George: Mary will be there

Throughout the month of October, Holy Mother Church urges us to give special consideration to the Rosary of Our Lady.

As we pray the rosary, through its various repetitions, we are asked, as Pope Benedict XVI reminds us, to "be guided by Mary in this prayer, ancient and ever new, which is especially dear to her because it leads us directly to Jesus, contemplated in his Mysteries of salvation: joyful, luminous, sorrowful and glorious."

Yesterday His Eminence Francis Cardinal George, O.M.I., Archbishop of Chicago e-mailed a brief reflection on the rosary.  He concluded, saying, "So many private apparitions of the Blessed Virgin over the centuries have given us messages about this help, and it is a great comfort to believe that Mary will be there when the soul, the source of life for our body, struggles toward a different form of living.  Mothers give birth; Mary will be there, no matter when or how death comes to each of us."

Cardinal George is presently undergoing chemotherapy treatment for his second bout with cancer.  I ask you, then, remembering his words, to pray the rosary for him.  Ask the Lord to sustain him in his ministry and ask Our Lady to wrap him in her mantle.