Introduction

The Living Rosary was established in 1962 by the Guardians of the Holy House of the Shrine of Our Lady of Walsingham as part of The Order of Our Lady of Walsingham.

In 2000, as we began the third millennium, the Guardians took the opportunity to open up the Living Rosary to any member of the Society of Our Lady of Walsingham or Priest Associate who wishes to participate in this important, often hidden, ministry.

Shrine Prayers

Each day the Rosary is said in the Shrine at 6.00pm.  On Monday and Saturday the Joyful Mysteries are recited; on Tuesday and Friday, the Sorrowful Mysteries, and on Wednesday and Sunday, the Glorious Mysteries. The Luminous Mysteries are said each Thursday (see panel).

Each Mystery is offered for a particular intention or need. The Opening Prayers are offered for Priest Associates of the Holy House and in thanksgiving. The first Mystery is offered for the sick; the second for those in spiritual need; the third for those in temporal or material need; the fourth for the departed; and the fifth for the Shrine and the village of Walsingham.

How the two are linked

Although you do not have to offer your decade of the rosary at 6.00 pm, the time of Shrine Prayers in Walsingham, it may help you to know that you are not praying alone if you are able to undertake this work at the same time as those who are gathered in the Shrine.

As part of the introductory prayers, every member of the Living Rosary will also be asked to pray for the Priest Associates of the Holy House and make an act of thanksgiving. You will also be sent a prayer list, updated three times a year, at Christmas, Easter and Assumptiontide.

There will also be a regular updates here on the website.

You yourself will also be remembered at Shrine Prayers as one of the links in a chain of living prayer which will stretch from the Holy House of England's Nazareth across continents to embrace the whole human family.

And offered at the altar

One of the distinctive things about the Shrine Church is its fifteen altars, each one dedicated to a Mystery of the rosary under the patronage of a particular saint.

Each year your work as a link in the living rosary of prayer will be offered to God with thanksgiving in a Mass celebrated at the altar in the Shrine dedicated to the Mystery you have been allocated. You will be informed of the date of that Mass, which will be determined either by the Mystery or the feast day of its patron.

Past, present and future

In order to maintain the continuity of prayer which the members of the Order of Our Lady of Walsingham have maintained since 1962, each member of that original Order will become a founder member of the new Living Rosary.

The Mystery allocated to you will be a Mystery that has been prayed in this way for many years. In some cases it will have been very significant in the shaping of a pilgrim journey of faith. The task you are receiving is therefore a precious one.

But not only is this giving of a Mystery of the rosary the gift of a part of Walsingham's history. The rosary is a form of prayer used by Christians throughout the world. It joins you with them in seeking that union with Mary and the whole communion of saints in which the Spirit turns us to Jesus, our great High Priest in whom we have access to the Father of us all.

Please click here for a Living Rosary application form.