The Healing Journey

October 7, 2026

“People must say the rosary. Let them continue saying it every day.”
— Our Lady of Fatima

The night before a naval battle that would determine the future of Christian Europe, sailors knelt in prayer to the Blessed Mother, in union with the faithful throughout Christendom. Together, they prayed the rosary and asked for her intercession in a battle against the Ottoman Turks.

Dominican Pope Pius V, who had a special devotion to the rosary, believed Our Lady’s spiritual assistance was their only hope in a fight where the fleet of the Holy League, from Spain and other Christian maritime kingdoms, was gravely outnumbered in what became known as the Battle of Lepanto. A victory would let the Turks move beyond Southeast Europe and take over other territories, including Rome.

On October 7, 1571, the alliance of warships from Catholic states confronted the Islamic empire of the Ottomans off the western coast of Greece. After four hours of battle, involving 400 warships, the much smaller fleet of the Holy League was victorious.

According to tradition, Pope St. Pius V saw the Blessed Mother in a vision, announcing the victory in one of the largest naval battles in history. In appreciation, he instituted the Feast of Our Lady of Victory. Pope Gregory XIII changed it to the Feast of the Holy Rosary, and eventually it became Our Lady of the Rosary, which we celebrate on October 7.

The rosary, one of the most cherished Catholic devotions, helps us meditate on the mysteries of salvation and has been called “a compendium of the Gospel.” Pope Leo XIII, who was well-known for his love of the Blessed Virgin, wrote 12 encyclicals about the rosary because he believed it could cure the world’s problems.

While observing the Feast of Our Lady of the Rosary in 2020, Pope Francis urged Catholics to always carry a rosary with them and said, “I invite everyone to rediscover, especially during this month of October dedicated to the rosary, the beauty of the prayer which has nourished the faith of the Christian people through the centuries …. The recitation of the rosary is the most beautiful prayer we can offer to the Virgin Mary; it is a contemplation on the stages of the life of Jesus the Savior with his Mother Mary and is a weapon that protects us from evils and temptations.”

The Blessed Virgin, herself, has urged us to recite the rosary in her apparitions at Lourdes and at Fatima, where she identified herself by the title, “Our Lady of the Rosary” and told thousands who had gathered for her final apparition on October 13, 1917: “I am the Lady of the Rosary. I have come to warn the faithful to amend their lives and ask for pardon for their sins. They must not offend Our Lord any more, for He is already too grievously offended by the sins of men. People must say the rosary. Let them continue saying it every day.”
©J Pisani

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