Poland – The last public rosary prayer in Warsaw, on 5 March, was attended by about 500 people and was recited for a just peace in Ukraine. For the past three years, every first Saturday of the month, the sidewalks of many Polish cities have been filled with groups of kneeling men reciting the Rosary together. It is an initiative called the “Men’s Rosary” (Męski Różaniec), with rallies bringing together men from different Catholic backgrounds who find strength in this Marian prayer to protect and defend their families from the attacks of anti-Christian ideologies. The organisers of the Men’s Rosary rallies say they want to attract men who share similar values without necessarily being part of Catholic communities or movements, men who are often discouraged and who may think that today faith can only be transmitted at home and that it is something impossible to express and share in the public space. The Men’s Rosary contradicts such a vision of religion as a strictly private matter.
In Warsaw, men of all ages, including little boys accompanying their older brothers, fathers, and grandfathers, gather at morning Mass at the Cathedral of St. John the Baptist in the Old City, and then head towards the statue of the Virgin Mary on Krakowskie Przedmieście Street, where, kneeling in neat rows, like an “army of God”, they pray the Rosary together. Similar rallies take place in Kraków, Gdańsk, Częstochowa, Poznań, and some 30 other cities in Poland.
On 2 October, the first Polish–Hungarian Men’s Rosary took place in Budapest. Paweł Jaworski, the founder of the Community of the Soldiers of Christ (Żołnierze Chrystusa), was hoping that the prayer action in the Hungarian capital would be the beginning of other such actions in other European countries: “This is a unique event that aims to begin building ties with Hungary, but we also believe that as a Community of Soldiers of Christ we are called to spread the men’s Rosary throughout Europe and the world. Following the historical link with our Hungarian brothers, we are starting with Hungary. We believe that it is not our wisdom or strength, but the Lord God who wants us, through the Blessed Mother, to begin a crusade of rosary prayer in Europe, starting with Hungary. We believe it will spread throughout Europe. We go there full of faith”, he explained on Polish Catholic Radio Maryja.
