The Rosary, Again?

By Fr. Christopher Foeckler, MJ • Phoenix, AZ

If you pay attention to Catholic news services even just a little bit, you have heard the call to pray the Rosary of the Blessed Virgin Mary. It is an urgent and widespread summons to pray it daily!

The Holy Father has requested its recitation several times this year for relief from the Pandemic, echoing St. John Paul II on one occasion by saying, “Contemplating the face of Christ with the heart of Mary our Mother will make us even more united as a spiritual family and will help us overcome this time of trial.” Dioceses in the United States and the world are promoting Rosary “Crusades” and “Campaigns”; Religious Orders are promoting the Rosary, like the Little Sisters of the Poor’s “A Million Families, A Million Rosaries”; Catholic radio stations and websites offering the daily recitation of the Rosary is staggering; National Catholic groups like “Rosary Coast to Coast” and America Needs Fatima’s “National Rosary Rally” and the “54-day Rosary Novena” are promoting the Rosary; and there is a World-Wide Campaign to “Pray 5 Million Rosaries” organized by the Marian Helpers in collaboration with many Fatima groups! 

If you look a little closer at these announcements, you have a very good idea of WHY it is necessary to pray the Rosary!

“We are living in times of great suffering where many have lost hope,” stresses Marian Father Chris Alar. “Evil abounds and families are struggling. But this is not the time to give up!”

Archbishop Samuel Aquila of Denver said recently, “In our current time of crisis, our Church and our country need faith in God and the protection and intercession of the Blessed Mother.”

Bishop Carl Kemme of Wichita, Kansas said, “Friends, we might be tempted to think that we can do little or nothing in the face of so many modern-day trials and challenges; sometimes we feel helpless, but as Christians, we can and must always pray.” He added an important observation to the request. “We are the ones whom God has chosen and destined to live at this time in history, bringing our faith to bear, as did our predecessors, so that with God’s grace and by God’s grace alone, we too will triumph and overcome all adversity and grow stronger in faith, hope and love in the process.” And he cited the Rosary as “a weapon against evil and a source of divine strength and consolation…a simple but powerful prayer, which many of the saints identified as our greatest spiritual weapon, second only to the Sacraments. Through the centuries, this devotion has connected us to Mary and to each other as a bond between heaven and earth.” The Bishop also said that St. Padre Pio advised, “In times of darkness, holding the rosary is like holding our Blessed Mother’s hand.” The Bishop concluded with the encouraging words of Our Lady to St. Juan Diego: “Do not fear any illness or vexation, anxiety or pain. Am I not here who am your Mother? Are you not under my shadow and protection? Am I not your fountain of life? Are you not in the folds of my mantle – in the crossing of my arms? Is there anything else you need?”

Let’s begin: In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit…