together, for heresy and calumny can not prevail without substantial
support, and heretics seek worldly power and assistance. On every page
of Church history we find recorded the clashes planned by these evil
forces, from which the Church always came out not conquered, but a
conqueror.

The history of the veneration of Mary tells us that the Blessed Virgin
Mary helped to win these victories. During the early times, when fierce
battles against the Church were raging, bishops and priests knew of no
more efficacious means to avert these dangers than to exhort the
faithful to pray to the Blessed Virgin. Thus we read in history that
the holy bishops and martyrs Ignatius and Irenaeus did this in the
second century, and in the third century it was Pope Calixtus who
advised the faithful to take refuge with the Blessed Virgin in time of
persecution of the Church. And so on through all Christian times.

Since the introduction of the rosary by St. Dominic all great victories
have been credited to the devotion of the rosary. The first great
conquest of the Church effected by the rosary was the victory over the
Albigenses, who had spread heresy in southern France and had caused
great havoc in Church and State.

St. Bernard complained in those times: "The churches are empty, the
people without priests, the Sacraments without reverence. People on
their deathbed refuse the assistance of the Church, ridicule penance."

How the weapon with which this heresy was conquered was the rosary we
have related in a previous sermon. This was the first glorious victory
through the devotion of the rosary. It was the sword with which the
Church slew the proud Goliath of heresy.