Everywhere you look these days, you can find information on the power of prayer. The scientific community is finally discovering what the rest of us already knew. For whatever reason, prayer works. It's not so much the form your prayer takes or the words you use, but the simple aspect of believing faith.
One tried and true form of prayer is the rosary. In his new book, Garry Wills, a Professor of History Emeritus at Northwestern and respected religious writer, tells us all we need to know in order to pray it and how to contemplate the various occurrences from the life of Christ as we pray.
While the rosary always has been primarily a Catholic prayer, it doesn't have to stay that way. People from many other religions pray the rosary, and Christians of any denomination will enjoy this book that delves into the life of Christ and makes us feel as though we are there.
Wills begins THE ROSARY with a background of the rosary that includes its history and elements. From there he moves on to examine each mystery, including gospel readings and meditations. Accompanying each event in the life of Christ are the beautiful paintings of Tintoretto, an Italian mannerist painter who lived in the 1500s. Wills explains the symbolism of each painting, which helps us see the meaning and definition beyond the obvious.
As someone who is in the process of converting to Catholicism, I have found THE ROSARY to be a beautiful addition to and expansion of what I already knew about praying the rosary. Wills's book takes events that happened 2,000 years ago and makes them real to the readers of today. Anyone who has an interest in the rosary will enjoy this beautiful book and the wisdom contained in its pages. In the words of Wills, "...the rosary is both very timely and also timeless."
--- Reviewed by Amie Taylor
In the last forty years, Garry Wills writes, the rosary has gotten a bad rap. For many Catholics, it reminded them of a time when prayers were muttered without thinking, in order to gain points for the afterlife. For instance, if you said so many rosaries, you only had to spend so much time in purgatory before moving on to heaven. By the sixties, he notes, it all seemed kind of ridiculous, and for many people, the rosary was something that was best left behind with a lot of other antiquated practices. Wills, however, writes that he never stopped praying the rosary, and he argues that it has a relevance for people today. In an age when people feel a need for the peace that comes from meditation, the rosary is a great tool for contemplation. The use of beads in repetitive prayer, he notes, is seen in other world religions, including Hinduism, Buddhism and Islam. Far too often, Catholics have ignored a wonderful mode of prayer laying right at their doorstep, and Wills argues that it's time to reclaim and reappropriate a rich aspect of the Catholic tradition. The rosary is made up of various events in Jesus' life called "mysteries." The joyful mysteries cover his early life, the luminous mysteries his public ministry, the sorrwoful mysteries his passion and death, the glorious mysteries his resurrection and the events that followed it. The core of the book consists of Wills' comments on the mysteries of the rosary, along with a beautiful set of paintings from Tintoretto illustrating each of them. At times he can be a bit too erudite, as in his dissection of the "Our Father" in the original Greek. But this book is valuable in that it rescues an ancient form of prayer from being labelled as irrelevant, and makes the point that it ought to be reconsidered and taken seriously. A lovely little book!
