Blessed Virgin Mary of the Rosary
Feast
On today’s feast, our Order, together with the whole Church, celebrates the wonders of God toward the human race through devout contemplation of the mysteries of the life, passion and resurrection of our Savior Jesus Christ, with Mary his Mother, who is “the model of meditation on the words of Christ and of docility in one’s own mission” (LCO 67 § II).
These great benefits, harmoniously gathered into one, are recalled through that particular form of prayer known as the Rosary, which is recognized as having taken its beginnings and development within the life and apostolate of our Order.
Blessed Humbert of Romans, writing for the novices of the Order in his work On the Manner of Praying, teaches in a particular way:
“First, after Matins of the Blessed Virgin, let the novice think upon and ponder with ardor the benefits of God: namely the Incarnation, the Nativity, the Passion and other general mysteries of this kind; … and afterward let him say the Our Father and the Hail Mary. … After Compline, let him recollect the benefits of God in the manner written at the beginning of this ‘Manner of Praying’ … and he may also add the Salve Regina, etc., with other antiphons and special prayers of the Blessed Virgin.”
Among the brothers who played a great role in the Rosary, Blessed Alan de la Roche (1428–1478) should be especially named for defining its structure and promoting its spread. The confraternities propagated everywhere by our brothers should also be mentioned, beginning with the first one founded by Alan himself at Douai in 1470, and another very celebrated one established at Cologne by James Sprenger, OP, with the approval of the Apostolic See in 1476.
Likewise, St. Pius V, by the bull Consueverunt Romani Pontifices of Sept. 17, 1569, established the definitive form of the Rosary. Then, by the new bull Salvatoris Domini of March 5, 1572, he instituted the liturgical feast of the Blessed Virgin Mary of Victory, later called the feast of the Rosary, to be celebrated on Oct. 7. This feast was confirmed in the most recent liturgical reform.
Therefore, the duty of diligent care falls upon us: to promote this form of prayer in our communities and, with apostolic zeal, to foster it among the faithful, increasing what is ancient with what is new. Indeed, the Rosary “leads us into contemplation of the mystery of salvation, in which the Virgin Mary is intimately associated with the work of her Son” (LCO 67 § II), and it offers itself as a most effective means for promoting faith and nourishing Christian life among the people.
For “this crown of prayers presents itself as a kind of compendium of the Gospel and, therefore, as a form of the Church’s piety” (Paul VI, Apostolic Exhortation Recurrens mensis october, Oct. 7, 1969).
Proprium Officiorum Ordinis Praedicatorum ad Normam Decretorum Sacrosancti Oecumenici Concilii Vaticani II Instauratum Vincentii Couesnongle iussu editum, Editio typica, Sanctae Sabinae, Romae 1982.
