The Pope Makes Changes in the Rosary

A report and comment on religious trends and events being covered by the media.  This week’s item is from Catholic News Service, October 22, 2002 with a headline: “Pope Announces Changes in the Rosary,” dateline: Washington.Pope John Paul II’s addition of five new mysteries to the centuries old tradition of the Rosary did not come as a huge surprise to some Marianist priests.It has always been a developing prayer.Many people have proposed changes over the years said Marianist Father Thomas Thompson, director of the Marian Library at the University of Dayton in Ohio.The priest noted that the U. S. Bishop suggested adding new mysteries to the Rosary more than 25 years ago.He was referring to the Bishop’s 1973 pastoral letter on Mary titled: “Behold Your Mother, Woman of Faith.”Pointing out that the prayers and mysteries of the Rosary are based on the Bible, the Bishop suggested that Catholics can freely experiment with new forms of the Rosary including new sets of mysteries, such as ones dealing with the public life of Christ.As Father Thompson sees it, the Pope called for the suggested edition at this time because it times of trouble and doubt the church looks to Mary for assistance.“The Rosary is a recourse for troubled times,” he told Catholic News Service in an October 21^st interview.Called “The Mysteries of Light,” the new Rosary theme suggested by the Pope in his October 16^th apostolic letter: Rosarium Virginis Mariae (The Rosary of the Virgin Mary) focus on Christ’s baptism, his first miracle, his preaching ministry, his transfiguration, and his institution of the Eucharist.Father Thompson who has published several articles on the Rosary, said the Pope’s apostolic letter about the Rosary and it’s particular references to today’s troubled times, is similar to the encyclicals on the Rosary that Pope Leo VIII began in 1883 when he called the Rosary a remedy for the ills of society.Marianist Father Johann Rotan said he has seen a renewed interest in the Rosary since last year’s terrorist attacks and noted that most of the questions had been specifically about prayer in troubled times.He thinks the Rosary provides a perfect solution.“It’s hard to invent an original and creative prayer and make it your own,” he said, noting that when people pray the Rosary they already have prayers in place.“The beads also give them something tangible to hang onto.The rhythm of the prayers,” he said, “frees you to concentrate on the important messages of the mysteries of Christ’s life.It’s like the melody of a song,” he added.“It gives you a sense of peace.”

Tom:

Dave as former Roman Catholic who’s prayed the Rosary, I never had any formal instruction in the Rosary, but you just learn how to pray the Rosary and you did it.In some cases, when you went to confession, this was given as a penance.I mean so in other words, it’s a punishment.So what they are talking about here, it’s really hard for me to fathom, not just as an evangelical, but even as a former Catholic who has been through these things.For example, you pray the Rosary—153 prayers to Mary, 16 Our Father’s, alright?In doing a round of this.Now I don’t know how when you have to go through all these prayers and you say them by rote, sometimes I remember I could say a Hail Mary, so fast that it all sounded like one sentence.It all just kind of mixed together.So I don’t know how—

Dave:

You’re not thinking about it, it is like a mantra.There’s some blessing, some power in the repetition of it.

Tom:

Dave, and this priest is re-enforcing that.He says it is hard to invent an original or creative prayer and make your own.Well I thought prayer was communication.I thought it was just dialogue between—you know thoughtful dialogue between God and yourself.

Dave:

Right, this is the very vain repetitions like the heathen that Jesus forbad his disciples to be involved in.

Tom:

Yes, in addition, now we have the mysteries which focused on certain issues which they say are biblical and yes, they do relate to biblical things, but what was missing from this was a focus on Christ.His life, what he went through, and this is what the Pope is adding to it.But he’s doing it in a way and with a vehicle that as you just said, Jesus condemned.

Dave:

Well Tom, why don’t you tell us where the Rosary came from.

Tom:

Well it really came from an apparition.Now the apparition the claim is that this was Mary, but this apparition and some would say this was not from the spirit of God, this was a demonic apparition.And why would you even say that?Because what was being taught was a focus, saying prayers to the apparition herself.Where do you find that in scripture?

Dave:

Never in the Bible, but of course Tom, this is part of Catholicism as you know.And it’s both the catechism and the second Vatican counsel that says “our Lady has been known as the mother of God,” and then it says, “To whom the faithful turn in all their trials and needs, all their difficulties and needs.”Now look, why would you turn to Mary in your difficulties and needs, number one.Number two, how could Mary hear the prayers of millions of people simultaneously in thousands of different languages?Number three, Mary would then have to be at least as great as God in order to meet all the needs, understand and meet all the needs, and solve all the dilemmas and problems of these hundreds of millions of Catholics.It is a turning from God and Christ to Mary.She becomes the real God of the Catholics and Tom, you could tell us by first hand experience.There are thousands of many times as many prayers to Mary as there are to the Father and to Jesus.

Tom:

You know Dave, as a Roman Catholic, as a child going through Catholic schools and so on, you see the Catholic apologists make a big issue of “we don’t worship Mary.”Dave, I’ve never ever—

Dave:

In fact Tom, they say we don’t pray to Mary.

Tom:

Right, but with regard to the worshipping of Mary, I was never corrected.I was involved very much in Mary and the sodality and so on in Catholic private schools, I was never ever corrected for going too far in terms of call it veneration, but it went beyond veneration.I mean she was the one who I turned to all the time for everything and then hoping that maybe Jesus would answer her prayers.But that’s the way you go and so this business as they set it up within the church of dulia, hyperdulia, and latria which has to do with the veneration of saints, veneration of Mary and then the worship of God, I never had a teaching on that.It was always do whatever you could so in practice no matter what they say officially, in practice it’s always encouraged to worship Mary.That’s the way it was.

Dave:

Jesus Christ is the one who died for our sins.He paid the penalty.He loves us.The Son of God, Paul said who loved and gave himself for me.He said we go to the Father in His name.Never do you have this in the Bible, praying to Mary or through Mary.