Men need to pray, lead and love the Rosary

With St. Joseph as God’s chosen spouse of the Mother of God and the pillar of families, his example as our spiritual father guides us to work toward being more diligent in our prayer lives. His leadership asks us to do this in faith, with hope and love.

We aspire with much love in our prayer devotion as spiritual fathers to lift our hearts and raise our minds to God in prayer, bringing glory to domestic life. As St. Paul writes about the many “things” of love, “it bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things” (1 Cor 13:7).

One of the most popular readings chosen by couples in the sacrament of matrimony, this “love chapter” perhaps gives us a glimpse of St. Joseph’s love for Jesus and the Blessed Mother, as protector of Christ and chaste guardian of the virgin. Striving to exhibit that kind of love is an important reason the rosary needs to be a regular devotion in every man’s prayer arsenal.

[…] Yes, all men, women and children need Mary to get to know Jesus better. A man especially needs her intercession through the rosary to assist him in being a better man and spiritual father — in a contemplative, yet active manner.

Imagine the example Mary was to St. Joseph as he worked to provide, protect and lead the Holy Family.

In one of his many dynamic presentations, Blessed Fulton Sheen describes our Blessed Mother as “The Woman I Love.” He presents Mary figuratively as “God’s dream.” He explains vividly how God preexisted his own mother, and “therefore he would try to make her just as perfect as he could.” Immaculately conceived — “the new Eve” — she became the mother of God as a young girl because she promised through an angel to give God a human nature. Jesus became one of us as God incarnate, and St. Joseph and the Blessed Mother raised him as he “advanced in wisdom and in age and in favor before God and man” (Lk 2:52).

This truth of sacred Scripture, among many truths of our Lord and Savior that witness to his life, passion, death and resurrection, are found by praying the mysteries of the rosary. It is a powerful prayer men need to pray, lead and love.

Deacon Gordon Bird, September 22, 2021 - The Catholic Spirit

Deacon Bird ministers at St. Joseph in Rosemount and All Saints in Lakeville, Archdiocese of Saint Paul and Minneapolis, and assists the archdiocese’s Catholic Watchmen movement.