Catholic Growth

Today we celebrate the Feast Day of Our Lady of the Rosary, so I felt it was important to take a break from my series on virtue to cover this topic.

The Rosary has an interesting history, filled with combatting evils and conflict. You’ll see that it is a gift from Our Lady, which she holds in very high esteem. In this post about the history of the Rosary, I will cover the biggest events I have found. Though there are many events I do not cover, these events I do will show a developing form of powerful prayer.

Ancient Roots

The Rosary has it’s roots in the traditions of the desert father’s, in the 3rd and 4th centuries. It was a popular tradition that these monks and priests would pray the 150 Psalms, and keep track of these using stones. In order to keep these stones from spilling out and getting lost, they drilled holes in these stones and strung them on rope, creating a prayer rope with beads.

Prayer ropes were used in other religions and continue to be used today, but these Psalm prayer ropes, or Psalters, are important because they were the precursors to the Rosary.

Not everyone was able to read the Psalms however. So a practice developed for the common person, in which they would pray 150 Our Father’s. This was called the Pater Noster Psalter, or just Pater Noster.

The First Part of the Hail Mary

The first part of the Hail Mary, “Hail Mary Full of Grace, the Lord is with thee. Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb.” Came from two passages of the Bible, Luke 1:28 and Luke 1:42. These two passages were first joined together in the seventh century, and it was said at mass during special feast days. This eventually became a common prayer among monasteries in the eleventh century. At this time it was called the Angelic Salutation.

Mary Gives Dominic the Rosary

In 1214, Our Lady appeared to St Dominic de Guzman, the same saint who started the Dominican Order. St Dominic had been trying to combat the Albigensian Heresy, which was a new Gnosticism. He was having trouble with this, because the heresy was deep-rooted and supported by the nobles in the area. All the sins of these people kept them from converting as well.

After working so hard and getting nowhere in converting the heretics in the region, St Dominic retreated into a forest near Toulouse. Here he he prayed constantly, wept, and did harsh penances on himself to appease God’s anger. This was how pained he was at the thought of all those lost souls. His praying and fasting lasted for three days.

After three days had passed, St Dominic received a visit from Our Lady. She asked him, ” Dear Dominic, do you know which weapon the Blessed Trinity wants to use to reform the world?” To which St Dominic replied, “Oh, my Lady, you know far better than I do because next to your Son Jesus Christ you have always been the chief instrument of our salvation.” Our Lady then replied to St Dominic, “I want you to know that, in this kind of warfare, the battering ram has always been the Angelic Psalter which is the foundation stone of the New Testament. Therefore if you want to reach these hardened souls and win them over to God, preach my Psalter.”

This Psalter consisted of 3 sets of 5 mysteries, and in each mystery there was 10 Hail Marys. This first Marian or Angelic Psalter had 150 Hail Marys, very much like the Pater Noster Psalters and the normal Psalters that came before it.

St Dominic found comfort in Our Lady’s words, and rose with intense zeal to save the souls of those people in the district of Toulouse. He ran to the Cathedral, where the Church bells rang because of unseen angels. The bells gathered the people in the town in front of the Cathedral. St Dominic gave a powerful sermons, in the midst of a powerful storm. The people saw a picture of Our Lady, displayed at the Cathedral, raise her arms three times. St Dominic preached on the incredible importance of the Rosary, and almost every person in Toulouse converted back to their Christian faith, and denounced their bad habits.

St Dominic preached about the Rosary passionately, and was very successful in converting many back to the truth of the Faith. By this time he had also founded the Dominican Order. He preached about the Rosary often, and would pray the Rosary in preparation for his sermons.

St Dominic died in 1221. Soon after he died, devotion to the Rosary died down to where it was barely prayed by anyone. At this time it was still called the Angelic Psalter.

Alan de La Roche Revives the Rosary

After devotion to the Rosary died down, a terrible plague went through Europe, killing a large part of the population. Emerging from the rubble of a broken society, the Rosary made a comeback, and helped many people stuck in such terrible situations. Our Lady chose Blessed Alan de la Roche, a Dominican, as the one who would revive this devotion.

In 1460 Alan received a visit from Our Lord, asking why he was not spreading knowledge of the Rosary. Then he received a visit from Our Lady, explaining that she obtained Alan’s conversation so he could spread knowledge of the Rosary. And finally, he received a visit from St Dominic, imploring him to take a look at all St Dominic accomplished through preaching the Rosary unceasingly.

The first visit from Our Lord made Blessed Alan resolve to preach the Rosary unceasingly. The next two visits from Our Lady and St Dominic made him so much more devoted to the cause.

After these visits, Blessed Alan de la Roche preached about the Rosary unceasingly, giving rose to it’s popularity once again. He was very well known for reviving a devotion to the Rosary, and became known by many as the Apostle of the Rosary.

It was also around this time that the name “Rosary” was developed. This came about because of a legend in which a Franciscan friar was found praying a Rosary, and with each Hail Mary and angel was seen taking a rose from his mouth and placing it on Our Lady’s head as a crown. Rosary came from the word Rosarium, which means rose garden, as we offer Our Lady roses as we say this prayer.

Pope Pius V

Devotion to the Rosary grew even more popular under the papacy of Pope Pius V. Pius V, another Dominican, was well known for his approving the changes in the Council of Trent, codifying the Tridentine Mass, promoting teaching of the Real Presence in the Eucharist, and most especially his love of Our Lady.

A few major things involving the Rosary happened under his leadership as Pope.

He wrote a papal bull titled Consueverunt Romani Pontifices (On the Rosary) in 1569. This document set in place the format of the Rosary for everyone to use.

In the Council of Trent, they put the rest of the Hail Mary as we know it in place. so now the Hail Mary was complete.

And then there’s the Battle of Lepanto.

Battle of Lepanto

On October 7th, 1571 the Holy League, formed from Pope Pius V, battled the fleet from the Ottoman Empire. The Ottoman Empire was wreaking havoc on the coastlines of Christian Europe in the Mediterranean Sea, enslaving christians and threatening to destroy European culture entirely. The Holy League composed of Spanish, Venician, and Papal State forces. Pope Pius V, seeing the incredible threat of the Ottoman Empire, had worked for three years to convince the different Catholic countries to unite under one banner to defend all of Europe. The Ottoman fleet was incredibly barbaric to the coastal towns and cities, enslaving men for their galleys, and women for their brothels. This made it possible for an alliance to happen, as the Catholic countries could not let this keep happening. The stage was set for a cataclysmic battle between Catholic and Muslim forces.

The Catholic forces found the Muslim fleet in the Gulf of Lepanto, and readied themselves for battle. For months the Pope had been encouraging all Catholics to pray a daily Rosary, for success for the Catholic forces. Before battle commenced, every Catholic soldier knelt on their ships and said the Rosary. After this the winds changed in the Holy Leagues favor, and some how they were able to defeat a much larger fleet with few casualties. This was a huge blow to the Ottoman Empire’s plan to invade Europe, and a huge win for the Catholic nations.

Because of the major role the Rosary took in this momentous battle, Pope Pius V named October 7th as the Feast of Our Lady of Victory. This day was later renamed as Our Lady of the Rosary.

After the papacy of Pope Pius V, the Rosary remained in it’s same form until a few children in the early twentieth century saw Our Lady herself.

Our Lady of Fatima

In 1917, three children, named Lucia, Jacinta, and Francisco saw an apparition of Our Lady. In a rural area of Portugal, in the midst of a horrible world war, and in a society that was rejecting God and divinity, Our Lady chose these three children to deliver a message. Among many things that Mary spoke about, she gave such importance to a daily Rosary and added a prayer. The Fatima prayer, which goes like this, ” Oh my Jesus, forgive us our sins, save us from the fires of hell. Lead all souls to Heaven, especially those in most need of thy mercy.” This prayer was to be added in to the Rosary after the Glory Be said after every Decade.

Our Lady emphasized a need for a daily Rosary for the conversion sinners. This is so similar to the reason that St Dominic was given the Rosary, to convert heretics back to the Faith.

There is so much more to say about Fatima that cannot be included in this post. There will be a future post on this topic to cover this incredible apparition in more depth, but since I am only giving a brief history of the Rosary, I’ll move on.

Pope John Paul II

The latest development in the Rosary was the addition of 5 more mysteries. The Luminous Mysteries were added by St Pope John Paul II in 2002 in his apostolic letter, “Rosarium Virginis Mariae.” This was a major addition to the devotion of the Rosary. However, in his own words, Pope John Paul II explained that this addition was only an optional addition. The goal of the Luminous Mysteries is to provide more points in Christ’s life to meditate on.

Concluding Thoughts

That brings us to today, where we have the Rosary in it’s current form. A battering ram, give to us by the Holy Trinity, through Our Lady, to combat evil. And this beautiful prayer, much like our Catholic Faith, develops as the years go by. This slowly revealed weapon against evil has such a miraculous history of changing people and destroying sin.

So today, on the day when Europe was saved by Our Lady’s intercession, as Catholics prayed with their Rosaries drawn against the forces of evil, let us all pray a Rosary. Let us all pray to protect, pray to convert, and pray for Our Lady’s help.