St. Dominic - August 8th

 

 Today is the memorial of St. Dominic. Dominic Guzman was born in Spain in 1170. After he was ordained a priest, he was sent to preach against the Albigensian heresy, but became disappointed by his lack of success. The Albigensian heresy denied the incarnation of Jesus. They did not believe Jesus became flesh and believed that the body was indecent and thought that the soul was imprisoned in an evil body.

That is until the Blessed Virgin Mary appeared to him and explained the Rosary to him and that he was to preach it everywhere. She added mysteries to each of the decades and he was supposed to preach on these mysteries. During his time, the people had already been praying 150 Hail Marys, but did not have meditations applied to the Rosary until Mary appeared to him.

Due to his success, he gained many followers, who called themselves the Order of Preachers, which later became known as the Dominicans and would include saints like St. Thomas Aquinas.

The words that are repeated when we pray the Rosary come from the angel Gabriel, who said, “Hail full of grace the Lord is with thee, blessed art thou among women and blessed is the fruit of thy womb Jesus.”

With the words of the angel Gabriel, we can see how they would affect those who struggled with the heresy. Truly the fruit of Mary’s womb, which was the body of Jesus was good. When people began to pray the rosary, they would say the words of the angel Gabriel to the Blessed Virgin Mary repeated 53 times.

The mediations which were added to the Rosary, by Our Lady through St. Dominic reminded the people about the correct teachings of the life, death and resurrection of Jesus, as the mysteries were contemplated in the minds of those who prayed the rosary. The body was no longer considered indecent, but rather, truly blessed because it was Our Lord’s body, which would become the instrument of salvation on the Cross and would gloriously rise and ascend into heaven in the person of Jesus Christ.

The rosary was not only a powerful means to crush heresy, but also to crush the enemies of Christianity. Not long after St. Dominic and his friars preached the rosary, the rosary was attributed to the winning the battle of Muret in the 1200’s. Likewise, all of us are familiar with the battle of Lepanto. Pope Pius V beseeched all Catholics to pray the Rosary, to win the battle against Muslims, who attempted to invade Europe in the 1500’s. Because Christians won the battle, the pope established the feast of the Holy Rosary on Oct. 7^th, the day the battle was won.

Besides defeating heresies and winning battles, the rosary increases virtue in the interior life of the soul. Our Lady told St. Bridget, “Whenever I mediated on the beauty, modesty, and wisdom of my Son, my heart was filled with joy. Whenever I thought of His hands and feet which would be pierced with cruel nails, I wept bitterly and my heart was rent with sorrow and pain.”

St. Louis de Montfort said, through the rosary, hardened sinners are converted, great battles have been won, pestilences have ended, people find courage to flee temptations, vocations have been wrought, and faith has been re-enkindled. And through the Rosary we grow in holiness and virtue by leaps and bounds.

Our Lady told Blessed Alan de la Roche, “When you say the Rosary-- angels rejoice, the Blessed Trinity delights in it, my Son finds joy in it too, and I myself am happier than you can possibly imagine”. And Our Lady also said, “After the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, there is no nothing in the Church that I love as much as the Rosary.”

Today, let us give thanks to God for sending the Blessed Virgin Mary to St. Dominic and for giving us the Rosary. May we treasure it and pray it every day, because we want to be made worthy of the promises of Christ, by the mysteries we meditate upon in the Most Holy Rosary.