The Most Holy Rosary Of The Blessed Virgin Mary. Feast Day 7 October.

Text and Illustrations from The Saint Andrew Daily Missal, which can be found on the
Web-Site of  UNA VOCE OF ORANGE COUNTY, who reproduce the same with the kind permission of  ST. BONAVENTURE PRESS

7 October.

Feast Day of The Most Holy Rosary of The Blessed Virgin Mary.

Double of the Second-Class.

White Vestments.

The Mysteries of The Holy Rosary: Joyful; Sorrowful; Glorious.

It was the custom in the Middle Ages, as formerly among the Romans, for noble personages to wear Crowns of Flowers, called "Chaplets". These Crowns were offered to persons of distinction, as a Feudal Due.

The Blessed Virgin, as Queen of Heaven, and of Souls, has a right to the same homage. Therefore, the Church asks us to recognise the title of Mary as Queen of the Holy Rosary, and she exhorts us to to offer to her, as Daughter of the Father, Mother of the Son, and Spouse of the Holy Ghost, a Triple Chaplet, or Three Crowns of Roses, of which she shows us all the beauties in today's Office, and to which she has given the name of "Rosary".

The Collect reminds us that the recitation of the Rosary is a mental Prayer, in which we meditate on the Mysteries of the Life, Death, and Resurrection, of Jesus; with these, Mary was intimately associated.

The Feast of the Most Holy Rosary is a summary of The Liturgical Year, as we meditate on the Mysteries, and also of the Breviary, as we recite one hundred and fifty Ave Marias, corresponding to one hundred and fifty Psalms, ending with Gloria Patri.

It shows, in an admirable Triptych, the Joyful, Sorrowful, and Glorious events in the lives of Jesus and Mary, which are recalled in succession in the Catholic Calendar.

In the Christmas Cycle, the Soul, plunged in an atmosphere of Joy, meditates on the Five Joyful Mysteries: On Wednesdays and Fridays of Ember Week in Winter; on Christmas Day; on 2 February (the Purification of the Blessed Virgin Mary); and on the Sunday in the Octave of the Epiphany.

Again, she contemplates, during the Season of the Passion, the Five Sorrowful Mysteries, on Holy Thursday and Good Friday.

Lastly, she sympathises, amid the Joys of the Paschal Season and Pentecost, with the Five Glorious Mysteries at the Feasts of Easter, Ascension, Pentecost and the Assumption of the Virgin. There is a Plenary Indulgence, similar to that of the Portiuncula, to be gained on the day of this Feast by all the Faithful, who visit a Church where the Archconfraternity of the Rosary is established.

Blessed Pope Leo XIII, moved by the sorrowful trials under which the Church groans, raised the Feast to one of the Second Class, with a new Mass and Office.

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