What the Rosary means to me ... 7

When I think about the Rosary I am taken back to my childhood. My mother taught me how to say it and I can remember her teaching myself and my sisters the Hail Holy Queen. Later I would go with her to the Rosary group in a friend of the family’s house; it was such a social occasion. Friends would meet after sometimes a week apart and greet each other warmly. Then there was the Rosary of course and also the Divine Mercy chaplet. There was always tea and biscuits and in the cold weather a little sherry. In the maternal embrace of Our Lady we learned to be brothers and sisters to one another, united by our devotion to her, learning from her how to love her Son more dearly. In my early teens, however, I failed to grow in love for God and never really learnt how to pray as a young man. It wasn’t until I was 16 that I was given the gift of a fervent faith and my return to the Rosary was very much a part of that. At the age of 19 I came across St. Louis Marie de Montfort and The Secret of the Rosary and it was such an inspiration to me. His spirituality of "Through Mary to Jesus" made perfect sense to me because it was the way that I had come. I was even happier when later I found out that he was a Dominican tertiary!