May is Mary’s Month

Michael Dubruiel conceived and put together the small hardbound book, Praying the Rosary. 

Click on the cover for more information.

And read “Rosary Walk” – a post from 2003 by Michael Dubruiel, in which he describes on of his lunchtime walks in Huntington.

The Satanist Priest who Became a Saint

Saved by the rosary and promoted the “rosary novena”, from The Church’s Most Powerful Novenas:

Bartolo Longo was born on February 10, 1841 in Latiano, Italy. His father was a doctor and instilled in him a love of justice and poetry while his mother taught him to visit the poor and to pray the rosary. When he was ten years old he suffered the death of his mother. He seems to have lost his faith as a result of the grief that ensued.           

While studying Law at the University of Naples, Bartolo came under the influence of a group who practiced the occult. At some point during his studies he was ordained a satanic priest and was heavily involved in satanic worship over the next few years until one night he heard the voice of his deceased father begging him to return to the true faith.           

 Bartolo searched out a priest and came under the instruction of a Dominican Friar who trained him in the Catholic Faith and after a period admitted him to the Sacraments once again. Soon afterwards on the Feast of the Annunciation Bartolo  became a Third Order Dominican and was given the religious name Brother Rosary.           

While working for a wealthy widow Countess Marianna De Fusco who was owed money by some tenants near Pompeii, Bartolo had another life changing experience. Memories of his satanic past flooded his mind and filled him with suicidal thoughts. Yet the words of the Dominican Friar who had instructed him in the faith suddenly came to him, “One who propogates the rosary shall be saved.” He vowed on the spot to the Blessed Virgin Mary that he would devote his life to spreading her devotion to the rosary and at that moment as if to confirm his vow the Angelus bells rang out from a nearby church.           

Bartolo set out to establish a shrine to Our Lady in Pompeii soon afterwards with the support of the local bishop. While searching for a suitable image for the Shrine Father Alberto Radente mentioned an image that he had bought at a shop and had given to a nun named Mother Concetta. The friar encouraged Bartolo to go to Mother Concetta and obtain the image for the Shrine.           

Bartolo went to Mother Concetta who showed the badly damaged image to him. He did not feel that this was the right image and felt that it wasn’t worthy of the shrine. But Mother Concetta insisted that he take it for the shrine saying “Our Blessed Mother will work many miracles using this image.”            

Mother Concetta’s prophetic words proved to be true and one miraculous recipient of the image’s favors was a dying Fortuna Agrelli. For over a year Fortuna had suffered horribly and the many doctors who examined her were unable to help. Finally crying out to the Blessed Virgin under the title of Queen of the Holy Rosary she was blessed with an apparition of Mary seated with the infant Jesus and accompanied by St. Catherine of Sienna and St. Dominic—the image that Bartolo had enshrined at his shrine in Pompeii. The Blessed Virgin told Fortuna to make three novenas (nine day) of the rosary in petition and three novenas in thanksgiving. She was completely healed of her affliction and through Bartolo this devotion of making a rosary novena soon spread. The petitioner would pray the rosary for twenty-seven (3 X 9) days in petition to the Queen of the Most Holy Rosary and then continue to thank Our Lady for having heard the petition by praying in thanksgiving for another twenty seven days.           

Bartolo married the widowed countess who had been a chief benefactor of his work to spread devotion to Our Lady in 1885. Bartolo continued to work to spread the devotion of the rosary until his death in 1926.           

On October 26, 1980 Pope John Paul II declared Bartolo Longo Blessed. He later mentioned him in his Apostolic Letter on the Rosary, Rosarium  Virginis  Mariae and calling him an “apostle of the rosary.”

The Rosary with the Fathers of the Church

The Fourth Luminous Mystery: The Transfiguration (Yesterday’s Feast) from Father Z and Ambrose’s commentary:

You may know that Peter, James and John did not taste death and were worthy to see the glory of the resurrection. It says, “about eight days after these words, He took those three alone and led them onto the mountain.” Why is it that he says, “eight days after these words”? He that hears the words of Christ and believes will see the glory of Christ at the time of the resurrection. The resurrection happened on the eight day, and most of the psalms were written “For the eighth”. (cf. e.g., Ps 6:1; 12:1 LXX and Vulgate) It shows us that He said that he who because of the Word of God shall lose his own soul will save it, (Luke 9:24) since he renews his promises at the resurrection. (Matthew 16:25-27) But Matthew and Mark say that they were taken after six days. (Cf. Matthew 17:1; Mark 9:2) We may say that they were taken after six thousand years, because a thousand years in God’s sight are as one day. (Ps 89:4 LXX) We counted more than six thousand years. We prefer to understand six days as a symbol, because God created the works of the world in six days (Gen 2:1), so that we understand works through the time and the world through the works. [Exposition of the Gospel of Luke 7.6-7]

Feast of Our Lady of Pompei

From Vultus Christi:

Tuesday, May 8, 2007 is the Feast of Our Lady of Pompei. In Italy and in places all over the globe the feast will be marked by the solemn recitation at noon of Blessed Bartolo Longo’s moving prayer, the Supplica, meaning supplication or petition.

The Prayer of People the World Over

The Supplica is, of Blessed Bartolo Longo’s published prayers to the Mother of God, the most famous. Its incandescent words have opened countless souls to the grace of Christ through the all–powerful intercession of His Mother.

The Supplica is a prayer that people have made their own. It is known on every continent; it has been translated into hundreds of languages. No authority ever imposed it, it is not part of the liturgy of the Church, it was never submitted to revision by ICEL, and yet, it has become universal. Sociologists of religion, take note! Translators of liturgical texts, wake up and smell the Italian coffee!

A Prayer of the Heart

Certain rationalistic types disdain the Supplica. They see it as representative of an unenlightened, sentimental, southern Italian piety bordering on superstition. They find its emphases embarrassing, its display of emotion unnerving.

The literary style of Blessed Bartolo Longo is the expression of his own character. He was capable of gentleness and of passion. He was, like all meridionals, rich in sentiment and quick to express it both in song and in tears. He was moved, before all else, by the reason of the heart.

Blessed Longo was a lover of Truth; but his particular grace was the discovery of Truth through love. He found Truth, not in syllogisms and in concepts, but in the Heart and on the Face of the Word Made Flesh in the womb of the Virgin, and held in her arms.

The Prayer of One Delivered From Evil

The Rosary was the means by which, at the age of twenty–eight, a confused and desperate Avvocato Bartolo Longo — a practicing Satanist and medium at the time — was converted to the Truth and delivered from the powers of darkness. He vowed that he would spend his life proclaiming to others the Rosary’s liberating and healing power. This is why, at the end of the Supplica, he exclaims: “O blessed Rosary of Mary, sweet chain which unites us to God, bond of love which unites us to the angels, tower of salvation against the assaults of hell, safe port in our universal shipwreck, we shall never abandon you.”

Bound to Mary by the Rosary

The Supplica may not be everyone’s cup of tea. Even pious folks may find it a bit too baroque, a bit overdone. It may be the southern Italian blood (mixed with Irish) that runs hot in my veins, but I love the Supplica and I plan on saying it with thousands of other people at noon on Tuesday. It is the prayer of a man very like myself: a poor sinner who fears nothing when he holds the Rosary in his hands, knowing that the Mother of God holds her end of the chain, and will not let it go.

I include the Supplica in my book The Church’s Most Powerful Novenas, beginning on page 175, you can also find the text of it at Vultus Christi.

Fr. Z has information on the Indulgences that can be gained by praying this prayer as well as an MP3 of the Supplica.

The Power of the Rosary Against the Devil

From Vultus Christi:

Concerning the Holy Rosary, once while the priest placed a rosary around the neck of the person who was being exorcised, all of a sudden the demon began crying out, “It is crushing me, it weighs on me, it is crushing me, this chain with the Cross on the end of it.” The exorcist exclaimed, “From this day forward this sister of ours will pray the Rosary every day.”

Immediately the demon replied, “But you are so few who say it (the Rosary), compared to the whole world!” It is just as well for me that it should be so, because it (the Rosary) harms me. You invoke That One (referring to our Lady), you make me remember the life of That One (referring to the life of Jesus meditated in the mysteries of the Rosary).

Another day, while exorcising the demon, the exorcist pulled a rosary out of his pocket; immediately the demon cried out: “Take away that chain, take away that chain!” “What chain?” “The one with the Cross on the end. She whips us with that chain.” This, of course is metaphorical language; it makes us understand, all the same, in very concrete terms, the power of the Rosary and how much the devil fears it.

Translated from Possessioni diabolici ed esorcismo by Father Francesco Bamonte (Paoline, 2006)