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Melkite Greek Catholic Church Information Center

Rosary

The article below was written by Rev. Fr. James Graham, Pastor of Saint Elias the Prophet Melkite Greek Catholic Mission, San Jose, CA.
The article appeared in THE VOICE OF THE PROPHET, News from St Elias the Prophet Melkite Greek Catholic Mission, Volume 7, Number 11, November 2001.

The Rosary Is a Western Devotion Dating from the 16th Century

Many Christians, West and East, Catholic and Orthodox, love to pray the rosary, 15 decades ("tens") of "Hail Marys" and meditations on the Sorrowful, Joyful, and Glorious Mysteries of Jesus Christ. The present form of the rosary was popularized by St Dominic and made official by Pope Pius V in the 16th Century. But the history of the rosary shows that it originated much earlier. The name rosary, first used in the 13th Century, came from thinking of this set of prayers as a garden of roses for the Mother of God. ¡ Saying 150 prayers derives from the early Christian monastic practice of reciting all 150 Psalms. In monasteries to this day, all 150 Psalms are read at services during the course of each week. It was customary to make the sign of the Cross and to bow or make a prostration or to genuflect at the beginning of each Psalm. When lay people began to adopt this prayer regime, they substituted saying 150 "Our Fathers" for the 150 Psalms, which they did not know by heart and could not read. ¡ The use of strings of beads or of knotted cords for counting repeated prayers is common to many religions. We cannot say for sure who did it first. The prayer rope (known in Russian as a chotki and in Greek as a komboischinion) was used in the Eastern Christian Church in the 7th Century for reciting the Jesus Prayer ("Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner.") ¡ About this time also, in Europe the "Hail Mary" began to replace the "Our Father" as the repeated prayer. At first, this prayer consisted only of the combined greeting of the angel to Mary from Lk. 1:28 ("Hail, Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with you" and Elizabeth's greeting to Mary from Lk. 1:42 ("Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb"). The conclusion of the prayer (in the East, "for you have given birth to the Savior of our souls") and in the West ("Jesus. Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death") developed later. ¡ Until recent times, the rosary was a private devotion, not recited in public, although it was recited communally in some monasteries in Europe. Because it is not part of our Eastern Christian tradition, we do not recite the rosary publicly in our churches. But because the Latins introduced the rosary to the Christian East (possibly at the time of the Crusades or during the missionary activity of the 16th and 17th Centuries), many Greek Catholics have a devotion to praying the rosary. We do not forbid or discourage this-all prayer that comes from the heart is a good thing-but we encourage our Greek Catholic people to learn and practice the prayers of our own tradition, such as the Jesus Prayer.

Melkites do not commemorate the Feast of Our Lady of the Rosary on 7 October.

Hail Mary

Hail Mary

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Melkite Greek Catholic Church Information Center is dedicated to my cousins: Bucky (Richard C. Liles), Shirley (Shirley Jean Liles Buck), and Donna (Donna Bertha Liles Campbell). Bucky fell asleep in the Lord on Dec. 12, 2000, Shirley fell asleep in the Lord on Nov. 8, 2001, and Donna fell asleep in the Lord on March 9, 2020.
O God of all spirits and of all flesh, who have destroyed death, overcome the devil, and given life to the world: grant, O Lord, to the souls of your servants Bucky and Shirley, who has departed from this life, that it may rest in a place of light, in a place of happiness, in a place of peace, where there is no pain, no grief, no sighing. And since You are a gracious God and the Lover of Mankind, forgive him/her every sin he/she has committed by thought, or word, or deed, for there is not a man who lives and does not sin : You alone are without sin, your righteousness is everlasting, and your word is true. You are the Resurrection and the Life, and the repose of your departed servants Bucky and Shirley. O Christ our God, and we send up glory to You, together with your eternal Father and your all-holy, good and life-giving Spirit, now and always and for ages upon ages. Amen.

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