Today is the Feast of Our Lady of Victory, or Our Lady of the Rosary. This feast was moved to the first Sunday of October by Pope Gregory III in 1573 – officially naming it the Feast of Our Lady of the Rosary. It was later moved back to October 7th by St. Pope Pius X in 1913.
Islamic armies ranged along the coasts of Africa, the Middle and Near East, toppling established powers, yearning “to bring all Europe within the dar al-Islam, the ‘House of Submission’ — submissive to the sharia law. Europe, as the land of the infidels, was the dar al-Harb, the ‘House of War’.
People in the city of Nicosia surrendered, “expecting the civilians to be spared, even as the Christian troops were enslaved. Instead, the Muslim attackers butchered every Christian they could find — 20,000 victims, murdered regardless of rank, sex, or age…”
In response, Pope Pius V promoted establishment of a “Holy League”, a Christian coalition cobbled together from the reluctant Christian European states to rescue the Venetian colony of Cyprus and prevent the fall of Europe. Pope Pius called all of Europe to fast and an appeal to the Blessed Mother through taking up the power of prayer in the weapon of the Holy Rosary.
Fresh from conquering Famagusta, the Ottoman and Holy League fleets engaged in a battle off Lepanto on October, 7.
“It was the last battle at sea between “oared” ships, which featured the most powerful navy in the world, a Moslem force with between 12,000 to 15,000 Christian slaves as rowers. The patchwork team of Catholic ships was powered by the Holy Rosary of the Blessed Virgin Mary.”
This resulted one of the decisive turning points in the long Ottoman-Christian struggle, ending the Ottoman naval hegemony in a crushing victory for the Christian fleet, while the Ottoman fleet was effectively destroyed and thwarted from invading all of Europe.
“At the hour of victory, St. Pope Pius V, who was hundreds of miles away at the Vatican, is said to have gotten up from a meeting, went over to a window, and exclaimed with supernatural radiance: ‘The Christian fleet is victorious!’ and shed tears of thanksgiving to God.”
The Holy League credited the victory to the Virgin Mary, whose intercession with God they had implored for victory through the use of the Rosary. Andrea Doria, fleet admiral, had kept a copy of the “miraculous” image of Our Lady of Guadalupe given to him by King Philip II of Spain in his ship’s state room.
The Victory over the Moslems at Lepanto was credited to the faithful prayers of the Rosary. Thus Pope Pius V instituted a new Catholic feast day on October 7 to liturgically celebrate the victorious Battle of Lepanto as Our Lady of Victory. In 1716, Pope Clement XI (who canonized Pope Pius V to sainthood in 1712) renamed this feast day as Our Lady of the Rosary, and extended it throughout the Universal Church.
Today, i ask all on The Road of Faith to form another Holy Prayer League in solidarity and take in our hands our most powerful and effective weapons. Pick up your Rosary today and beseech Our Lady of Victory, Our Lady of the Rosary in earnest prayers to once again intercede on our behalf.
“Where the Rosary is present and devoutly prayed, demons flee in shrieks of terror and souls are saved.” – St. Louis De Montfort
Our Lady of Victory, pray for us.
