Rosary pilgrimage in nation’s capital unites thousands of Catholics in love for Mary

WASHINGTON — Thousands of pilgrims from across the country gathered at the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception in Washington Sept. 28 to honor Mary, the Mother of God, and her gift of the rosary.

“I am entirely yours, Mary, I am entirely yours,” the crowd sang in Latin as the second annual Dominican Rosary Pilgrimage opened with a procession of a statue of Mary, Queen of the Most Holy Rosary. “All that I have, Mother of Christ, all that I have is yours.”

More than 3,000 people registered for the free, daylong pilgrimage celebrating the rosary hosted by the Dominican Friars of the Province of St. Joseph and their local charters of the Confraternity of the Most Holy Rosary, a spiritual association dedicated to the rosary. Dominican friars and sisters dotted a diverse crowd of men and women, young and old, individuals and families of different cultures and backgrounds.

The event at the basilica, the largest Roman Catholic church in North America, included preaching, adoration, confession, book signings, a recitation of the rosary, enrollment in the confraternity, Mass and an evening concert with the Hillbilly Thomists, a bluegrass band of Dominican friars.

“Our two goals for the Dominican Rosary Pilgrimage are that people are led closer to Jesus Christ — and there is no one better at doing that and no one who desires that more than the Blessed Virgin Mary,” Dominican Father John Paul Kern, executive director of the Dominican Friars Foundation and director of the Rosary Shrine of St. Jude in Washington, told OSV News. “Secondly, that … we come to share in St. Dominic’s zeal for the salvation of souls.”

Founded by St. Dominic de Guzmán in 1216, the Dominican order, also known as the Order of Preachers, has a special relationship with the rosary: According to tradition, Mary appeared to St. Dominic, entrusting the rosary’s promotion to him.

The rosary pilgrimage, the culmination of a nine-month novena said ahead of the event, drew people from near and far.

Sarah Garrett, 28, drove from Chester County in Pennsylvania with her husband, 3-year-old son and 1-year-old twin daughters to participate in the pilgrimage.

“We were just confirmed in March, so we haven’t done any pilgrimages yet,” she told OSV News. “We wanted to get together with everyone and be a part of all of the beautiful things that are taking place here today. ... We wanted to expose our children to more people who are involved with the church.”

She and her husband pray the rosary daily, she said. They involve their young children as much as possible: Her son does his best to pray along while their daughters, she said, say “Amen” at the end.

For the pilgrimage, the basilica itself transformed into a kind of rosary, with its chapels dedicated to different mysteries of the rosary, each housing a scene from the life of Jesus and Mary.

Dominican Father James Sullivan, prior at St. Dominic’s Priory in Washington and the principal preacher of the event, focused on the Annunciation, the first joyful mystery of the rosary, when God becomes man in Mary’s womb. At that moment, God not only gives us his son but also the mother of his son, he said.

“The Annunciation is a gift to us of both Jesus and Mary and both of them together weave the prayers of the rosary,” Father Sullivan said.

In an email ahead of the event, Father Sullivan told OSV News that the rosary will bind pilgrims together “no matter where we go after today.”

“It’s easy sometimes just to listen to all the negative news and to think that’s all there is to say,” he said. “Our making this Dominican Rosary Pilgrimage … reminds us of the beauty and the power of being united in prayer.”

At the basilica, he recognized Mary as “the compass on our pilgrimage to heaven.”

“She leads the way to Jesus, to heaven, to our eternal happiness, Godward,” he told the crowd.

The pilgrims listening from the pews included Dennis and Mary Francis Musk, who drove more than 10 hours through the rain to arrive from New Hope, Kentucky. It was their first time attending the pilgrimage. They introduced themselves as lay Dominicans.

“That’s the main reason we came,” Mary Francis, 77, said, “but I always love to come to this basilica. … It’s beautiful, it’s just peaceful, it gives you a really good atmosphere to pray.”

Dennis, 71, said that they have always honored Mary, specifically in the rosary. Involved in pro-life work since 1975, he said that they have been praying the rosary outside of abortion clinics since the ‘70s, after the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling in Roe v. Wade, which previously legalized abortion nationwide. The court overturned the 1973 decision in its Dobbs ruling in 2022, returning the issue of abortion to the legislature.

Other pilgrims shared their relationship with Mary and said that they first encountered Mary through Jesus. Megan Clancy, 21, grew up in Lexington, South Carolina, and now serves as student president of GW Catholics, affiliated with the Newman Center at George Washington University in Washington. The philosophy major said she heard about the pilgrimage from the Dominican priests who sometimes celebrate Mass at the Newman Center.

Mary, she said, transformed her life. While Clancy grew up in the Catholic Church, she entered college unsure of her faith.

“I was pretty lukewarm, didn’t know what I thought about things, didn’t know Our Lady. Nobody had ever told me that Mary was my mom,” she remembered.

That changed when, one day, she heard a podcast by Father Mike Schmitz — perhaps best known for hosting the “Bible in a Year” and “Catechism in a Year” podcasts — where he talked about the seven last words or sayings of Jesus.

“He was like, ‘And Jesus gives his mom to you,’” she remembered him saying of Mary. “That just blew my heart into a million pieces, because that is a particular hole in my life.”

She said that she had always felt like she never really had a mother.

“My biological mom, there’s a whole set of wounds there,” she said. “The Lord has blessed me with so many lovely women who act as mothers to me and has kind of filled that hole in a really abundant and overflowing way, which I was so grateful for, but it was like, I never actually had a mom.”

Then, she said, she discovered that she had Mary.

“Most people, they ask Mary to bring them to her son, Jesus, right?” she said. “But for me, I was learning how to have a relationship with a mother at all.”

She asked Jesus: “Bring me to your mom, teach me to be your mother’s daughter.”

“And it’s just been such a constant in my spiritual life for the past couple of years as I’ve grown in my faith,” she said. “She just continues to guide me and is always looking out for me.”

Father Kern, who is a convert to Catholicism, said that Jesus also led him to Mary.

“The rosary had a strong role more in my growth in the faith after I made the initial leap,” he said. “It was through Jesus Christ in the Eucharist that I realized if he is there, that’s where I must be.”

But among the many gifts of entering the church, he said, “was Jesus also saying, ‘Great, you came here for love of me. I’m also going to share my mother with you, and she’s going to help you draw even closer to me.’”

Katie Yoder writes for OSV News from the Washington area.