My October is dedicated to the rosary

I don’t know if you read the same Catholic blogs I do, but I can tell you that mine have been in a tizzy over Pope Francis’ interviews by Fr. Spadaro of La Civiltá Cattolica and by 89-year-old Eugenio Scalfari of La Repubblica. Both interviews had startling elements, elements made more startling by mistakes in translation and, it turns out, the fact that Scalfari did not record his interview but relied on his memory for a reconstruction.

The uproar over both interviews, the point-scoring, the tooth-gnashing and, especially, the sincere dismay at ideas being attributed to Francis, saddened me. I felt powerless and saw that, given that it was 9 p.m. there was only one thing I could do.

“Let’s say the rosary,” I said to my husband.

Readers may be surprised that nightly rosaries were not already a feature of the McLean household...