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CHRISTIAN PERSPECTIVES

Rosary and the Marian devotion

It was in the year 1214 that the Catholic Church received the Rosary, a loop of strong thread with beads 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 Albigensians and other sinners.

The story of how he received it is found in the very well known book! De Diginitate Psalterii by Blessed Alan de La Roche. Saint Dominic seeing that the gravity of peoples sins were hindering the conversion of the Albigensians withdrew into a forest and prayed for three days.

Here Mother Mary appeared to him accompanied by three angels and requested Dominic to preach her Psalter to reach hardened souls and win them over to God. God wished by means of these supernatural phenomena to spread the new devotion to Mary and the Holy Rosary and to make it more widely known.

St. Therese of the child Gesus once said; If a sermon on the Blessed Virgin is to please and help me I must be told about her real life not her imagined life. Now I am sure her real life must have been quite simple. Preachers tell us things that make her unapproachable. Instead they should tell us things about her that enable us to initiate her.

They should bring out her virtues and stress the fact that she lived by faith as we do and prove it from the gospel. We know of course the Blessed Virgin is queen of heaven but she is more of a Mother than a Queen to us. Many say that just as the rising sun makes the stars vanish Mary’s glory outshine the glory of all the saints. This is one aspect of Maryan devotion.

The devotion to the Holy Rosary was established in a miraculous way. It proves its value and importance. Inspired by the Holy Spirit instructed by the Blessed Virgin as well as by experience St. Dominic preached the Holy Rosary for the rest of his life.

Among all the devotions approved by the church none has been favoured by so many miracles as the devotion to Mary and the Holy Rosary.

For centuries the Rosary was taught to Catholics to greet Mary with the very words used in the gospel at the annunciation and the visitation to medicate together with Mary on what the gospel tells us of the Birth, the Death and the Resurrection of Christ. Thus by its very nature the Rosary is a school of Marian devotion or commonly known as Mariolatry that is based on the word of God.

If our understanding of the gospel is dynamic then our Marian devotion will be a prayer from the heart believing in what we pray because what happened to Mary happens in our lives as well.

Like Mary annunciations take place in our lives and we too receive messages from God. In the Marialis cultus of Paul VI we are told ‘The Rosary by its very nature requires to be prayed calmly and at a reflective pace so that the person praying it may better meditate on the mysteries of the Lords life as seen through the heart of Mary who was closest of all to him. Founded and preached in the 13th century the Rosary comes to us with 7 centuries of Catholic tradition.

It consists of the our father, Ten hail Mary’s and the gloria in honour of each of the 15 mysteries connected with the redemption.

These 15 mysteries are divided into three fives, the joyful, the sorrowful, and the glorious.

The Rosary is suitable as a personal devotion to Mary more so as a community prayer.

The Rosary saved the church in Southern Europe during the times of St. Dominic. It saved Europe from the onslaught of Turkish domination at Vienna in 1525 A.D. and against lepanto in 1571 A.D.

Vatican council, Lumen Gentium (67/422) says; True devotion to Mary proceeds from true faith by which we are led to recognise the excellence of Mary and we are moved by fillial love towards her and to the initiation of her virtues. Pope Paul VI and Marialis Cultus says; Devotion to Mary is deeply rooted in the revealed word of God and is solidly grounded in the truths of Catholic teaching (MC-56).

Devotion to the virgin Mother of god is not an end in itself but is meant as a help that is suited by its very nature bringing men and women to christ and uniting them to the eternal heavenly father by the bond of love that is the Holy spirit. Marian devotion is based on the word of god. This means our devotion to Mary will grow only as we rediscover mary through the gospel.

Miran Perera Kandy


Message of Our Lady has shaped lives of people

This year marks the 150th anniversary of the apparitions of Our Lady to Bernadette Soubirous and since then, Lourdes has become synonymous with those who are physically sick and ailing with a crystal-clear message, shaping the lives of numerous people.


The statue of Our Lady of Lourdes. Blessed Virgin Mary appeared to St. Bernadette Soubirous in Lourdes, France


St. Bernadette’s statue enshrined at St. Bernadette’s Church Wella Weediya. The diamond jubilee of the Church was celebrated on September 21, 2008.

Coincidentally, it was in this spirit, The Diamond Jubilee of St. Bernadette’s Church, Wella Weediya, Chilaw was celebrated last week with the Bishop of Chilaw, Rt.Rev.Dr. Valence Mendis and Bishop Emeritus Rt.Rev.Dr.Frank Marcus Fernando officiating at Vespers and Holy Mass.

With a population of little over 3,000, Lourdes was, in 1858, an unimportant village and the Soubirous family was compelled to live in surroundings unfit for human living.

Bernadette was only fourteen years and her whole life radically changed on 11th February, 1858, when she had a vision of Blessed Virgin Mary as she was looking for firewood at a rocky recess, in a place known as Massabielle.

In her own words she described: “Our Lady was draped in white with a blue belt and a yellow rose on each foot, the colour of her rosary”. Who the lady was, became the subject of much debate. During the following six months, there were eighteen apparitions of Our Lady, witnessed by Bernadette.

When the news of the subsequent apparitions reached the neighbouring districts, crowds flocked to Massabielle. With the discovery of a spring of water and the news of healings, more people thronged to the venue.

As a result, she was mocked, questioned and threatened with imprisonment; but in the face of all misfortunes and adversity, she remained resolute and unswerving. After four years of rigorous investigation and with distinct evidence of thirty cases of inexplicable healing at Lourdes, the credibility of Bernadette became irrefutable, and the local Bishop declare: “Truly, the Blessed Virgin Mary did appear to Bernadette.”

From what Bernadette described, it was clear that Mary, in fact, had descended from the rock. She had come down to the little visionary. In the words of Bernadette herself, “She was so close, I could almost touch her”, she said.

In all that took place between Our Lady and Bernadette at Massabielle, the message was that God undoubtedly loves us. Lourdes has now become a legendary place of pilgrimage but symbolically, it is a pilgrimage that we make through life to God for our own spiritual well-being.


St. Bernadette’s Church, Wella Weediya, Chilaw.

The feast of St. Bernadette is held every year in Lourdes on February 18. One day, someone had asked Bernadette if she was a saint and she replied, “No, I’m not; I’m just a broom in the hands of the Virgin Mary.

” Indeed, it was an imposing instrument used by God to achieve so many great and wondrous things. She was canonised because in all things, she tried to do the will of God and she became a nun and remained at the convent of Nevers, in France for thirty-eight years until her death, as a humble and religious sister. For, Bernadette experienced a deeper union and love with Jesus.

As we ponder the miracles that take place at Lourdes, day in and day out, we discern how God has touched the hearts of people far and wide.

It is this “little broom” who reveals to us the wisdom of the Most High. She as a living testament reveals to us that we should always work for the greater glory of God.

In a nutshell, Bernadette, was only a broom in the hands of the Virgin Mary. The Lord therefore, has a wonderful plan for each and every one of us.

We must seek His will and not our will and accomplish it by striving for our spiritual progress, in our daily lives.

The Latin saying: “Noverim me, noverim Te, Domine” (“May I know myself, and may I know you, O Lord!”), says it all.


First Jewish holy man to address Catholic synod: Vatican

An Israeli rabbi will become the first Jewish holy man to address a Roman Catholic synod when it convenes next month to discuss the Bible, Vatican spokesman Federico Lombardi said Wednesday.

“It’s the first time a rabbi has been invited to speak before the synod,” Lombardi told AFP, noting that Shear-Yashuv Cohen, Grand Rabbi of Haifa, Israel, would speak on the second day of the October 5-26 event gathering Catholic bishops from around the world. The second such gathering to be presided over by Pope Benedict XVI since his election in 2005 will have the theme “The Word of God in the Life and Mission of the Church.”

More than 200 bishops are expected to attend the synod, a consultative body created in 1965 to ease contacts between bishops and to help the pope set policies for running the Church. Cohen told the Washington-based Catholic News Service (CNS) in Jerusalem that the invitation was a “signal of hope (bringing) a message of love, coexistence and peace for generations.”

He was due to speak on the Jewish interpretation of the Bible, whose first five books comprise the Torah, Judaism’s most holy sacred writings. Cohen told CNS he was able to recite almost the entire Torah by the time he was eight years old.

Benedict has continued the conciliatory steps taken by his predecessor, Polish-born John Paul II, to improve inter-faith relations, but has sometimes stumbled. Most recently he allowed the reintroduction of a controversial Good Friday prayer calling for the conversion of Jews.

However in April the German-born pontiff won some Jewish hearts and minds when he became the first leader of the Roman Catholic Church to visit a synagogue in the United States.

VATICAN CITY, AFP

 

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