By Archbishop Thomas Wenski - The Archdiocese of Miami
On Saturday, Sept. 5, just a few days before the feast of Our Lady of Charity, I blessed a bronze statue of Bishop Agustin Roman, former auxiliary bishop of Miami, who died on his way to give a catechism class during Easter week of 2012.
The statue is located on the grounds of the Shrine of Our Lady of Charity, or “Ermita” as this national shrine dedicated to the patroness of Cuba is affectionately known. The statue faces the bay. The bishop’s eyes look out across the bay towards Cuba, one hand touching his pectoral cross and the other holding a rosary.
“Padre” Roman prayed the rosary as he saw the coastline of Cuba disappear when he was sent into exile aboard an ocean liner. He prayed it daily and taught others to discover the beauty of this contemplative form of prayer.
The rosary was more than a personal devotion for Bishop Román — it was his personal companion throughout his life. The rosary was in his hands and on his lips a powerful weapon in the battle to win souls for Christ.
He told me once: “If you want someone to walk with you, you have to make sure that he has comfortable shoes.” His catechetical message was framed so as to be those comfortable shoes that would permit thousands to walk with Christ. And in that framing, Mary and her rosary played a prominent part. In this way, he could bring the message of the Gospel down to the level of the any person without ever watering it down.
“If you love Mary,” he would tell those who had deep devotion to her (even if they had little formal instruction in the faith), “you must imitate her.” Indeed, that is the essence of evangelization — to become like the one who accepted that the Word become flesh in her virginal womb.
Since the time of St. Dominic, who promoted its recitation to counteract the spread of the Albingensian heresy, the rosary has been a most effective tool of evangelization. Pope Paul VI described it as “the synthesis of the Gospel.” In meditating on the now 20 mysteries of the rosary, we touch on all the major events of Jesus’ life and ministry.
When I was a seminarian, the then Father Román taught me something about the power of this prayer and of the Blessed Mother’s ability to draw people to her son. At that time, I was working at St. Benedict Parish in Hialeah and Father Román encouraged me to use the rosary as a means of outreach and evangelization to the thousands who lived in the apartment buildings that dotted the area.
With a plan of action devised by him, a group of Cuban Cursillistas and I went out visiting those sites with a Cuban flag, a statue of Our Lady of Charity and, of course, the rosary. We prayed for the political prisoners of Cuba. To be sure, even those who had not darkened the doorway of a church for many years could not resist the invitation to pray to the patroness of Cuba for their imprisoned brothers and sisters. Later, in my work with the Haitian people, I witnessed how the rosary was also accessible to them both as a means of prayer and a catechetical tool.
When I was assigned as coadjutor bishop of Orlando in 2003, after the Mass of Welcome there, Bishop Roman bade me farewell. “Take this,” he said to me. “This is my rosary. I give it to you.” At first, I didn’t know what to say or do. I was deeply touched and humbled by this wonderful expression of this holy bishop’s solidarity with me as I left the archdiocese to assume new duties in Orlando. The only thing I could think of doing, other than saying “muchas gracias,” was to reach into my own pocket and give him my own rosary.
October is always celebrated as the month of the rosary, and thus it offers us yet another opportunity to rediscover this beautiful devotion which leads us through Mary to Jesus. A little effort will yield great results. Pray the rosary and discover its power to draw you closer to her Son. And since the family that prays together, stays together, dare to invite your family members and your friends to pray it with you and to discover its power to bring all of you closer to each other and to Him.
Bishop Roman — memorialized in bronze with a rosary in his hand — still teaches us how to pray and to evangelize.
