October 7: Our Lady of the Rosary

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On October 7, the Catholic Church celebrates another beautiful Marian feast day, Our Lady of the Rosary.

Did you know that this feast day was formally called "Our Lady of Victory" and "it takes place in honor of a 16th century naval victory which secured Europe against Turkish invasion. Pope St. Pius V attributed the victory to the intercession of the Blessed Virgin Mary, who was invoked on the day of the battle through a campaign to pray the Rosary throughout Europe."  Fascinating and miraculous history that you may not have read about in your history texts!

There are so many beautiful Marian feast days in the liturgical Church calendar, besides the feast of Our Lady of the Rosary.  Some of our favorites are the Solemnity of Mary on January 1, Our Lady of Lourdes on February 11, Feast of the Annunciation on March 25, Feast of the Annunciation on August 15, Our Blessed Mother's birthday on September 8, Our Lady of Sorrows on September 15, Our Lady of Fatima on October 13, Feast Day of the Immaculate Conception on December 8, and Our Lady of Guadalupe on December 12.  Whew! Celebrating our Blessed Mother throughout the year vs. just at Christmas time is really a wonderful way to honor such a special and important Blessed Lady and Mother of God!

As we have done for a few years now, we celebrated this beautiful feast day by making edible rosaries and as we prayed a decade of the rosary my children ate the sweets.  This year our neighbor, who isn't Catholic, also made a rosary and prayed with us.

In the morning, I set out a tray with a special statue that was my deceased grandmother's and put a small, brown rosary in her hands.  I also set out some Marian books.

The books on the tray are: Scriptural Rosary for Children, I Pray the Rosary!, I Meet Mary!, and Just Like Mary.

After lunch in the afternoon, we made our edible rosaries.  We used candy corn, Cheerios, M&Ms and chocolate chips.  There are so many different things you can use to make your edible rosaries: Fruit Loops, Lucky Charms, fruit (like strawberries and blueberries), variety of chocolate.

My 8 year old daughter decided to make just a decade with her candy corn which is hers on the far right in the photo.

In the evening when my husband got home from work, we prayed the The Joyful Mysteries using the Holy Heroes CD.  We really enjoyed this CD because there are children's voices reciting the prayers which kept my family's attention and before each prayer there is scripture verse given to help mediate on the mystery.   At the end of the rosary, there is also a summary of the Battle of Lepanto and Our Lady of the Rosary.

It was a simple, fun and meaningful celebration!

Our Lady of the Rosary, pray for us!