SECOND ROSE: ORIGIN AND NAME
SINCE the Holy Rosary is composed, principally and in substance, of the
Prayer of Christ and the Angelic Salutation, that is, the Our Father
and the Hail Mary, it was without doubt the first prayer and the first
devotion of the faithful and has been in use all through the centuries,
from the time of the Apostles and disciples down to the present.
But it was only in the year 1214, however, that Holy Mother Church
received the Rosary in its present form and according to the method we
use today. It was given to the Church by Saint Dominic who had received
it from the Blessed Virgin as a powerful means of converting the
Albigensians and other
sinners.
I will tell you the story of how he received it, which is found in the
very well-known book De Dignitate
Psalterii by Blessed Alan de la
Roche. [1] Saint Dominic, seeing
that the gravity of
people's sins was
hindering the conversion of the Albigensians, withdrew into a forest
near Toulouse where he prayed unceasingly for three days and three
nights. During this time he did nothing but weep and do harsh penances
in order to appease the anger of Almighty God. He used his discipline
so much that his body was lacerated, and finally he fell into a coma.
At this point Our Lady appeared to him, accompanied by three Angels,
and she said:
"Dear Dominic, do you know which weapon the Blessed Trinity wants to
use to reform the world?"
"Oh, my Lady," answered Saint Dominic, "you know far better than I do
because next to your Son Jesus Christ you have always been the chief
instrument of our salvation."
Then Our Lady replied: "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."
So he arose, comforted, and burning with zeal for the conversion of
the people in that district he made straight for the Cathedral. At once
unseen Angels rang the bells to gather the people together and Saint
Dominic began to preach.
At the very beginning of his sermon an appalling storm broke out, the
earth shook, the sun was darkened, and there was so much thunder and
lightning that all were very much afraid. Even greater was their fear
when looking at a picture of Our Lady exposed in a prominent place they
saw her raise her arms to Heaven three times to call down God's
vengeance upon them if they failed to be converted, to amend their
lives, and
seek the protection of the Holy Mother of God.
God wished, by means of these supernatural phenomena, to spread the new
devotion of the Holy Rosary and to make it more widely known.
At last, at the prayer of Saint Dominic, the storm came to an end, and
he went on preaching. So fervently and compellingly did he explain
the importance and value of the Holy Rosary that almost all the people
of Toulouse embraced it and renounced their false beliefs. In a very
short time a great improvement was seen in the town; people began
leading Christian lives and gave up their former bad habits.
1. De
Dignitate Psalterii. The importance and Beauty of the Holy
Rosary,
by Blessed Alan de la Roche, O.P., French Dominican Father and Apostle
of the Holy Rosary.
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