Why is this simple prayer so dear to the Dominicans?

It may seem odd that a prayer as simple as the Rosary should be particularly associated with the Dominicans. Dominicans are rarely thought of as simple people. We have a reputation for writing long, complex works of theology.

Yet we have fought to preserve the Rosary. It is our holy heritage. But why is this simple prayer so dear to Dominicans? Perhaps because at the heart of our theological tradition lies an aspiration to simplicity. Saint Thomas Aquinas said that we cannot understand God because God is perfectly simple.

There is a false simplicity that we need to get rid of: the simplification of those who always have too easy an answer for everything, and who know everything in advance. They are either too lazy or incapable of thinking.

And there is true simplicity, the simplicity of the heart, the simplicity of clear eyes. We can only achieve it slowly, with God's grace, by approaching the blinding simplicity of God. The Rosary is indeed simple, very simple. But of a kind of simplicity that is both wise and profound, and to which we aspire, and in which we will find peace.

Fr. Timothy Radcliffe, o.p.

"Praying the Rosary", Lourdes Conference, October 1998