Pontifical Shrine of Our Lady of the Rosary of Pompei

Image: Wikimedia Commons

A lawyer who had wandered into the occult and come back, Bartolo Longo arrived in the desolate Pompei valley in 1872 to manage a countess's estates, tormented by his past until he remembered a promise: one who propagates my Rosary shall be saved. So he began teaching the Rosary to the farmers, and on November 13, 1875, a worn-out painting of Our Lady of the Rosary, bought by a Dominican from a Naples junk dealer for a few coins, arrived at his little church on a cart loaded with manure. Miracles began almost at once; three hundred locals pledged a penny a month, the cornerstone was laid in 1876, and Pompei became one of the great Marian shrines of the world. On this feast of Our Lady of the Rosary, remember also the Supplica, the petition Longo wrote in 1883, still recited before this very image each May 8 and first Sunday of October by millions across the earth at the same hour. Longo, apostle of the Rosary and father to the children of prisoners, died in 1926 and rests here; the Church has since raised him to the altars as a saint.