FOLLOW UP: Massive Rosary Prayer in Poland and disdain from @MassimoFaggioli

I read with extreme delight about the massive Rosary rally in Poland, on 7 October – the anniversary of the Battle of Lepanto and Feast of the Holy Rosary – to ring the entire 2000 mile border of the country in prayers of protection.  HERE

[…]

Father Pawel Rytel-Andrianik, a spokesman for the Polish Bishops’ Conference, said it was the second largest prayer event in Europe after the 2016 World Youth Day. The New York Times reported, however, that final participation numbers were still being tabulated.

Airport chapels, considered gateways to the country, were prayer sites for Catholics as well, the AP said, and Polish soldiers stationed in Afghanistan prayed at Bagram Airfield there.

The prayer positions for the rosary event also included fishing boats at sea as well as kayaks and sailboats forming chains on Polish rivers, according to a report from Agence France-Presse.

“During the prayer, I was at the Chopin airport in Warsaw,” Father Rytel-Andrianik said, “and there were so many people that they were pouring out of the chapel.”

“This was an initiative started by lay people, which makes it even more extraordinary,” he continued. “Millions of people prayed the rosary together. This exceeded the boldest expectations of the organizers.”

Churches taking part kicked the prayer event off with a talk and celebration of Mass before Catholics headed to the border to pray the rosary.

[…]

And then there is this:

Villanova University theologian Massimo [“Beans”] Faggioli used Twitter to criticize what he termed using the rosary from “anti-immigrant use.”

“Using the Virgin Mary as a human shield and the Rosary as a weapon against Islam is not exactly my kind of thing,” he tweetedand, “using the Rosary as a weapon against Islam is not ‘the Catholic Church.’”

Hmmm…

“using the Rosary as a weapon against Islam is not ‘the Catholic Church.’”

Hmmm… poor confused man.

VaticanMuseumRosaryLepanto

“Using the Virgin Mary as a human shield”

Hmmm….

Hmmm…

Lippi Martini Madonna Schutzmantel

May I suggest that the readers here stop and say a Rosary for the awakening to reality of one Massimo Faggioli?

About Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

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25 Comments

  1. dbonneville says:

    I’m going to pray the maximum number of rosary beans for MF…

  2. Dan says:

    I seem to recall a line from Ingruentium malorum, that Father was kind enough to read for us the other day, Pope Pius XII referring to the Holy Rosary as “The Sling of David” sounds like a weapon to me.
    It seems probable that the reason that some people do not want others to think of the Rosary as a weapon is because they do not want to have it wielded at them and their relativistic, constitutionalist ideas.
    I will take Fathers advice and be sure to include Massimo Faggioli in my rosary intentions today.

  3. clarinetist04 says:

    Indeed, what a confused little man Mr. Faggioli is.

    There is no culture that I admire most right now than the Polish. I work with several Polish, young and old, and there are no other groups of people who are so disdained by the western EU powers, who are so proud of their culture, and so faithful to the church as the Polish. And let me tell you, it’s not just old people, the young are also strong in the faith and in their support of traditional social values (against abortion, euthanasia, etc.). To the folks I know it is unthinkable to allow these genocides in Poland.

    But we can’t rest on our laurels. Satan wants Poland. Mark my words that Poland could lead a saving of the EU. We hear a lot about Muslim migration to Europe, but with Poland’s joining of the EU there are a ton of Polish filling the churches all over western Europe. And don’t forget the heroicism of their most famous king, Jan Sobieski!! The Polish even had the gall to put him on their new 500 zlotych banknote! Take that, Mr. Faggioli!

    Yes, I love the Polish!

  4. Kathleen10 says:

    Does Poland realize it is becoming the envy of the Catholic world? I wonder if Poland was this earnest and faithful before JPII? If not, perhaps that is why we had a Polish pope, to prepare the way for the nation that would one day lead the world in faith. A nation that knows it’s spiritual heritage and refuses to let go of it for anybody, this is a singular nation, one to watch. May God continue to bless Poland and help them be successful in holding off the powers of Satan that wish to turn Christian populations into Muslims hordes.

  5. chantgirl says:

    Padre Pio also referred to the rosary as “the weapon”.

    I agree that this is one of the coolest Catholic spectacles I have seen. However, I also agree with Tim Capps’ take on Poland’s total fertility rate:

    http://corbiniansbear.blogspot.com/2017/10/youre-officially-exctinct-but.html

    So, maybe add a little procreating to those rosaries!

  6. Kevin says:

    I wonder what St. Pope Pius V thinks about using the Rosary as a weapon as he called forth the Holy League…and Don Juan of Austria as he had his sailors pray the Rosary just before battle. We need the Holy Weapon of the Rosary.

    And I pray with Poland. They will be our light!

  7. Traductora says:

    Great visuals! I go to Spain a lot and frequently get into little churches in the middle of nowhere – they’re open when I’m passing by, so I stop, although rarely do I see another soul there – and so much of the art from about the 12th century on, as places began to resist the Muslims or even became free, depicts Mohammed or Muslims (represented by people wearing what they considered Islamic dress) as the main enemy of Christians. Vicious, ugly, brutal and cruel.

    In one way, Islam is still the main enemy..but as with all evil, there will be a face off with another evil force, that of radical leftism. Domination by either one would not be fun for Christians. And almost none of the shepherds bother to pick up their staffs or even notice the wolf.

  8. SKAY says:

    How wonderful.

  9. LarryW2LJ says:

    Regarding the Rosary, who am I going to listen to? The saints or Mr. Faggioli?

    I think the answer is a no-brainer. Sorry, Mr. Faggioli, but you don’t have a leg to stand on.

  10. Absit invidia says:

    With “theologians” like Faggioli in our Church, who needs Screwtape?

  11. JARay says:

    I too have long had a great respect for the Poles and their faithfulness. God bless Poland.

  12. the little brother says:

    hmmmmmmmmmmmmmm. Yes indeed, the Good Saint Father Pio sent the brothers after his weapon one night. & when they questioned him ‘what weapon Father??!’ he said “THE ROSARY, THE ROSARY!!” … & then there was the Time Our lady said ‘The rosary is the frail chord that binds satan’.

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  14. CanukFrank says:

    I was so impressed, moved and inspired by the efforts of the Poles (my dear departed dad was Polish settling in the UK after the end of WWII) that I joined in with the rosary vigil myself here in Canada. I timed myself to start here at the same time it began in Poland and completed the Four Mysteries early on Saturday morning. The intention, as quoted on the web site: “This is a request for the Creator to give suitable inspiration to the people responsible for all the places where man lives and works.”. Nothing controversial there, although the BBC and “Beans” chose to make an issue if it.

  15. Bruce says:

    I think Massimo Faggioli misspoke. I think what he meant to say was “using the Rosary as a weapon is not Protestant”.

  16. otsowalo says:

    This brings to mind the lesser known naval victories over Protestant Dutch forces through the intercession of Our Lady of the Rosary:

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battles_of_La_Naval_de_Manila

  17. Tony McGough says:

    Sub Tuum praesidium confugimus, sancta Dei Genetrix …

    and God bless those sturdy Poles.

  18. Marine Mom says:

    A Holy and wise priest commented that Our Lady has never appeared to a theologian but to children..

  19. The Astronomer says:

    …and lest we forget, what about the official “Combat Rosary?”

    [Lest we forget, the “Combat Rosary” isn’t “official”.]

  20. frjim4321 says:

    I was wondering if there is anything in the gospels about the use of prayer as a weapon? The notion has always intrigued me. I’d also be curious about any theology behind the “prayer warrior” phenomenon. I’m certainly aware that “petition” is an element of prayer, after praise, thanks and contrition, but I’ve heard of it being the fourth of that particular hierarchy; and the “weapon/warrior” take on petition seems to be quite a stretch, and almost a creating a god in our own likeness. I wouldn’t go to far as to equate the weapon/warrior notion of prayer with idolatry, but it certainly raises ponderous questions for me at to whether they are related.

    [Confined to the Gospels… off the top of my head: Mark 9:29 – And he said to them: This kind can go out by nothing, but by prayer and fasting.]

  21. donato2 says:

    It seems to me that Mr. Faggioli has failed to take Evangelii Guadium to heart. What is happening in Poland is an expression of popular piety, which as Evangelii Guadium notes, is sometimes referred to as “the people’s mysticism.” Evangelii Guadium counsels us to honor and learn from these expressions of popular piety. Mr. Faggioli might reconsider his views concerning the Polish people’s popular piety in light of these passages from Evangelii Guadium:

    “In the same way, we can see that the different peoples among whom the Gospel has been inculturated are active collective subjects or agents of evangelization. This is because each people is the creator of their own culture and the protagonist of their own history. Culture is a dynamic reality which a people constantly recreates; each generation passes on a whole series of ways of approaching different existential situations to the next generation, which must in turn reformulate it as it confronts its own challenges. Being human means ‘being at the same time son and father of the culture to which one belongs’. Once the Gospel has been inculturated in a people, in their process of transmitting their culture they also transmit the faith in ever new forms; hence the importance of understanding evangelization as inculturation.” (EG 122).

    “Each portion of the people of God, by translating the gift of God into its own life and in accordance with its own genius, bears witness to the faith it has received and enriches it with new and eloquent expressions. One can say that ‘a people continuously evangelizes itself’. Herein lies the importance of popular piety, a true expression of the spontaneous missionary activity of the people of God. This is an ongoing and developing process, of which the Holy Spirit is the principal agent.” (EG 122).

    “Popular piety enables us to see how the faith, once received, becomes embodied in a culture and is constantly passed on.” (EG 123).

    “[Pope Paul VI] stated that popular piety ‘manifests a thirst for God which only the poor and the simple can know’ and that ‘it makes people capable of generosity and sacrifice even to the point of heroism, when it is a question of bearing witness to belief’”. (EG 123).

    “[Latin American] bishops also refer to it as ‘popular spirituality’ or ‘the people’s mysticism’. It is truly ‘a spirituality incarnated in the culture of the lowly’. Nor is it devoid of content; rather it discovers and expresses that content more by way of symbols than by discursive reasoning, and in the act of faith greater accent is placed on credere in Deum than on credere Deum. It is ‘a legitimate way of living the faith, a way of feeling part of the Church and a manner of being missionaries’; it brings with itself the grace of being a missionary, of coming out of oneself and setting out on pilgrimage: ‘Journeying together to shrines and taking part in other manifestations of popular piety, also by taking one’s children or inviting others, is in itself an evangelizing gesture’. Let us not stifle or presume to control this missionary power!” (EG 124).

    “Expressions of popular piety have much to teach us; for those who are capable of reading them, they are a locus theologicus which demands our attention, especially at a time when we are looking to the new evangelization.” (EG 126).

    And so, Mr. Faggioli, in the words of Pope Francis, “Let us not stiffle or presume to control” the “missionary power” of the Polish people! For “expressions of popular piety have much to teach us; for those who are capable of reading them, they are a locus theologicus which demands our attention, especially at a time when we are looking to the new evangelization.”

  22. Fr. Kelly says:

    Marine Mom
    Our Lord seems to agree with His Mother:
    At that time Jesus said in reply, “I give praise to you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, for although you have hidden these things from the wise and the learned you have revealed them to the childlike. (MT 11:25)

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  24. Aquinas Gal says:

    Poor Beans just doesn’t get it.

  25. Dan says:

    I wonder if he boycotts the Feast of the Most Holy Rosary and The Month of the Rosary which came about because Catholics successfully used the rosary as a weapon and Mary as a shield against the turks. [at the Battle of Lepanto 1571]. Pope Pius the V made that day October 7th the Feast of the Most Holy Rosary, and since then,October has become the month of the Rosary

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