Catechism Corner:

The World Mission Rosary was created in 1951 by the Venerable Archbishop Fulton Sheen, who was the National Director of Missio (Pontifical Mission Societies) in the United States.

Archbishop Fulton saw the need to pray for the whole world, especially for those living in poverty.

Each decade of the Rosary is colour-coded to represent a continent where the Church continues her mission:

• Africa is represented by the green decade for its forests and grasslands.
• The Americas are red to show the continent's fire of faith.
• Europe is white because it is the home of the Holy Father, who wears white.
• Oceania is shown in blue for the oceans surrounding the islands there.
• Asia is portrayed in yellow as a symbol of the sun rising in the east.

HISTORY OF THE ROSARY

The Rosary means "Crown of Roses". Our Lady has revealed to several people that each time they say a Hail Mary they are giving her a beautiful rose and that each complete Rosary makes her a crown of roses. The rose is the queen of flowers, and so the Rosary is the rose of all devotions and it is therefore the most important one.

The Holy Rosary is considered a perfect prayer because within it lies the awesome story of our salvation. With the Rosary we meditate on the mysteries of joy, of sorrow, of glory, and of light of Jesus and Mary. It's a simple prayer, humble so much like Mary.

It's a prayer we can all say together with Her, the Mother of God. With the Hail Mary, we invite Her to pray for us. Our Lady always grants our request. She joins Her prayer to ours. Therefore, it becomes ever more useful because what Mary asks She always receives, Jesus can never say no to whatever His Mother asks for.

Journeying through the Joyful, Sorrowful, and Glorious mysteries of the rosary, the individual brings to mind our Lord's incarnation, His passion and death, and His resurrection from the dead.

In so doing, the rosary assists us in growing in a deeper appreciation of these mysteries, in uniting our life more closely to our Lord, and in imploring His graced assistance to live the faith. We also ask for the prayers of our Blessed Mother, who leads all believers to her Son.

The use of "prayer beads" and the repeated recitation of prayers to aid in meditation stem from the earliest days of the Church and has roots in pre-Christian times. Evidence exists from the Middle Ages that strings of beads were used to count Our Fathers and Hail Marys.

The structure of the rosary gradually evolved between the 12th and 15th centuries. Eventually, 50 Hail Marys were recited and linked with verses of psalms or other phrases evoking the lives of Jesus and Mary.

During this time, this prayer form became known as the rosarium ("rose garden"), actually a common term to designate a collection of similar material, such as an anthology of stories on the same subject or theme. During the 16th century, the structure of the five-decade rosary based on the three sets of mysteries prevailed.

Tradition does hold that St. Dominic (d. 1221) devised the rosary as we know it. Moved by a vision of our Blessed Mother, he preached the use of the rosary in his missionary work among the Albigensians, who had denied the mystery of Christ.

A dozen popes have mentioned St. Dominic's connection with the rosary, sanctioning his role as at least a "pious belief."

The rosary gained greater popularity in the 1500s when Moslem Turks were ravaging Eastern Europe. Recall that in 1453, Constantinople had fallen to the Moslems, leaving the Balkans and Hungary open to conquest. With Muslims raiding even the coast of Italy, the control of the Mediterranean was now at stake.

In 1571, Pope Pius V organized a fleet under the command of Don Juan of Austria, the half-brother of King Philip II of Spain. While preparations were underway, the Holy Father asked all of the faithful to say the rosary and implore our Blessed Mother's prayers, under the title Our Lady of Victory, that our Lord would grant victory to the Christians. Although the Moslem fleet outnumbered that of the Christians in both vessels and sailors, the forces were ready to meet in battle. The Christian flagship flew a blue banner depicting Christ crucified.

On October 7, 1571, the Muslims were defeated at the Battle of Lepanto. The follow-ing year, Pope St. Pius V established the Feast of the Holy Rosary on October 7, where the faithful would not only remember this victory but also give thanks to the Lord for all of His benefits and remem-ber the powerful intercession of our Blessed Mother.

The fact that our Church continues to include the Feast of the Holy Rosary on the liturgical calendar testifies to the importance and goodness of this form of prayer.

Archbishop Fulton Sheen said, "The rosary is the book of the blind, where souls see and there enact the greatest drama of love the world has ever known; it is the book of the simple, which initiates them into mysteries and knowledge more satisfying than the education of other men; it is the book of the age, whose eyes close upon the shadow of this world, and open on the substance of the next. The power of the rosary is beyond description." (*)