Coming on May 19, from 6-9pm, in the Rose Bowl: The Rosary Bowl!

Here’s the event’s website

Here’s an article:

And here’s Dave Hartline’s interview with Fr. Willie Raymond of Catholic Family Theater on the event:

Father Willy Raymond CSC All the big stadiums in the Northeast, Midwest and West had rosary events in the 40s, 50s and early 60s.  As a matter of fact when the Archdiocese of San Francisco recently had their 150^th anniversary celebration, the archivist for the archdiocese listed the top 10 events in their history.  The 1961 Rosary Gathering in San Francisco , which attracted 550,000 people, was listed as the most important archdiocesan event.

Dave Hartline  When I was doing research for my book The Tide Is Turning Toward Catholicism, I was stunned to find these events occurred even in the early years of my life. However, I have no recollection of them in my teenage years of the late 1970s and early 1980s.  Why is that?

Father Willy Raymond CSC I think there was a misreading of Vatican II.  For some reason too many people thought we had to get rid of devotions, statues, litanies etc.  That’s not what the Council said but it happened.  One minute we were saying the rosary and admiring the beautiful statues in our churches and then in many places they were gone. I can remember the difference from when I entered the seminary to when I finished [early to mid 1960s.]  There were many who said we had to embrace the centrality of Christ and cut back on Marian devotions. Of course Mary is bringing all to Christ so perhaps we are beginning to understand the truth of Marian devotions.  However, I think your generation and those younger than you want to understand the beauty of the church.  You mentioned in your talk here at Family Theater something about the breadth and depth of our faith.  I am convinced that many people younger than me want to understand some of the beauty of the Church which they might not have fully experienced.