nazareth,
they learn the original truth of the family according to
God's
plan; listening to the Master in the mysteries of his public ministry, they
find the light which leads them to enter the
Kingdom of
God; and following him on the way to Calvary, they learn the
meaning of salvific suffering. Finally, contemplating
Christ
and his Blessed
Mother in glory, they see the
goal towards which each of us is called, if we allow ourselves to be healed and
transformed by the Holy Spirit. It could be said that each
mystery of the
Rosary, carefully meditated, sheds light on the mystery
of man.
At the same time, it becomes natural to
bring to this encounter with the sacred humanity of the
Redeemer
all the problems, anxieties, labours and endeavours which go to make up our
lives. "Cast your burden on the Lord and he will sustain you" (Ps 55:23). To pray the
Rosary
is to hand over our burdens to the merciful hearts of
Christ
and his
Mother.
Twenty-five years later, thinking back over the difficulties which have also
been part of my exercise of the Petrine ministry, I feel the need to say once
more, as a warm invitation to everyone to experience it personally: the
Rosary
does indeed "mark the rhythm of human life", bringing it into harmony
with the "rhythm" of
God's
own life, in the joyful communion of the
Holy Trinity,
our life's destiny and deepest longing.
CHAPTER III
"FOR ME, TO LIVE IS
CHRIST"
The Rosary, a way of assimilating the mystery
26. Meditation on the mysteries of
Christ
is proposed in the
Rosary by means of a method designed to assist in their
assimilation. It is a method based on
repetition. This applies above all to the
Hail Mary, repeated ten times in each
mystery. If this repetition is considered superficially, there could be a
temptation to see the
Rosary as a dry and boring exercise. It is quite
another thing, however, when the Rosary
is thought of as an outpouring of that love which tirelessly returns to the
person loved with expressions similar in their content but ever fresh in terms
of the feeling pervading them.
In
Christ,
God
has truly assumed a
"heart of flesh". Not only does
God
have a divine heart, rich in mercy and in forgiveness, but also a
human heart,
capable of all the stirrings of affection. If we needed evidence for this from
the Gospel, we could easily find it in the touching dialogue between
Christ
and
Peter
after the
Resurrection: "Simon, son of
John, do you love me?" Three times this question is put
to
Peter,
and three times he gives the reply: "Lord, you know that I love you"
(cf. Jn 21:15-17). Over and above
the specific meaning of this passage, so important for
Peter's
mission, none can fail to recognize the beauty of this triple repetition, in
which the insistent request and the corresponding reply are expressed in terms
familiar from the universal experience of human love. To
understand the Rosary, one has to enter into the psychological dynamic
proper to love.
One thing is clear: although the repeated Hail Mary
is addressed directly to Mary,
it is to Jesus that the act of love is ultimately directed, with
her and through her. The repetition is nourished by the desire to be
conformed ever more completely to
Christ,
the true program of the Christian life.
Saint Paul
expressed this project with words of fire: "For me to live is
Christ
and to die is gain" (Phil
1:21).
And again: "It is no longer I that live, but
Christ
lives in me" (Gal 2:20).
The Rosary helps us to be conformed ever more closely to Christ
until we attain true holiness.
A valid method...
27. We should not be surprised that our
relationship with
Christ makes use of a method.
God
communicates himself to us respecting our human nature and its vital rhythms.
Hence, while Christian spirituality is familiar with the most sublime forms of
mystical silence in which images, words and gestures are all, so to speak,
superseded by an intense and ineffable union with
God,
it normally engages the whole person in all his complex psychological, physical
and relational reality.
This becomes apparent in the
Liturgy.
Sacraments and
sacramentals
are structured as a series of rites which bring into play all the dimensions of
the person. The same applies to non-liturgical
prayer.
This is confirmed by the fact that, in the East, the most characteristic
prayer
of
Christological
meditation, centered on the words "Lord Jesus
Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner"34 is
traditionally linked to the rhythm of breathing; while this practice favors
perseverance in the
prayer, it also in some way embodies the desire for
Christ
to become the breath, the
soul and the "all" of one's life.
... which can nevertheless be improved
28. I mentioned
in my Apostolic Letter Novo Millennio
Ineunte that the West is now experiencing a renewed demand for meditation, which at times
leads to a keen interest in aspects of other religions.35 Some
Christians, limited in their knowledge of the Christian
contemplative
tradition, are attracted by those forms of
prayer.
While the latter contain many elements which are positive and at times
compatible with Christian experience, they are often based on ultimately
unacceptable premises. Much in vogue among these approaches are methods aimed
at attaining a high level of spiritual concentration by using techniques of a
psychophysical, repetitive and symbolic nature. The
Rosary
is situated within this broad gamut of religious phenomena, but it is
distinguished by characteristics of its own which correspond to specifically
Christian requirements.
In effect, the Rosary
is simply a method of contemplation.
As a method, it serves as a means to an end and cannot become an end in itself.
All the same, as the fruit of centuries of experience, this method should not
be undervalued. In its favour one could cite the experience of countless Saints.
This is not to say, however, that the method cannot be improved. Such is the
intent of the addition of the new series of mysteria
lucis to the overall cycle of mysteries and of the few suggestions
which I am proposing in this Letter regarding its manner of recitation. These suggestions, while
respecting the well-established structure of this prayer,
are intended to help the faithful to understand it in the richness of its
symbolism and in harmony with the demands of daily life. Otherwise there is a risk
that the Rosary would not only fail to produce the intended
spiritual effects, but even that the beads,
with which it is usually said, could come to be regarded as some kind of amulet
or magic object, thereby radically distorting their meaning and function.
Announcing each mystery
29. Announcing each mystery, and
perhaps even using a suitable icon to portray it, is as it were
to open up a scenario on which to focus
our attention. The words direct the imagination and the mind towards a
particular episode or moment in the
life of
Christ. In the Church's traditional spirituality, the veneration of
icons and the many devotions appealing to the senses, as well as the
method of prayer proposed by Saint
Ignatius of Loyola in the Spiritual
Exercises, make use of visual and imaginative elements (the compositio loci), judged to be of great
help in concentrating the mind on the particular mystery. This is a
methodology, moreover, which corresponds to
the inner logic of the Incarnation: in Jesus,
God
wanted to take on human features. It is through his bodily reality that we are
led into contact with the mystery of his divinity.
This need for
concreteness finds further expression in the announcement of the various
mysteries of the Rosary. Obviously these mysteries neither replace the
Gospel nor exhaust its content. The Rosary,
therefore, is no substitute for lectio
divina; on the contrary, it presupposes and promotes it. Yet, even though the mysteries
contemplated
in the
Rosary,
even with the addition of the mysteria lucis,
do no more than outline the fundamental elements of the
life of
Christ, they easily draw the mind to a more expansive
reflection on the rest of the Gospel, especially when the
Rosary
is prayed in a setting of prolonged recollection.
Listening to the word of God
30. In order to supply a
Biblical
foundation and greater depth to our meditation, it is
helpful to follow the announcement of the mystery with the proclamation of a related Biblical
passage, long or short, depending on the circumstances. No other words can ever match the efficacy of the inspired word.
As we listen, we are certain that this is the word of God, spoken for today and
spoken "for me".
If received in this way, the word of
God can become part of the
Rosary's methodology of repetition without giving rise
to the ennui derived from the simple recollection of something already well
known. It is not a matter of recalling information but of
allowing God
to speak.
In
certain solemn communal celebrations, this word can be appropriately
illustrated by a brief commentary.
Silence
31. Listening and meditation are nourished by silence.
After the announcement of the mystery and the proclamation of the word, it is
fitting to pause and focus one's attention for a suitable period of time on the
mystery concerned, before moving into vocal
prayer.
A discovery of the importance of silence is one of the secrets of practicing
contemplation
and meditation. One drawback of a society dominated by technology and the mass
media is the fact that silence becomes increasingly difficult to achieve. Just
as moments of silence are recommended in the
Liturgy,
so too in the recitation of the
Rosary
it is fitting to pause briefly after listening to the word of God, while the
mind focuses on the content of a particular mystery.
The "Our Father"
32. After listening to the word and
focusing on the mystery, it is natural for
the
mind to be lifted up towards the
Father.
In each of his mysteries, Jesus
always leads us to the Father, for as he rests in the Father's
bosom (cf. Jn 1:18) he is
continually turned towards him. He wants us to share in his intimacy with the Father,
so that we can say with him: "Abba, Father" (Rom 8:15; Gal 4:6). By virtue of his relationship to
the Father
he makes us
brothers and sisters of
himself and of one another, communicating to us the
Spirit
which is both his and the
Father's. Acting as a kind of foundation for the
Christological
and Marian meditation which unfolds in the repetition of the
Hail Mary, the
Our Father
makes meditation upon the mystery, even when carried out in solitude, an
ecclesial experience.
The ten "Hail Marys"
33. This is the most substantial
element in the
Rosary and also the one which makes it a Marian
prayer
par excellence. Yet when the Hail Mary
is properly understood, we come to see clearly that its Marian
character is not opposed to its Christological
character, but that it actually emphasizes and increases it. The
first part of the
Hail Mary,
drawn from the words spoken to
Mary
by the
Angel Gabriel
and by
Saint
Elizabeth, is a
contemplation
in adoration of the mystery accomplished in the Virgin of
Nazareth.
These words express, so to speak, the wonder of
heaven
and earth; they could be said to give us a glimpse of
God's
own wonderment as he
contemplates his "masterpiece" – the
Incarnation
of the Son in the womb of the
Virgin Mary.
If we recall how, in the Book of Genesis,
God
"saw all that he had made" (Gen
1:31),
we can find here an echo of that "pathos with which
God,
at the dawn of creation, looked upon the work of his hands".36The
repetition of the
Hail Mary
in the
Rosary
gives us a share in
God's own wonder and pleasure: in jubilant amazement we
acknowledge the greatest
miracle of history.
Mary's
prophecy here finds its fulfilment: "Henceforth all generations will call
me blessed" (Lk 1:48).
The centre of
gravity in the Hail Mary,
the hinge as it were which joins its two parts, is the name of Jesus. Sometimes, in hurried recitation, this centre of gravity
can be overlooked, and with it the connection to the mystery of
Christ
being
contemplated.
Yet it is precisely the emphasis given to the name of
Jesus and to his mystery that is the sign of a meaningful and fruitful
recitation of the Rosary. Pope Paul VI drew attention, in his
Apostolic Exhortation Marialis Cultus,
to the custom in certain regions of highlighting the name of Christ by the
addition of a clause referring to the mystery being
contemplated.37
This is a praiseworthy custom, especially during public recitation. It gives forceful expression to our faith in Christ,
directed to the different moments of the Redeemer's
life. It is at once a
profession of faith and an aid in concentrating our meditation,
since it facilitates the process of assimilation to the mystery of Christ
inherent in the repetition of the Hail Mary.
When we repeat the name of Jesus – the only name given to us by which we may hope
for salvation (cf. Acts
4:12) –
in close association with the name of his
Blessed
Mother, almost as if it were done at her suggestion, we set
out on a path of assimilation meant to help us enter more deeply into the
life of
Christ.
From
Mary's
uniquely privileged relationship with
Christ,
which makes her the Mother of God,
Theotókos, derives the forcefulness of the appeal we make to her in
the second half of the
prayer, as we entrust to her maternal
intercession
our lives and the hour of our death.
The "Gloria"
34. Trinitarian doxology is the goal of
all
Christian
contemplation. For
Christ
is the way that leads us to the
Father
in the
Spirit.
If we travel this way to the end, we repeatedly encounter the mystery of the
three divine Persons, to whom all praise, worship and thanksgiving are due. It is important that the Gloria, the
high-point of contemplation, be given due prominence in
the Rosary.
In public recitation it could be sung, as a way of giving proper emphasis to
the essentially Trinitarian structure of all Christian prayer.
To the extent that meditation on the
mystery is attentive and profound, and to the extent that it is enlivened –
from one
Hail Mary
to another – by love for
Christ
and for
Mary,
the glorification of the Trinity
at the end of each decade, far from being a perfunctory conclusion, takes on
its proper contemplative tone, raising the mind as it
were to the heights of
heaven and enabling us in some way to relive the
experience of
Tabor, a foretaste of the
contemplation
yet to come: "It is good for us to be here!" (Lk 9:33).
The concluding short prayer
35. In current practice, the
Trinitarian
doxology is followed by a brief concluding
prayer
which varies according to local custom. Without in any way diminishing the
value of such invocations, it is worthwhile to note that the
contemplation
of the mysteries could better express their full spiritual fruitfulness if an
effort were made to conclude each mystery with
a
prayer
for the fruits specific to that particular mystery. In this way the
Rosary
would better express its connection with the Christian life. One fine liturgical prayer suggests as much, inviting us to pray
that, by meditation on the mysteries of the Rosary,
we may come to "imitate what they contain and obtain what they
promise".38
Such a final
prayer
could take on a legitimate variety of forms, as indeed it already does. In this
way the
Rosary
can be better adapted to different spiritual traditions and different Christian
communities. It is to be hoped, then, that appropriate formulas will be widely
circulated, after due pastoral discernment and possibly after experimental use
in centres and shrines particularly devoted to the
Rosary,
so that the People of God may benefit from an abundance of authentic spiritual
riches and find nourishment for their personal
contemplation.
The Rosary beads
36. The traditional aid used for the
recitation of the
Rosary is the set of
beads.
At the most superficial level, the
beads
often become a simple counting mechanism to mark the succession of
Hail Marys. Yet they can also take on a
symbolism which can give added depth to
contemplation.
Here the first
thing to note is the way the beads
converge upon the Crucifix, which both opens and closes the
unfolding sequence of prayer. The life and
prayer
of believers is centered upon
Christ.
Everything begins from him, everything leads towards him, everything, through
him, in the
Holy Spirit, attains to the
Father.
As a counting mechanism, marking the
progress of the
prayer, the beads
evoke the unending path of contemplation and of Christian perfection. Blessed
Bartolo Longo saw them also as a "chain" which links us to God.
A chain, yes, but a sweet chain; for sweet indeed is the bond to God
who is also our Father. A "filial" chain which puts us in tune with Mary,
the "handmaid of the Lord" (Lk
1:38) and, most of all, with Christ
himself, who, though he was in the form of God,
made himself a "servant" out of love for us (Phil 2:7).
A fine way to expand the symbolism of
the
beads
is to let them remind us of our many relationships, of the bond of communion
and fraternity which unites us all in
Christ.
The opening and closing
37. At present, in different parts of
the
Church,
there are many ways to introduce the
Rosary.
In some places, it is customary to begin with the opening words of Psalm 70:
"O
God,
come to my aid; O Lord, make haste to help me", as if to nourish in those
who are praying a humble awareness of their own insufficiency. In other places, the Rosary
begins with the recitation of the Creed, as if to make the profession of faith
the basis of the contemplative journey about to be undertaken.
These and similar customs, to the extent that they prepare the mind for
contemplation,
are all equally legitimate. The
Rosary
is then ended with a
prayer for the intentions of the
Pope,
as if to expand the vision of the one praying to embrace all the needs of the
Church.
It is precisely in order to encourage this ecclesial dimension of the
Rosary
that the
Church has seen fit to grant indulgences to those who recite
it with the required dispositions.
If prayed in
this way, the Rosary truly becomes a spiritual itinerary in which Mary
acts as Mother, Teacher and Guide, sustaining the faithful
by her powerful intercession. Is it any wonder, then, that the soul
feels the need, after saying this prayer and experiencing so profoundly the
motherhood of Mary, to burst forth in praise of the Blessed
Virgin, either in that splendid prayer
the Salve Regina or in the Litany of Loreto? This is the crowning moment of an
inner journey which has brought the faithful
into living contact with the mystery of Christ
and his Blessed
Mother.
Distribution over time
38. The Rosary
can be recited in full every day, and there are those who most
laudably do so. In this way it fills with
prayer
the days of many a
contemplative, or keeps company with the sick and the
elderly who have abundant time at their disposal. Yet it is clear – and this
applies all the more if the new series of
mysteria
lucis is included – that many people will not be
able to recite more than a part of the Rosary,
according to a certain weekly pattern. This weekly
distribution has the effect of giving the different days of the
week a certain spiritual "color", by
analogy with the way in which the
Liturgy
colors the different seasons of the
liturgical
year.
According to current practice, Monday
and Thursday are dedicated to the "joyful mysteries", Tuesday and
Thursday to the "sorrowful mysteries", and Wednesday, Saturday and
Sunday to the "glorious mysteries". Where might the "mysteries
of light" be inserted? If we consider that the "glorious
mysteries" are said on both Saturday and Sunday, and that Saturday has
always had a special Marian flavour, the second weekly meditation on the
"joyful mysteries", mysteries in which
Mary's
presence is especially pronounced, could be moved to Saturday. Thursday would
then be free for meditating on the "mysteries of light".
This indication is not intended to
limit a rightful freedom in personal and community
prayer,
where account needs to be taken of spiritual and pastoral needs and of the
occurrence of particular
liturgical celebrations which might call for suitable
adaptations. What is really important is that the
Rosary
should always be seen and experienced as a path of
contemplation.
In the
Rosary,
in a way similar to what takes place in the
Liturgy,
the
Christian
week, centred on Sunday, the day of
Resurrection,
becomes a journey through the mysteries of the
life of Christ,
and he is revealed in the lives of his disciples as the Lord of time and of
history.
CONCLUSION
"Blessed Rosary of Mary, sweet chain linking us to
God"
39. What has been said so far makes
abundantly clear the richness of this traditional
prayer,
which has the simplicity of a
popular
devotion but also the theological depth of a
prayer
suited to those who feel the need for deeper
contemplation.
The Church
has always attributed particular efficacy to this prayer,
entrusting to the Rosary, to its choral recitation and to its constant
practice, the most difficult problems. At times when Christianity itself seemed
under threat, its deliverance was attributed to the power of this prayer,
and Our Lady of the Rosary was acclaimed as the one whose intercession
brought salvation.
Today I willingly entrust to the power
of this
prayer
– as I mentioned at the beginning – the cause of peace in the world and the
cause of the family.
Peace
40. The grave challenges confronting
the world at the start of this new Millennium lead us to think that only an intervention
from on high, capable of guiding the hearts of those living in situations of
conflict and those governing the destinies of nations, can give reason to hope
for a brighter future.
The
Rosary
is by its nature a prayer for peace, since it consists in the
contemplation
of
Christ,
the Prince of Peace, the one who is "our peace" (Eph 2:14). Anyone who assimilates the
mystery of
Christ – and this is clearly the goal of the
Rosary
– learns the secret of peace and makes it his life's project. Moreover, by virtue of its meditative character, with the tranquil
succession of Hail Marys,
the Rosary
has a peaceful effect on those who pray it, disposing them to receive and
experience in their innermost depths, and to spread around them, that true
peace which is the special gift of the Risen Lord (cf. Jn 14:27; 20.21).
The
Rosary
is also a
prayer for peace because of the fruits of charity which
it produces. When prayed well in a truly meditative way, the
Rosary
leads to an encounter with
Christ in his mysteries and so cannot fail to draw
attention to the face of
Christ in others, especially in the most afflicted. How
could one possibly contemplate
the mystery of the Child of Bethlehem, in the joyful
mysteries, without experiencing the desire to welcome, defend and
promote life, and to shoulder the burdens of suffering children all over the
world? How could one possibly follow in the footsteps of
Christ
the Revealer, in the mysteries of light, without resolving to bear
witness to his
"Beatitudes" in daily life? And how could one
contemplate
Christ
carrying the Cross and Christ Crucified, without feeling the need
to act as a "Simon of Cyrene" for our brothers and sisters weighed
down by grief or crushed by despair? Finally, how could one possibly gaze upon the glory of the Risen Christ or of Mary Queen of
Heaven, without yearning to make this world more
beautiful, more just, more closely conformed to God's plan?
In a word, by focusing
our eyes on Christ, the
Rosary
also makes us peacemakers in the world. By its nature as an insistent choral
petition in harmony with
Christ's invitation to "pray ceaselessly" (Lk 18:1), the
Rosary
allows us to hope that, even today,
the difficult
"battle" for peace can be won. Far from offering an escape
from the problems of the world, the
Rosary
obliges us to see them with responsible and generous eyes, and obtains for us
the strength to face them with the certainty of
God's
help and the firm intention of bearing witness in every situation to
"love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony" (Col 3:14).
The family: parents...
41. As a
prayer
for peace, the
Rosary is also, and always has been,
a
prayer of and for the family. At one time
this
prayer
was particularly dear to
Christian
families, and it certainly brought them closer together. It
is important not to lose this precious inheritance. We need to return
to the practice of family prayer and prayer
for families,
continuing to use the Rosary.
In my Apostolic Letter
Novo Millennio Ineunte I encouraged the
celebration of the
Liturgy of the Hours by the
lay faithful
in the ordinary life of parish communities and Christian groups;39 I
now wish to do the same for the
Rosary.
These two paths of
Christian contemplation are not mutually exclusive;
they complement one another. I would therefore ask those who devote themselves
to the pastoral care of
families to recommend heartily the recitation of the
Rosary.
The
family that prays together stays together. The
Holy Rosary, by age-old tradition, has shown itself
particularly effective as a
prayer which brings the family together. Individual
family members, in turning their eyes towards
Jesus,
also regain the ability to look one another in the eye, to communicate, to show
solidarity, to forgive one another and to see their covenant of love renewed in
the
Spirit of God.
Many of the problems facing
contemporary
families, especially in economically developed
societies, result from their increasing difficulty in communicating.
Families
seldom manage to come together, and the rare occasions when they do are often
taken up with watching television. To return to the recitation of the family Rosary
means filling daily life with very different images, images of the mystery of
salvation: the image of the
Redeemer, the image of his
most Blessed
Mother. The family that recites
the Rosary
together reproduces something of the atmosphere of the household of Nazareth:
its members place Jesus at the centre, they share his joys and sorrows,
they place their needs and their plans in his hands, they draw from him the
hope and the strength to go on.
... and children
42. It is also beautiful and fruitful
to entrust to this prayer
the growth and development of children.
Does the
Rosary not follow the
life of
Christ, from his conception to his death, and then to his
Resurrection
and his glory? Parents are finding it ever more difficult to follow the lives
of their children as they grow to maturity. In a society of advanced
technology, of mass communications and globalization, everything has become
hurried, and the cultural distance between generations is growing ever greater.
The most diverse messages and the most unpredictable experiences rapidly make
their way into the lives of children and adolescents, and parents can become
quite anxious about the dangers their children face. At times parents suffer
acute disappointment at the failure of their children to resist the seductions
of the drug culture, the lure of an unbridled hedonism, the temptation to
violence,
and the manifold expressions of meaninglessness and despair.
To pray the
Rosary
for children, and even more, with children, training them
from their earliest years to experience this daily "pause for
prayer"
with the family, is admittedly not the solution to every problem, but it is a spiritual aid which should not be underestimated. It
could be objected that the
Rosary seems hardly suited to the taste of children and
young people of today. But perhaps the objection is directed to an impoverished
method of praying it. Furthermore, without prejudice to the
Rosary's
basic structure, there is nothing to stop children and young people from
praying it – either within the family or in groups – with appropriate symbolic
and practical aids to understanding and appreciation. Why not try it? With
God's
help, a pastoral approach to youth which is positive, impassioned and creative –
as shown by the World Youth Days! – is capable of achieving quite remarkable
results. If the
Rosary is well presented, I am sure that young people
will once more surprise adults by the way they make this
prayer
their own and recite it with the enthusiasm typical of their age group.
The Rosary, a treasure to be rediscovered
43. Dear brothers and sisters! A
prayer
so easy and yet so rich truly deserves to be rediscovered by the Christian
community. Let us do so, especially this year, as a means of confirming the
direction outlined in my Apostolic LetterNovo
Millennio Ineunte, from which the pastoral plans of so many
particular Churches have drawn inspiration as they look to the immediate
future.
I turn particularly to you, my dear
Brother Bishops, priests
and deacons,
and to you, pastoral agents in your different ministries: through
your own personal experience of the beauty of the
Rosary,
may you come to
promote it with conviction.
I also place my trust in you,
theologians: by your sage and rigorous reflection, rooted in the word of God
and sensitive to the lived experience of the Christian people, may you help
them to discover the
Biblical foundations, the spiritual riches and the
pastoral value of this traditional
prayer.
I count on you, consecrated men and
women, called in a particular way to
contemplate
the face of
Christ at the
I look to all
of you, brothers and sisters of every state of life, to you,
Christian
families, to you, the sick and elderly, and to you, young
people: confidently take up the Rosary
once again.
Rediscover
the
Rosary
in the light of
Scripture, in harmony with the
Liturgy,
and in the context of your daily lives.
May this appeal of mine not go unheard!
At the start of the twenty-fifth year of my Pontificate, I entrust this
Apostolic Letter to the loving hands of the
Virgin Mary,
prostrating myself in spirit before her
image in the splendid Shrine built for her by Blessed Bartolo Longo,
the apostle of the
Rosary. I willingly make my own the touching words with
which he concluded his well-known
Supplication
to the Queen of the Holy Rosary:
sculpted by C. Edmund Sullivan
www.catholicartgallery.com
"O Blessed Rosary of Mary, sweet chain which unites us to God, bond of love which unites us to the angels, tower of salvation against the
assaults of Hell, safe port in
our universal shipwreck, we will never abandon you. You will be our comfort in
the hour of death: yours our final kiss as life ebbs away. And the last word
from our lips will be your sweet name, O Queen of the Rosary of Pompei, O
dearest Mother, O Refuge of Sinners, O Consoler of the Afflicted. May
you be everywhere blessed, today and always, on earth and in heaven".
From the Vatican, on the 16th
day of October in the year 2002, the beginning of the twenty-fifth year of my
Pontificate.
JOHN
PAUL II
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Notes
1
Pastoral
Constitution on the Church in the Modern World
Gaudium et Spes, 45.
2 Pope Paul VI, Apostolic Exhortation Marialis Cultus (2 February 1974), 42: AAS 66 (1974), 153.
3 Cf. Acta Leonis XIII,
3 (1884), 280-289.
4 Particularly worthy of note is his Apostolic Epistle on the
Rosary
Il religioso convegno (29
September 1961): AAS 53 (1961), 641-647.
5 Angelus: Insegnamenti di
Giovanni Paolo II, I (1978): 75-76.
6 AAS 93 (2001), 285.
7 During the years of preparation for the Council, Pope John XXIII
did not fail to encourage the Christian community to recite the
Rosary
for the success of this ecclesial event: cf. Letter to the Cardinal Vicar (28
September 1960): AAS 52 (1960), 814-816.
8 Dogmatic Constitution on the Church
Lumen Gentium, 66.
9 No. 32: AAS 93 (2001), 288.
10 Ibid., 33: loc.
cit., 289.
11 It is well-known and bears repeating that
private
revelations are not the same as public revelation, which is
binding on the whole
Church. It is the task of the
Magisterium
to discern and recognize the authenticity and value of
private
revelations for the piety of the
faithful.
12 The Secret of the Rosary.
13 Blessed Bartolo Longo, Storia
del Santuario di Pompei, Pompei, 1990, 59.
14 Apostolic Exhortation Marialis
Cultus (2 February 1974), 47: AAS (1974), 156.
15 Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy Sacrosanctum Concilium, 10.
16 Ibid., 12.
17 Second Vatican Ecumenical Council, Dogmatic Constitution on the
Church Lumen Gentium, 58.
18 I Quindici Sabati del
Santissimo Rosario, 27th ed., Pompei, 1916, 27.
19 Second Vatican Ecumenical Council, Dogmatic Constitution on the
Church Lumen Gentium, 53.
20 Ibid., 60.
21 Cf. First Radio Address
Urbi
et Orbi (17 October 1978): AAS 70 (1978), 927.
22 Treatise on True Devotion to
the Blessed Virgin Mary.
23 Catechism of the Catholic
Church, 2679.
24 Ibid., 2675.
25 The Supplication to the Queen
of the Holy Rosary was composed by Blessed Bartolo Longo in 1883 in
response to the appeal of
Pope Leo XIII, made in his first
Encyclical on
the Rosary, for the spiritual commitment of all Catholics in
combating social ills. It is solemnly recited twice yearly, in May and October.
26 Divina Commedia,
Paradiso XXXIII, 13-15.
27 John Paul II, Apostolic Letter
Novo
Millennio Ineunte (6 January 2001), 20: AAS 93 (2001), 279.
28 Apostolic Exhortation
Marialis
Cultus (2 February 1974), 46: AAS 6 (1974), 155.
29 John Paul II, Apostolic Letter
Novo
Millennio Ineunte (6 January 2001), 28: AAS 93 (2001), 284.
30 No. 515.
31 Angelus Message of 29 October 1978 :
Insegnamenti, I (1978), 76.
32 Second Vatican Ecumenical Council, Pastoral Constitution on the
Church in the Modern World Gaudium et Spes,
22.
33 Cf. Saint Irenaeus of Lyons,
Adversus
Haereses, III, 18, 1: PG 7, 932.
34 Catechism of the Catholic
Church, 2616.
35 Cf. No. 33: AAS 93 (2001), 289.
36 John Paul II, Letter to
Artists (4 April 1999), 1: AAS 91 (1999), 1155.
37 Cf. No. 46: AAS 66 (1974), 155. This custom has also been
recently praised by the Congregation for Divine Worship and for the Discipline
of the Sacraments in its Direttorio su pietà popolare e liturgia. Principi e orientamenti
(17 December 2001), 201, Vatican City, 2002, 165.
38 "...concede, quaesumus,
ut haec mysteria sacratissimo beatae Mariae Virginis Rosario recolentes, et
imitemur quod continent, et quod promittunt assequamur".
Missale Romanum 1960, in festo B.M. Virginis a Rosario.
39 Cf. No. 34: AAS 93 (2001), 290.