In just over a fortnight, Belfast begins a week given to Our Lady. Our Lady’s Rosary Festival runs from Monday 12 to Sunday 18 October 2026, and among those who are preparing it there is a great deal of anticipation. This year the invitation goes out to everyone: every parish, every family, every praesidium, and anyone who has never taken part before.
From a procession to a week
The Legion of Mary has organised Belfast’s Annual Rosary Procession for decades. In 2023 it grew into a week-long festival, run together with the Knights of Saint Columbanus, and the number walking rose from around 150 in 2022 to more than 800. Since then the programme has widened every year: family events, talks and testimonies, Eucharistic Adoration, Confession, retreats and pilgrimages, all leading to the procession.
This year’s week is built the same way, and it is worth seeing before you read any further. Here is the festival in two minutes.
The festival in two minutesTwo minutes of the festival: the procession, the Sisters, Adoration and Our Lady. Sound on.
The week ahead
There are four public events. Each has its own page, with directions and a way to add it to your calendar.
- Mon12Penal PersecutionsMass 6.30pm · lecture 7.15pmA lecture by the historian A. Bede on the faith of Irish Catholics in the Penal Times, at the Church of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, Antrim Road.
- Tue13To Jesus Through Mary7pmGod Changed My Life: the Sisters on Sr Clare Crockett, with Fr Robert Smialek and Michael McDonagh, at St Malachy’s Church.
- Thu15Be ReconciledFrom 6pm · Mass 9pmAdoration and Confession from 6pm at St Mary’s, Chapel Lane, Mass at 9pm, then Nightfever.
- Sun18Annual Rosary Procession2.30pmFrom St Malachy’s Church to St Peter’s Cathedral, then Benediction and refreshments.
Notice the Tuesday: 13 October is the anniversary of the last apparition at Fátima, when Our Lady told the three children, “I am the Lady of the Rosary.”
Why everyone, and why now
A procession is a strange kind of event. Nobody watches; everybody takes part. There is no stage and no audience, only people praying the Rosary aloud in the street, and the more of them there are, the more plainly the city hears it. That is why the invitation is not only to the Legion, or to those who already come to everything. It is to the parish that has never sent a group, to the family that has not been to a procession since the children were small, to young people, to those who have drifted, and to the neighbour who would come if somebody asked.
So here is the ask, and it is a small one.
- Come. To one evening, or to all four. Put the whole week in your calendar now, while it is still a fortnight away.
- Bring someone. A friend, a neighbour, a son or daughter, someone who has drifted from Mass. Every event page has a “Share on WhatsApp” link, and it takes a few seconds.
- Pray for it. Say a decade of the Rosary each day of the week for the festival, and for everyone who will come.
For legionaries
The Annual Rosary Procession is the Legion’s own tradition in Belfast. On Sunday 18 October, walk with your praesidium, and bring your rosary.
The prayer that closes the Rosary
O God, whose only-begotten Son, by his life, death and resurrection, has purchased for us the rewards of eternal life: grant, we beseech thee, that meditating upon these mysteries of the most holy Rosary of the Blessed Virgin Mary, we may imitate what they contain and obtain what they promise. Through the same Christ our Lord.
Amen.
Through Mary to Jesus.