Mary, the Rosary and the Logic of the Gift

Mary, the Rosary and the Logic of the Gift

Fr Nick Welsh

Since 1208 when Our Lady appeared to St Dominic, the rosary has been a staple feature of the Church’s devotional life and a powerful means of intercession. In certain ecclesiastical circles it is considered, pejoratively, as a prayer of the simple. But the rosary is not simply the mindless repeating of formulaic prayers; the rosary is a prayer of relationship, a means of entering into the very heart of the Gospel through the eyes of Our Blessed Mother.

St John Paul II, who had a deep devotion to the rosary as well as to Mary, can help us understand the rosary as a prayer of relationship. John Paul’s insight finds its root in the truth that the human person is created in the image and likeness of God, who is love. To be created in God’s image means that we only truly come to know ourselves when we make a sincere gift of ourselves[1]. Life, for the disciple, is not something that we cling to as our possession; life is received from God, as a gift, and it becomes fruitful when it is given in love. Mary shows this truth in her fiat: ‘Behold, I am the servant of the Lord; let it be to me according to your word.’[2] Mary receives the gift of Christ and offers herself fully to God’s plan.

When we speak of the rosary, we enter into Mary’s contemplation of the mysteries of Christ: in the joyful mysteries, we see how God’s gift comes into the world through the humility of Mary and Joseph. In the sorrowful mysteries, we see Christ making a gift of himself on the Cross. In the glorious mysteries, we see how that gift ins transformed into life and glory. And in the luminous mysteries, added by John Paul II, we see how Christ gives himself in his public ministry, especially in the Eucharist, the sacrament of self-gift. Praying the rosary, then, cannot be considered a passive rattling of beads; rather, it forms our hearts to live according to this ‘logic of the gift.’

In the person of Mary herself we see a model of self-gift. Mary does not keep Christ for herself. She immediately goes to bring the good news of Jesus’ coming to her cousin Elizabeth; at Cana she intercedes for the couple and points the servants to Jesus; at the foot of the Cross, she receives the disciple John as her son and becomes mother to us all. Mary shows that the gift of life in Christ is never for us alone. Her gift of herself gifted Christ to the world, and she invites us to make the same gift of ourselves.

The rosary is not a formula, but a prayer of transformation. As St John Paul said, it ‘marks the rhythm of human life,’[3] in harmony with God’s own gift of love. When we take up those beads we are not mindlessly repeating prayers, we are training our hearts in the logic of self-gift. As we honour today Our Lady of the Rosary, let us ask us to teach us how to receive our life as a gift and how to make of our lives a gift for others.

Our Lady of the Rosary, teach us to live in the mystery of Christ, to that our lives, like yours, may be a gift to God and to the world.