Today we celebrate the Feast of Our Lady of the Rosary. This prayer, though simple in form, is really a way to take us to the depths of union with God.     The following is from The Women of Grace Foundational Study Guide.

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The Rosary is an ancient prayer form that incorporates all three categories of prayer — vocal, meditative, and contemplative. Its name is derived from the word rosarius,  meaning a garland or bouquet of roses. This popular devotion has been practiced in teh Chruch for more than a thousand years.

Initially, monks strung pebbles or bone fragments on a rope and used it to count their prayers. By the thirteen  century, these ropes were manufactured by an honored craft guild, and were widely called “Paternosters,” the Latin name for the “Our Father,” which at the time was the predominant prayer of this devotion. The “Hail Mary” as we know it was not used until the twelfth century; it was gradually added until the Rosary grew into its present form.

Until recently, fifteen Christian mysteries were associated with the Rosary: five joyful, five sorrowful, an dfive glorious. Each of these mysteries was reflected upon for the time it took to pray ten Hail Mary’s, represented by ten beads (called a “decade”), followed by a single Our Father. 

The Rosary is “Christocentric,” for each mystery is intimately connected to the life and work of Jesus. On October 16, 2002, Pope John Paul II signed an apostolic letter called Rosarium Virginis Mariae  (“The Rosary of the Virgin Mary”). In it he suggested that the faithful consider adding five additional mysteries to the prayer of the Rosary. These “Luminous Mysteries” or “Mysteries of Light” focus on the public ministry of Jesus.

Implicit in the Holy Father’s letter is the fact that the Rosary incorporates all three forms of prayer — vocal prayer, meditations, and contemplation. The “repetition” of the Rosary is designed to help the one who prays to assimilate the mysteries of Christ’s life through meditation. Consequently, the prayer of the Rosary “engages the whole person in all his complex, psychological, physical, and relational reality, a characteristic common to Christian spirituality” (No. 27).

The Holy Father also suggested that the very design of the Rosary takes on “a symbolism which can give added depth to contemplation” (No. 36). The circular set of beads fashioned around the Crucifix indicates that the life and prayer of the believer is to be centered on Christ: “Everything begins from him, everything leads towards him, everything through him, in the Holy Spirit attains to the Father.”

According to the Holy Father, the beads provide a “counting mechanism” that mark the progress of the prayer evoking the “unending path of contemplation and of Christian perfection,” while the “sweet chain” that links the beads binds us to God as Father and puts us in tune with Mary and Christ himself. The beads also “remind us of our may relationships, of the bond of communion and fraternity which unites us all in Christ.”

The prayers of the Rosary themselves continue to aid our union with God. Although the Hail Mary is “the most substantial element in the Rosary and also one that makes it a Marian prayer par excellence”   (No. 33) , the Holy Father points out that this prayer is also profoundly Christological, for it gives 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.”

In his letter, the Holy Father draws our attention to the central position of the name of Jesus  in the prayer, and refers to it as the hinge  that joins together the two parts of the Hail Mary. It is the prayer’s center of gravity , establishing the relationship between Mary and Christ, that gives us the confidence to entrust ourselves to her maternal intercession.

Pope John Paul II closes his beautiful letter by exhorting families to once again make the Rosary a part of their family prayer. He encourages all parents to entrust to the Rosary the growth and development of their children.” 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.” Prayed with consistency, faithfulness, and devotion, those who make the Rosary part of their prayer life can expect to learn “the secret of peace and make it his life’s project.”