By DONAL ANTHONY FOLEY
How to Pray the Secret Rosary by Frank M. Rega OFS (CreateSpace, 132 pages, Paperback $11.43, ebook $6.30). Available at amazon.com.
This slim paperback from Frank Rega gives guidance on how to pray the rosary when you aren’t necessarily able to pray with rosary beads — if you are doing household chores, for example. It has 15 chapters, and a three-part preface, with the first ten chapters focusing on what the author describes as “Aves” in which he looks at virtues such as humility, faith, and love, as well as the Three Persons of the Holy Trinity.
The themes of these chapters are then associated by the author with the ten Hail Marys of each of the traditional decades of the rosary. For example, his first concept is humility, and the idea is that for each of the first Hail Marys of the five decades, the person praying the rosary should meditate on that particular mystery with the idea of humility in mind.
So, for example, if we are dealing with the joyful mysteries, for the first mystery, the Annunciation, for the first Hail Mary of this decade the person meditates on this in view of the virtue of humility, for the second Hail Mary, the virtue of meekness, and so on. Then when they come to the second mystery, the Visitation, they follow the same procedure for each Hail Mary, humility first, then meekness, and then with other themes such as faith, hope, and love.
Even if individuals might find it difficult to pray in the above manner, the book has value in that Rega provides a whole selection of passages from acknowledged spiritual writers which can provide valuable material for prayerful reading or meditation. To this end, he has utilized passages from works such Humility of Heart, by Fr. Cajetan da Bergamo, and The Imitation of the Sacred Heart, by Fr. Peter J. Arnoult.
Rega collected these passages together over many years, and ties them in with what he describes as the seven pillars of wisdom, which he associates with passages found in four locations in the Bible and traditional spirituality, that is, the beatitudes of St. Matthew’s Gospel, the seven gifts of the Holy Spirit, the seven petitions of the Our Father, and the seven last words of Christ on the cross.
Each pillar has what the author describes as a mini-Gospel attached to it. For example, in the second chapter, on meekness, we have the gift of the Spirit as piety, the beatitude as “Blessed are the meek for they shall inherit the land,” the passage from the Our Father, as “Thy Kingdom come,” and the word from the cross as, “Amen, I say to thee; this day thou shalt be with me in paradise.”
The strength of How to Pray the Secret Rosary lies in the fact that is very solidly based on good traditional writers, and the Scriptures, including St. Thomas Aquinas, St. Augustine, St. Gertrude, St. Alphonsus de Liguori, Cassaude, and St. Pio of Pietrelcina, as well as from books such as The Spiritual Combat by Scupoli.
At the end of each chapter there is a space for the reader’s own personal reflections.
There are one or two questionable authorities cited, i.e., Ven. Mary of Agreda, and Luisa Piccarreta, but these are very much the exception.
The author also gives instructions on how to pray the traditional rosary, discusses the importance of the rosary in the Fatima message, and has a chapter on Padre Pio and the rosary.
In sum, this is not a book to be read quickly — rather it is really a work to be prayed and meditated over, and in that respect, any careful reader will surely find it very helpful.
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(Donal Anthony Foley is the author of a number of books on Marian Apparitions, and maintains a related website at www.theotokos.org.uk. He has also a written a time-travel/adventure book for young people — details can be found at: http://glaston-chronicles.co.uk/.)
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