An excellent form of prayer
Source:
District of Asia
Pope Leo XIII calls the Rosary an excellent form of prayer (eximia precondi formula). We shall indicate summarily the excellences of the Rosarian prayer which make it so highly efficacious.
- The Rosary strengthens the theological virtues and the other virtues which perfect prayer.
- It is most apt for lifting up the soul to God and to divine things, for it occupies the imagination with the Gospel scenes, the intellect with the divine truths, and the will with the infinite goodness and with the merciful love of God, of Jesus, and of Mary. Moreover, it contributes to this interior elevation with the vocal reiteration.
- It comprehends all the acts of perfect worship, as has been pointed out above.
- It is directed to God in union with and through the mediation of Jesus and Mary.
- It offers the most efficacious claims for obtaining favor which are the merits of Jesus and Mary.
- It proposes the mysteries most apt for exciting devotion, For, as St. Thomas teaches, although of itself the purely divine has greater power in moving the affections and exciting devotion, however, because of our human makeup we must go to the invisible by means of the visible, Thus the mysteries of the humanity of the Word make a greater impression on us and more easily enkindle in us the love of God.
- It greatly facilitates the very necessary practice of meditation, arresting our attention with the variety and wealth of the recalled Gospel events.
- It is connatural to our mode of spiritual and corporal being with its union of mental and vocal prayer.
- The vocal prayer of the Rosary is at once sublime and simple, and it is subordinated to the consideration of the mysteries, the meaning of which it expresses.
- It asks for that for which it ought to ask, and in the order in which it ought to be desired and asked.
- It petitions for whom it ought to petition, that is, for ourselves and for our neighbor.
- It is of itself a pious and persevering supplication.
- It is, therefore, of universal utility. No one is able to reject it as too difficult, for it is most simple, nor as too simple, for it is exceedingly sublime. The unlettered know how to recite it, and the learned will never recite it with sufficient wisdom. The sinner recites it as an entreaty for pardon, and the just as a hymn of love.
