Praying the Rosary for Our Troubled World

We have proven incapable of fixing the problems of our world

I received the following in my email inbox this morning and believe it is important to share with people of goodwill thoughout the world.  It is a simple request founded on the principle of looking beyond our own selves to the author of our salvation for the help we need from Him to bring about peace in our world and a return to moral values.

Here is the email:

Hi Everyone,

Imagine what might happen if every Catholic in the world would pray a Rosary on the same day! We have an example in October of 1573, when Europe was saved from the invasion of the mighty Turkish fleet, by the praying of the Rosary by all Christians!

So, on Good Friday, let us all pray a Rosary for peace in the world and the return of moral values into our communities. If possible, please pray your Rosary between 12 noon and 3:00 pm.

Also, please e-mail this message to every Catholic on your address list, and ask them to pass it along to every Catholic on their lists. Let's unite in praying one of the most powerful prayers in existence, for these intentions, on one of the holiest days in our Church year.

God bless all,

"I shall pass this way but ONCE.
Any Goodness I can DO; Any Kindness I can SHOW
Let me do it NOW. For I shall Never Pass this way,.. AGAIN

There is a slight bit of confusion on the date of the invasion of the Turkish Muslim fleet of Europe.  That battle occurred at Lepanto, off western Greece on October 7, 1571.  On October 7, 1571 Pope St. Pius V prayed the Rosary with many faithful in Rome from dawn to dusk.  On that day, as documented here, the winds miraculously changed to assist the Christian forces against a superior Muslim invading force, suffering minimal casualties for such a significant battle.

From that same article is this quote:

"Following the great Christian victory at Lepanto, Pope St. Pius V declared that henceforth a commemoration of the Rosary would be a part of the Vatican's Mass on every October 7. His successor, Pope Gregory XIII, went further. In 1573 he established the Feast of the Most Holy Rosary--to be celebrated at all Churches which had specific altars dedicated to the Rosary."

If you read further, you will note that the Rosary was instrumental in further protection of Europe from Muslim invasion.

But today

"our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the powers, against the world forces of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places." Ephesians 6:12

The enemy has infiltrated every structure, political and corporate in our world, has laid waste family after family, has brought sickness and disease into our bodies, and has stolen the faith (at least temporarily) of loved ones and family members around the world.  Morals have disappeared in a moral relativist maelstrom in our society, and up is down and down, up.

As the nations of the world have turned away from prayer to try and fix these challenges and problems by our own merits, we have learned that we are no closer to resolution, and have lost our way.

So, here is a simple opportunity to place trust where it belongs, in the hands of He who died on the Cross to save us, Jesus Christ.  When the Church has turned to Him in prayer, He has answered.  When we have turned our backs on Him, He has allowed us to operate in our free will, and to wander about almost aimlessly.

So, on Good Friday, when we celebrate the atoning sacrifice of Jesus, could we set aside a short span of time, preferably between noon and 3 pm in your local time, to join others in the world praying the Rosary for peace in our World, and a return to moral values?

What have we got to lose?  More than that, what have we got to gain?

The Our Father

Prayers of the Rosary

OK,so the Our Father is a prayer of more than the Rosary, but it is foundational to the Rosary as well.  Most people are familiar with this prayer, but here are the words:

Our Father, Who art in heaven,
Hallowed be Thy Name.
Thy Kingdom come.
Thy Will be done, on earth as it is in Heaven. Give us this day our daily bread.
And forgive us our trespasses,
as we forgive those who trespass against us.
And lead us not into temptation,
but deliver us from evil. Amen.

This is the prayer that Jesus gave us, and He said "This is how you pray:" in Matthew Chapter 6, and then followed with this beautiful prayer.  So, if the Son of God says This is how you pray, then it seems appropriate to pray this way, and that there must be real meat in this prayer.

As Jesus gave us this prayer, and He is the Son of the Father of the prayer, then the depth of His relationship with His Father must be evident and their unity must be as well.  Further the prayer must be much deeper than our frail human minds can totally grasp. So, a lifetime of meditation might not be sufficient to plumb its depths, because no matter how deep we dig, we are the clay and He is the potter.

But let us look at this beautiful prayer and see if scratching the surface gives us any insights.

We know that God the Father is the Father of Jesus, but Jesus told us to pray "Our Father".  How easily we gloss over this call to relationship.  I had a great earthly father, and I loved him, and knew that he loved me.  But, he was just a type of Our Father, and can't hold a candle to Our heavenly Father.  Imagine what the best father in the world, the king of Father's Day would be like.  Multiply that by a million, and you have not yet scratched the surface of Our Father, the father of everyone.

OK, but He's in heaven like "who art in heaven."  But Jesus said the kingdom of heaven is at hand.  I don't begin to grasp where heaven is, or even if heaven is a where.  But if it is at hand, it must be close by.  Then again Jesus told us in John 14:23 that He and the Father would dwell with us if we follow the commandments.  That's got to make the kingdom of heaven pretty close.

And what does "Hallowed be Thy Name" mean.  We probably have heard the kid version of the prayer where the child says "Harold be Thy Name".  Well hallowed is a little deeper than a human name.  It means made or set apart as holy, respected or honoured greatly, revered.  So, the greatness of Our Father is brought out in this phrase.

Let me split the next bit up a bit: "Thy kingdom come. . . on earth as it is in heaven,"  and "Thy will be done . . . on earth as it is in heaven."  Why did Jesus link the coming of the kingdom and the Father's will being done together?  If God's people do His will, then the kingdom of heaven which is at hand will then be in hand.  Easy words to say; not so easy to do.

"Thy will be done".  Jesus used those same words in the Garden of Gethsemane, and then his tears fell like drops of blood.  Then, he suffered and died an ignominious death on a Cross to set us free from sin and death.  How's that for Thy will being done?  We are not all called to die on a cross, but we are all called to die daily to the sinful tendencies and temptations that come our way, and we are all called to see Jesus in our brothers and sisters, and to know that all mankind are our brothers and sisters.

"Give us this day our daily bread."  Daily bread may not include that shiny Porsche, Gucci bag, Expensive motor home, or other bauble.  It means only what we need for today, not what we want for our ongoing perceived security.  If we have more than we need for today, we are called to be stewards of it, and to share it with our brothers and sisters, as our formed conscience guides us, and as we see needs in front of our faces.  It is not sufficient to say to the beggar: "I'll pray for you.  Have a nice day." 

The next sentence is connective " And forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us."  If we have more than our daily bread and fail to share it, then we trespass against our brother, and if our brother does not share from his abundance with us, then he has trespassed against us.  But Jesus calls us not to be harsh even in this.  Rather he calls us to forgive our brother who has hurt us by his action or his inaction, and not to judge him, so that then we may be forgiven for our own sins against him or others.    The human condition is that of a sinaholic.  We are addicted to sinning, all of us.  Our holiness and call to holiness can never make us truly and totally holy as Our Father is.  Hence the call to forgiveness, so that we too can be forgiven.

Ah, and the penultimate statement: "And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil."God does not lead us into temptation, so it seems odd that we would pray that He not do what He does not do.  But, we need to be reminded that God does not lead us into temptation, that it is the desires of our body, and our imperfect hearts that lead us into temptation.  But, what He does do is "deliver us from evil."  The problem with delivering us from evil, is that we miss most of the times that He does it, and so we are ingrates, thanking Him periodically for something that has caught our eye, while missing so many of the big ones that He does in his majesty and power.

And then the prayer concludes with "Amen."  It is so. I believe.  There is nothing more to say.

We say this wonderful prayer 6 times in the rosary, once at the beginning, and to commence each decade.  It is a constant reminder that God the Father is the center of the universe.

The Apostle's Creed

Prayers of the Rosary

The second prayer of the Rosary is the Apostle's Creed.  It is said only once.

The words are as follows:

I believe in God, the Father Almighty, Creator of Heaven and earth; 

and in Jesus Christ, His only Son Our Lord, 

Who was conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of the Virgin Mary,

suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, died, and was buried. 

He descended into Hell;

the third day He rose again from the dead; 

He ascended into Heaven, and sits at the right hand of God, the Father almighty;

from thence He shall come to judge the living and the dead.

I believe in the Holy Spirit,

the holy Catholic Church, the communion of saints,

the forgiveness of sins,

the resurrection of the body and life everlasting.
Amen. 

 The Catechism of the Catholic Church has this to say about the Apostle's Creed at 194, as quoted from EWTN here:

"The Apostles' Creed is so called because it is rightly considered to be a faithful summary of the apostles' faith. It is the ancient baptismal symbol of the Church of Rome. Its great authority arises from this fact: it is 'the Creed of the Roman Church, the See of Peter, the first of the apostles, to which he brought the common faith." 

From the same site, St. Ambrose is quoted:

"This Creed is the spiritual seal, our heart's meditation and an ever-present guardian; it is, unquestionably, the treasure of our soul."

So, we move into the heart of the Rosary by praying a mini Apostle's Creed with the Sign of the Cross, and then follow up with the whole enchilada.

Though the actual date of origin of this prayer is hard to find, it is clear that it has been in fundamental existence since the early days of the Church.  One tradition states that the 12 Apostles provided one article each of the 12 in the Creed as early as at Pentecost.  Does it matter really how or when this revelation came to be, as long as it came to be?  It is called the Apostle's Creed because it summaries the faith of those first Apostles of the Christian faith.

If you look back above to the prayer, you can see that I separated it into the 12 Articles of Faith that are contained therein.

This beautiful prayer joins us to all Christians in the world, going back as far as the Apostles.  There is a history of the actual words evolving, but this is the essence of our faith, that most of us say in our weekly Celebration of the Eucharist, and here too, in the Rosary.

The Apostle's Creed  highlights a major focus of the Rosary.  The Rosary is by and large a small instruction manual in the faith.  We have already seen how the Sign of the Cross serves that function in its simplicity, but depth.

As a Catholic, I believe that praying the Rosary daily draws me ever deeper into the faith of our fathers, and closer to He who is the author of that faith, our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.

The Sign of the Cross

Prayers of the Rosary

In the Name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, Amen.

The Sign of the Cross is the very first prayer of the Rosary.  It is, of course, not exclusive to the Rosary, but is important as the Beginning and Ending of praying it.

Bert Ghezzi, a Catholic author of  many books including "Sign of the Cross: Recovering the Power of the Ancient Prayer", was interviewed for Catholic Online over 5 years ago, and shared some of the wisdom he has gained about this lovely short prayer here.

Here is the essence of that interview:

LAKE MARY, Florida, NOV. 24, 2004 (Zenit) - The simple gesture that Catholics make thousands of times in their lives has a deeper meaning most of them don't realize.

Now, the multifaceted significance of the sign of the cross has been investigated and explained by Bert Ghezzi, author of "Sign of the Cross: Recovering the Power of the Ancient Prayer" (Loyola Press).

He told us how the sign came about, what six meanings it has and why making it reverently can enhance one's life in Christ.

Q: When did the sign of the cross originate?

Ghezzi: The sign of the cross is a very ancient practice and prayer. We don't have any indication of it in Scripture, but St. Basil in the fourth century said that we learned the sign from the time of the apostles and that it was administered in baptisms. Some scholars interpret St. Paul's saying that he bears the marks of Christ on his body, in Galatians 6:17, as his referring to the sign of the cross.

In the book, I note that the sign originates close to Jesus' time and goes back to the ancient Church. Christians received it in baptism; the celebrant signed them and claimed them for Christ.

Q: How did it become such an important liturgical and devotional practice?

Ghezzi: I speculate that when adult Christians were baptized, they made the sign of the cross that claimed them for Christ on their forehead proudly.

Tertullian said that Christians at all times should mark their foreheads with the sign of the cross. I can imagine that Christians would make a little sign of the cross with their thumb and forefinger on their foreheads, to remind themselves that they were living a life for Christ.

Q: Beyond the words themselves, what does the sign mean? Why is it a mark of discipleship?

Ghezzi: The sign means a lot of things. In the book, I describe six meanings, with and without words. The sign of the cross is: a confession of faith; a renewal of baptism; a mark of discipleship; an acceptance of suffering; a defense against the devil; and a victory over self-indulgence.

When you make the sign, you are professing a mini version of the creed -- you are professing your belief in the Father, and in the Son and in the Holy Spirit. When you say the words and pray in someone's name you are declaring their presence and coming into their presence -- that's how a name is used in Scripture.

As a sacramental, it's a renewal of the sacrament of baptism; when you make it you say again, in effect, "I died with Christ and rose to new life." The sign of the cross in baptism is like a Christian circumcision, which united Gentile converts to the Jewish nation. The sign links you to the body of Christ, and when you make it you remember your joining to the body with Christ as the head.

The sign of the cross is a mark of discipleship. Jesus says in Luke 9:23, "If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow me." The word that the Fathers of the Church used for the sign of the cross is a Greek word that is the same as what a slave owner put on a slave, a shepherd put on a sheep and a general put on a soldier -- it's a declaration that I belong to Christ.

Self-denial is not just giving up little things; to be a disciple you are under Christ's leadership and you don't belong to yourself. By doing the sign of the cross, you're saying to the Lord, "I want to obey you; I belong to you. You direct all my decisions. I will always be obedient to God's law, Christ's teachings and the Church."

When suffering comes, the sign of the cross is a sign of acceptance. It's remembering that Jesus became a man and suffered for us and that we participate in Christ's suffering. The sign of the cross says, "I am willing to embrace suffering to share in Christ's suffering."

When you're suffering, when you're feeling like God is not there, the sign of the cross brings him there and declares his presence whether you feel it. It is a way of acknowledging him at that time of trial.

One of the main teachings of the early Church Fathers is that the sign of the cross is a declaration of defense against the devil. When you sign yourself, you are declaring to the devil, "Hands off. I belong to Christ; he is my protection." It's both an offensive and defensive tool.

I've found that the sign of the cross is a way to put to death self-indulgence -- those big problems we have, the stubborn things we can't get rid of. The Church Fathers say if you are angry, full of lust, fearful, emotional or grappling with fleshly problems, make the sign when tempted and it will help dispel the problem.

I began to make it to gain control with a problem with anger. Signing myself is a way of destroying the anger, putting on patient behavior, imitating Jesus' practice of virtue.

Q: Do non-Catholics use the sign of the cross?

Ghezzi: Yes, the sign of the cross is used by Episcopalians, Lutherans, Methodists and Presbyterians, particularly in baptisms. In his small catechism, Martin Luther recommends making the sign of the cross at bedtime and first thing in the morning.

It's a shame that many non-Catholics see it as something they shouldn't be doing; it comes from an ancient Church that we all share. One of my hopes in writing this book is that non-Catholics will read it and share in the sign of the cross.

Q: Why do Catholics use the sign of the cross with holy water upon entering and exiting a church?

Ghezzi: In order to participate in the great sacrifice of the Mass, you need to be baptized. Using holy water to sign yourself is saying "I am a baptized Christian and I am authorized to participate in this sacrifice."

When you make the sign of the cross when you leave, you say that the Mass never ends -- your whole life is participating in Christ's sacrifice.

Q: Why should Christians learn more about this prayer?

Ghezzi: I think that it's not something to be taken casually. The sign of the cross has enormous power as a sacramental; it does not cause the spiritual thing it signifies but draws on the prayer of the Church to affect us in our lives. The sign of the cross is the supreme sacramental.

When I see professional athletes make the sign of the cross during games, I'm not critical of them. It says that everything I do, I do in the name of Christ -- even games can be played in the presence of God.

When people make the sign of the cross casually, I pray that they will recognize how serious it is -- that they are declaring that they belong to Christ, they want to obey him and accept suffering. It's not a good-luck charm.

Q: Why is the sign of the cross significant today, especially in areas where laws are becoming less tolerant of public displays of faith?

Ghezzi: They can tell us that we can't have the Ten Commandments in a public building, but they can't stop us from making the sign of the cross publicly. We need to remember what Jesus said: If we are ashamed of him, he'll be ashamed of us.

We should feel confident in letting people know that we are Christians and that we belong to Christ.

Wow, a mini version of the Apostles Creed among many other good things.  Catholics love those prayers that we associate with our practice of the faith, but how much more delightful to know their origins, and meanings, so that we can join even more fully with our brothers and sisters of the faith when we pray them.

I confess that I really did not have any understanding of the depth of making the Sign of the Cross on my body, and when entering or leaving Church, doing it with holy water.

Who Knew!!!