I often meditate on these words, by Saint Theresa of the Child Jesus: “By the Rosary, you can obtain everything. According to a graceful comparison, the Rosary is a long chain that links Heaven and earth. One end of it is in our hands and the other end is in the hands of the Holy Virgin.”
As long as the Rosary is prayed, I am sure that God cannot let the world down, for this prayer intercedes on our behalf to the very heart of God. It is like the yeast that regenerates the earth. The loving Queen of Heaven cannot forget her children who endlessly sing her praises. No prayer is more pleasing to God than the Rosary. This is why the Church invites us to pray the Rosary. The Feast of Our Lady of the Rosary was instituted by His Holiness Pope Saint Pius V as the Feast of “Our Lady of Victory” (1572), to thank God for the Victory of Lepanto.
What the Lord did in Mary, out of sheer grace, to allow her to become the Mother of his Son, He also did for us through Baptism. In Jesus, we are made beloved sons and daughters of the Father, which means that sin is not the final word, we are made for love. Faith is for us a gift of God, a grace. Every day, we are to give a faith response, to live our faith pilgrimage in the midst of our joys, our pains and our daily difficulties.
On this path, Mary is our star, preceding us. She is our model to grow and progress in faith. Mary did not look inward on her difficulties, her questions. She kept an open heart. Oh no, Mary was not spared the difficulties of everyday life… This is why Mary can help us today to follow a path of faith. With her, in her name, with the words of Saint John-Paul II, I dare say again: “Do not be afraid, do not be afraid of this world, of the events, because God is with you. Do not be afraid, do not look inward to your questions, your legitimate doubts, your daily difficulties.” For Mary invites us to live our life, not closed in ourselves, but as a gift to God and to our brothers.
Mary experienced suffering at the foot of the cross, but she was still standing. God always chooses the little things, the weak things of the world, as he did for Mary, to achieve great things. Even if some in the media often give us the feeling that hatred and violence triumph, we must look at all events with faith to allow us to see that there will always be people to proclaim the right of the little one, of the weak one!
At Fatima (Portugal), the Virgin Mary said to the three children: “I am Our Lady of the Rosary. I have come to call for men to pray the Rosary every day, to do penance for their sins and to change their life…” Let us hear, each of us, the call, the prayer of the Virgin Mary!
Father JM