| A Commentary on the Rosary Stratford Caldecott |
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The
Rosary A
commentary by Stratford Caldecott The
Most Holy Rosary of the Blessed Virgin Mary is perhaps the most
widely-disseminated and popular devotion among Catholics outside of the
Liturgy of the The
Rosary is associated with Mary, but it is almost entirely focused on the
life of her Son. Mary simply
serves here as our "initiator" into the mysteries of Christ. In
other words, the Rosary contains the Mother of God’s own meditations on
the Incarnation. And he went down with them and came to The majority of the beads on the Rosary represent a short prayer called the “Hail Mary”. The first words of this prayer are those that were spoken by the Angel when he appeared to her before the conception of Christ. Every time we repeat the words of this prayer we are trying to approach Jesus through Mary. Hail
Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee. Blessed
art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb Jesus. Holy
Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners now and at the hour of our
death. The Rosary is also a "metaphysical" prayer. Mary is like the primordial waters lying open before the life-giving action of God at the beginning of the world. By praying we are trying to become like her, receptive to the will of God. Mary’s fiat ("Let it be to me according to your word") echoes God’s fiat ("Let there be light") in the very beginning of creation, and her Son’s fiat ("Let not my will but thine be done") in the Garden of Gethsemane (Luke 22:42, etc.). The
Structure of the Mysteries The one hundred and fifty Hail Marys of the traditional Rosary are sometimes preceded by three which represent Faith, Hope and Charity. But the most obvious and important structural principle of the Rosary lies in the order of mysteries which are assigned to be contemplated during each "decade" or sequence of ten Hail Marys, and which are listed lower down. Of course, a "mystery" here does not mean something that is deliberately being kept obscure. It is not something irrational or something secretive. It is, however, something that our human intelligence cannot fully understand, or get to the bottom of. It may consequently in a sense be "hidden" (though not intentionally) from those who insist on grasping everything quickly and superficially. The greatest practical difficulty that many people encounter in the devotion lies in the attempt to pray verbally at the same time as gazing interiorly upon the mysteries evoked through an image – a tableau or icon - in the imagination. To do so requires a mental discipline that brings the mind into closer alignment with the pattern of Mary’s thoughts as she treasures these memories of her Son and "ponders them in her heart". The five Joyful, five Sorrowful and five Glorious mysteries describe the life of human childhood, the adult life and the supernatural life. Taken as applying to the individual soul they describe, first, the life of the soul as it opens itself to grace, second as it struggles to follow Christ, and finally as it experiences the transformation wrought by grace. In
his Apostolic Letter published in October 2002 (Rosarium Virginis Mariae),
Pope John Paul II introduced a further set of five "Luminous"
mysteries to be prayed between the Joyful and the Sorrowful. These summarize
Christ’s public ministry between his Baptism and his Passion (his Baptism
in the It
may seem strange that a Pope so traditionally-minded, especially in matters
of Marian devotion, should be willing to innovate in such a drastic manner.
The Trinitarian structure of the Rosary had been well established
since at least the fifteenth century. The Rosary seems to have begun as a
way of praying the 150 Psalms in three groups of 50 – a kind of lay
breviary. Partly for convenience, the Psalms were later replaced with Our
Fathers, and later Hail Marys, in five sets of ten beads at a time, each set
of 50 linked to one of the three cycles of Mysteries.
But by adding another set of 50, with another cycle of Mysteries,
John Paul II had effectively broken the tradition linking the Rosary to the
Psalms. Although the link had
become vestigial, I do not believe he would have done so without direct
inspiration or authorization from heaven.
So what was the meaning of the change? To begin with, the four sets of mysteries may be compared to the Cross, with its four arms. If we stand at the base of the Cross, we are present with Mary the Mother of God. Thus we begin our meditation by thinking of the Joyful Mysteries, recalling the Incarnation. Then we look up. Above the head of Jesus is the plaque affixed by the order of Pilate, bearing the message: "Jesus Christ, the King of the Jews". The two horizontal arms of the Cross linked by this proclamation therefore represent the Kingship of Jesus. One arm points towards the good thief who recognized him as King and the other to the unrepentant, who did not. The two arms also represent the Kingship as lived (the Sorrowful Mysteries, for on earth Our Lord lived his Kingship as the Passion) and as taught (the Luminous Mysteries). Finally, when we look up higher, to the top of the Cross, we are remembering the Glories of heaven to which the Cross conducts us. The fourfold structure of the Mysteries also recalls the fourfold structure of the Gospels, and each of the four sets of Mysteries seems to correspond to one of the Gospels in a special way. The Joyful Mysteries correspond to the Gospel of Matthew, whose symbol is a Man and who emphasizes the titles “Son of Man”, “Son of Abraham”, “Son of David”. The Sorrowful correspond to Luke, whose symbol is the Ox and whose Gospel emphasizes the role of Jesus as sacrificial victim. The Luminous would then correspond with Mark, whose symbol is the Lion, and who proclaims the divine power of the Lord. Finally the Glorious Mysteries can be associated with John, whose symbol is the Eagle, and who teaches us about the intimate relationship between the Son and his heavenly Father. Ancient and medieval thinkers found symbolic significance in numerical patterns. The Apostles’ Creed through which one enters the Rosary has twelve sections, like the gates of the New Jerusalem. The Lord’s Prayer which begins each sequence has seven, like the seven sacraments or the seven days of creation. The Glory Be with which each sequence ends is Trinitarian. Each sequence of beads is made up of ten Hail Marys, ten being the sum of seven and three, itself symbolic of the expansion of the totality of numbers contained in One. A Rosary contains five mysteries, five being the number of life and growth, found especially in flowers and leaves. Five is also closely related to the Golden Ratio and thus to many aspects of beauty in nature. By the addition of the Luminous Mysteries, bringing the number of rosaries to four, Pope John Paul II seems to have brought the tradition to its completion. Ways
of Praying the Rosary There are many forms of Rosary, both short and long (for example, "Rosary Rings" or Chaplets are very popular, which contain only ten marks or beads and a cross). The full Rosary is a circular string of five groups of ten beads interspersed by larger or slightly separate ones (marking the beginning or end of each decade). To go around the Rosary once with one’s fingers is to pray one of the four sets of mysteries (Joyful, Luminous, Sorrowful or Glorious). The beginning of the Rosary normally consists of a short string consisting of a Crucifix, followed by a single bead at the beginning and end of a sequence of three. This leads to a holy image or medal, attached to which is the longer, circular part of the Rosary. The prayers assigned to the short string are the Apostles’ Creed (for the Cross), an Our Father, three Hail Marys (for Faith, Hope and Charity), and a Glory Be. In this way one enters the Rose Garden of Our Lady through the Cross, along the “path” of the three theological virtues, and through the "gate" represented by the medallion. A complete circuit of the longer part of the Rosary includes five sets of ten Hail Marys, one set for each of five mysteries, each such “decade” beginning with the Lord’s Prayer and ending with a Glory Be. When one reaches the medallion again at the end of the circuit, one prays some closing prayers, including the Salve Regina or "Hail, Holy Queen". The idea is to close the gate of the Garden behind one and leave softly. When praying the Rosary, it is customary also to “offer” each decade for a particular “intention” or for a particular person. Thus one might offer a decade for the healing or comfort of a friend or enemy, or for the ending of a war, or the establishment of justice in a certain situation, for example. In
The
Joyful Mysteries And
blessed is the fruit of thy womb,
Jesus, whom you, O Virgin, conceived of the Holy Spirit ...Jesus,
whom you, O Virgin, took to ...Jesus, to whom you, O Virgin, gave birth ...Jesus,
whom you, O Virgin, offered up in the ...Jesus,
whom you, O Virgin, found again in the The
Luminous Mysteries …Jesus,
who was baptized in the …Jesus, who turned water into wine …Jesus,
who proclaimed the …Jesus, who was transfigured on the mountain …Jesus, who gave himself to us as Eucharist The
Sorrowful Mysteries ...Jesus, who sweated blood for us ...Jesus, who was scourged for us ...Jesus, who was crowned with thorns for us ...Jesus, who bore the heavy Cross for us ...Jesus, who was crucified for us The
Glorious Mysteries ...Jesus, who rose from the dead …Jesus, who ascended into Heaven …Jesus, who sent us the Holy Spirit …Jesus, who took you, O Virgin, up into Heaven …Jesus, who crowned you, O Virgin, in Heaven
Many Catholics also insert a short "Fatima Prayer" after each decade, after the Glory Be. It is a prayer for universal salvation (in the sense of 1Timothy 2:4), and the words are as follows: "O my Jesus, save us from the fires of hell. Lead all souls to heaven, especially those most in need of thy mercy." The mysteries are often assigned to different days of the week. The Joyful used to be said on Mondays and Thursdays (and Sundays during Advent and Epiphany), the Sorrowful on Tuesdays and Fridays but daily in Lent, and the Glorious on Wednesdays and Saturdays (and Sundays from Easter to Advent). John Paul II suggested Thursday as the day for praying the Mysteries of Light, leaving Friday for the Sorrowful and moving the Joyful to Saturday. Thus one may still follow the traditional threefold sequence on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday, before praying the whole set of four beginning on Thursday, finishing with the Glorious mysteries on Sunday. (In terms of number symbolism, this division of the week into two parts brings out the fact that seven, which is the number of the Covenant and of Creation, is made by the adding groups of three and four, just as twelve is produced by multiplying them.) Opening
and Closing Prayers The Rosary may begin with this prayer: Queen of the Holy Rosary, inspire in my heart a true love of this devotion, so that by meditating on the mysteries of our Redemption which are recalled in it, I may be enriched with its fruits and obtain peace for the world, the conversion of sinners, and the favour which I ask of you in this Rosary, which is to pray for me to the Lord our God, in the name of Christ our Saviour, for [insert your petition]. I ask it for the greater glory of God, for your own honour, Mary, and for the good of souls, especially my own. Amen.
Hail Holy Queen, Mother of Mercy, Our life, our sweetness and our hope. To you do we cry, poor banished children of Eve. To you do we send up our sighs, mourning and weeping in this valley of tears. Turn then, most gracious advocate, thine eyes of mercy towards us, and after this our exile, show unto us the blessed fruit of thy womb, Jesus. O clement, O loving, O sweet Virgin Mary! Pray for us, most holy Mother of God, that we may be made worthy of the promises of Christ. 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 both imitate what they contain and obtain what they promise, through the same Christ our Lord. Amen. [Optional:] May the divine assistance remain always with us. Amen. And may the souls of the faithful departed [especially…..], through the mercy of God, rest in peace. Amen.
Commentary
on the Mysteries As
one prays each decade of the Rosary, it is helpful to focus one’s
imaginative and intellectual attention (and thus one’s feelings and
prayer) around one particular mystery in the life of Jesus and Mary.
The following commentary tries to bring out the way each of these
mysteries relates to the others and to our own life – how each can lead us
deeper into the life of faith. After
the name of each mystery I have put [in brackets like this] one of the
things we might pray for during this meditation. 1.
Joyful Mysteries: The Hidden Life The
soul prepares herself to welcome Christ, she manifests him and
eventually is forced to go deeper, through loss, into the
temple of the heart where he may be found again.
The
Annunciation [to
be humble] The Angel greets Mary, who is little more than a child: "Hail Mary". In Latin, the word "Hail" is Ave, the reversal of Eva, which is the name of our fallen Mother. This reminds us that the first mystery is to do with a reversal of the Fall. (Ave is also thought by some to be a shortened version of absque vae – meaning “without woe”.) "Full of Grace". The Angel pronounces this as though it were a name or title, and so it is: Mary is the one who is full of grace, for she is without sin; that is, without any space from which grace has been excluded. Mary is "immaculate" because she is sanctified in advance by the Son who is to be born of her, who existed as God eternally before her own birth, and without whom no one born after Adam could escape the presence of sin. God permits her to be born without the damage resulting from human sin, knowing that her Son will pay the price of her innocence upon the Cross. For when she reaches the age when she might consent to his conception within her womb, her freedom to do so must not be impeded by the reluctance that comes from moral weakness. Now nothing in her resists the will of God. She is free to oppose it, of course, but why should she? She knows or senses that it is in the will of the creator that the interests of the creature are best defended. Yet the future of the world hangs on her reply to the Angel, for the decision is not automatic: it is an act she must make her own, a step she must take, which no one can do for her. Eve was just as free to reject the temptation of the Serpent, yet chose not to do so. "The Lord is with thee." In a sense the Angel is the Lord’s presence to her, announcing in these words his arrival and what it means. In another sense she is the one with whom the Lord is always present. For us this second meaning is important, for if we lose the Lord, or a sense of his presence, we may find it again by going to Mary. The Rosary is also the story of the Christian soul, and thus Mary’s encounter with the Angel Gabriel may be taken to represent our own encounter with our angelic Guardian. We are thereby approaching that level of our being which Mary represents. We hear the voice of the Angel who is continually in the presence of God, we feel the touch of divine love, the necessary word of guidance. In this meeting with the Angel the purpose of our life is revealed. Our mission is assigned to us, if we will accept it. How will we answer? Each time we pray this Mystery we are trying to make it our own, to pour ourselves (as it were) into the mould of Mary, or to reach that place in ourselves where the Lord’s will is to be done. Mary
replies, "Let it be done (fiat) to me according to thy
word." Her fiat echoes God’s fiat lux ("Let there
be light") in the very beginning of creation, and her Son’s fiat
("Not my will but thine be done") in the
The
Visitation [to
love others] The spiritual, inner encounter with God, and the conception of the divine life within the soul and body of Mary, immediately leads to a human encounter. It impels Mary to an act of charity, sending her across the hills to visit her elderly cousin Elizabeth, to share her joy and support her in a difficult pregnancy. We
imagine she would not have been allowed to go across country all alone,
without companions, but it seems unlikely Joseph was with her, or that he
yet knew of Mary’s own pregnancy. The Bible tells us that she stayed for
about three months. Since the Angel had come to her in We,
too, to the extent we are able to receive the grace God offers, find the
motivation to turn away from ourselves towards another’s need. This is
part of the mission that is entrusted to us, just as it is part of Mary’s
mission to go to "Blessed
art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb." Once
the soul has met God in the Angel, she can meet God everywhere, whether at
home or at the end of a long journey, in the self or in others. Mary’s
encounter is now with the mother of a prophet, and with the prophet John
himself, hidden but dancing in the womb before Mary, like King David before
the tabernacle of the Lord. His motion, perhaps no more than a kick, is
interpreted by These are real babies, real wombs, real mothers. The events picked out by the Gospel writers are selected and stylized, almost hieratic or emblematic, to emphasize the meanings now known to be present in them. We
must place ourselves not only in the position of Mary, but in the position
of
The
Nativity [to
be poor in spirit] Each
set of five mysteries can be read from the centre out. At the heart of the
Joyful mysteries is this one, the mystery of the Nativity or Birth of
Christ, or Christmas, while at the heart of the Luminous is the Prophecy of
the Kingdom, at the heart of the Sorrowful is his Crowning with Thorns, and
at the heart of the Glorious is the Descent of the Holy Spirit upon the
Apostles (the Nativity of the Church). Each of these central mysteries in a
sequence of five concerns kingship, for the Nativity is the birth of the
true King albeit in obscurity, the Crowning with Thorns is a real coronation
although it appears to be a form of humiliation, and at Pentecost the flames
of fire come to rest on the heads of the Apostles. The entire series ends
with the Coronation of the Virgin. After all, God is the King of But first and foremost, the Nativity is simply a birth, which is the bringing forth of the secret that Mary has cherished within her for nine months – the face that God has fashioned for himself in the womb of the world. This is nothing less than a re-making of the world, for the world as it existed before was perishing, falling into nothingness, whereas now it is united through this tiny child with the divine life of the Trinity. Into relation with this child all people and things are being drawn, and in this relationship they will pass through death into a new existence. The seed of this life began to grow in the earth’s soil at the Annunciation, but now it shows itself above ground, at Epiphany it will be acknowledged by the Wise, and on the Cross it will spread its branches over the earth. In the image of Madonna and Child is represented the drama of the human personality, coming to birth in the meeting of two gazes and of two smiles, the mother’s smile kindling the child’s, the child’s spontaneous smile evoking this sign of love from the enfolding cosmos. The Mother here is the purely human, the Child is God. It is Joseph’s mission to protect and raise this Child, which means first of all to shelter the Mother who is the Child’s first home. Icons of the Nativity show him weary, perhaps doubting his fitness for the task, puzzling over God’s plan. He is appointed to represent the heavenly Father and become an Icon of the Invisible.
The
Presentation in the Temple [to
be pure and obedient] The
mysteries represented in the Rosary as "Joyful" partly concern the
continuity of the Old in the New Testament. The mystery of the Presentation
shows the submission of Joseph and Mary to the Law and the An
old man and an old woman, no doubt tolerated by the Anna
reads the destiny of the Mother in the face of the Child, for a sword is
coming that will pierce her soul. It is the sword of Roman power, the power
to kill the Son when he is betrayed by his friends. At a deeper level it is
the burning sword of the Angel who guards the way back to the Garden in These
ten prayers also concern the mystery of purity, for the act of childbearing
is sacred and the mother exists for a time outside the formalities of
religion. Now she brings the fruit of her womb to become a part of the wider
community, and in this case she brings to the There
is no stain of sin, no damage to the human will, either of Mother or of Son.
They come to the Simeon
and Anna would not have recognized Jesus unless they had maintained great
purity in their heart, which is the organ of interior sight. If their
imagination had been distracted by images of worldly pleasure or the
passions of anger and jealousy, the light that shone from the Child would
not have been evident to them. Like recognizes like, and the coming of the
dawn to
The
Finding in the Temple [to
search for God everywhere] This
mystery looks forward to the public ministry of the Lord’s teaching years,
between his Baptism in the The mystery also represents the twelve years up to that point, years in which he grew in the home of Joseph and Mary, and also in awareness of his mission to the People of Israel. It is the mystery of his obedience to Joseph and Mary, and therefore of his humility. It is the mystery of his hiddenness, even from the parents who know the secret of his conception, and therefore of the "secret" teaching which, though manifest, is only revealed and understood to those who "have ears to hear", at the right time and place. Christ
always stands in the This is also the mystery of conversation with the Word: the Word of God speaking by means of words in a human language with his creatures. Here is an image of the Trinity reproduced in the second Person: his human mind forming an idea, the idea embodied in a word, and the word sent forth on his breath, uniting him in exchange with those who receive and understand. It is the mystery of losing and finding, of losing perhaps in order to find, for when they found him it was to understand him better than before – and at the same time less than before, because they had been led deeper into the mystery of his mission. We search for Jesus – that is, for God in findable form – and we search for him in the three days when he is absent from us (in the Tomb) or when we are absent from him (looking in the wrong place). We will find him, but he may be surprised that we did not find him earlier.
2.
The Mysteries of Light: Revealing the Kingdom to Mere Children The
soul is filled with light, the light of the world, unrecognized
by so many yet present in everywhere in
truth, goodness, and beauty. The
Baptism in the Jordan [to
be faithful to the promises of our baptism] “Hail
Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee.”
Up to now Jesus has lived with his mother, but now the Lord is
beginning his ministry. He is
leaving the obscurity of his hidden life with Mary to reveal the light of
the kingdom. His baptism at
John’s hands marks the transition. When
he steps into the waters of the river that runs through The
descent of the Holy Spirit like a dove upon Jesus, as he stands in the
waters and hears the voice of the Father, is the most extraordinary image of
the Trinity in action, creating and re-creating the world. In the very first
verses of Genesis the Spirit of God hovers over the waters as the world is
created by the sound of God’s voice. God’s first words are Fiat lux (“Let
there be light”). That was the
original “luminous mystery”. The
Spirit is the breath of God, the Son is his Word.
In the Son all things are made, in heaven and on earth and under the
earth. The Son is the true Light
that shines from the darkness of the Father.
He is the Father’s Fiat. The
solid earth is made between the upper and lower waters, after they are
separated on the second day, and after the lower waters are gathered
together on the third. Standing
in the Jordan, Jesus stands in the midst of the lower waters, like a
new-made continent, or like a new Like
Moses walking into the Red Sea, like Joshua crossing the Jordan, Jesus leads
his people through these waters into freedom and the The Spirit sends him into the desert places as God sent the fallen Adam out of the Garden into a wilderness, saying, “In the sweat of your face you shall eat bread till you return to the ground, for out of it you were taken; you are dust, and to dust you shall return.” The Second Adam must have remembered these words as he yearned for bread, only too conscious of the mortality he had put on with his human nature. But he refuses to turn stones into bread for himself, for that is not his Father’s will, and he will obey no one else. The three temptations represent all possible temptations (physical, psychological, spiritual), and Jesus’s victory over them creates in human nature the possibility of the three Vows (poverty, chastity, obedience). Thus he turns the wilderness of human nature back into a Garden, and the wild beasts and angels come and minister to him, as they did for Adam in his innocence. The
Wedding at Cana [to
trust in Mary] His
mission having begun with his return from the wilderness, now we begin to
see signs that testify to Jesus’s authority and manifest his nature. This
one is the first of seven miracles recorded by the Evangelist John
(corresponding perhaps to the seven days of creation and the seven “I
am” sayings), which include also three miracles of healing, one of the
multiplication of bread, one of walking on water, and one of raising of the
dead. In the Rosary, this one
may be taken to stand in for all the other miracles recorded of Christ in
Scripture. This
first miracle is precipitated by Mary, the Mother of Jesus. Noticing the
lack of wine at the wedding, she prompts him to do something.
Why should she do that, unless she knew he could perform miracles?
Why would she persist in her confidence that he would act, even after he
seemingly rebuffs her request, unless she knew him almost better than he
knew himself, and was intimately aware of God’s will for him? Mary was
always filled with the Holy Spirit, almost an “incarnation” of the
Spirit, and just as the Spirit led Jesus from the Why
this miracle? Just to make a
wedding party go more smoothly? How banal! But we must remember the
significance of marriage in the cosmic scheme of things, and in the parables
of Jesus. A wedding is a symbol of the Kingdom, and of the final
reconciliation of all things in Christ – the union of divine nature with
human, of heaven with earth. On one level the miracle is simply a hidden act
of kindness to the bride and groom, itself not without significance. On
another, it is a manifestation (at least to the disciples) of the reality
that is to be preached to the people: the coming of the Jesus
has recently transformed the natural waters of the earth into the waters of
Baptism. Now he changes six jars of water into the finest wine to show his
power over the elements themselves. He had refused to exercise that power to
assuage his hunger by turning stones to bread, but now at the prompting of
his mother he turns water into wine for someone’s else’s sake. It is a
blessing on the wedding itself, indicating that when Jesus is present in a
marriage it becomes a sacrament, partaking of the communion he offers to all
men in the Church. It points forward to the Last Supper, the “wedding
feast of the Lamb”, and to the Cross, which seals the new Covenant in his
blood. The
Proclamation of the Kingdom [for
our hearts to be fully converted] The
Greek word kerygma means the preaching or proclamation of the “good
news”, and this mystery refers to the moment when Jesus read aloud in the
synagogue the scroll of Isaiah, proclaiming it fulfilled: “The
Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to preach good
news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives, and
recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed,
to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord” (Luke 4:16-21; cf. Is.
61:1-2). The
immediate reaction of the people is admiration, but it quickly turns to
anger, for he tells them he can perform no miracles there.
They try to throw him off a hilltop, but he walks through the crowd
and disappears. He does not run
and hide, or dodge and weave, but “passes through the midst of them”.
How is that possible, through a crowd that wants to kill him?
Perhaps it is thanks to a miracle (invisibility, or intangibility),
but however it happens we are reminded that nothing and no one can harm us
unless God permits it. This
Mystery also recalls the Sermon on the Mount (e.g. Matt. 5:1-20), where he
teaches the spirituality of the Kingdom – his equivalent of the Ten
Commandments. The Beatitudes are
a composite portrait of his true followers: the poor in spirit, those who
mourn, the meek, those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, the
merciful, the pure in heart, the peacemakers, those who are persecuted. In
Luke 9 it is linked to the sending of the Twelve, the feeding of the Five
Thousand, and Peter’s inspired recognition of him as the anointed Christ
of God. The
Transfiguration [to
love meditation and prayer] Before
the week of his Passion, which involved his final confrontation with the
powers of evil, Jesus takes his three closest disciples up into the mountain
to pray. Luke tells us this was about eight days (Mark says it was six)
after his prophecy of the Kingdom: “But I tell you truly, there are some
standing here who will not taste death before they see the kingdom of God”
(9:27-8). Thus in one way, the Transfiguration is a glimpse of that Kingdom,
which the disciple John was to see more fully when he was an old man, in the
visions narrated in the Book of Revelation. Jesus
takes his disciples with him to pray. He is teaching them to pray, leading
them in prayer, showing them what prayer means. His face is altered and his
clothing becomes dazzling white as he talks to Moses and Elijah about his
coming “exodus” (Luke 9:31). In No
one saw where Moses was buried, and Elijah was taken up bodily to heaven in
a chariot of fire. The human body is an essential part of the highest
prayer, for the body belongs to the whole person who is transfigured in God.
The disciples are heavy with sleep but remain awake. They are not fully
conscious, for their bodies still hold them back. They themselves are not
yet transfigured; they are merely witnesses. Peter’s
suggestion that they make booths for Jesus, Moses and Elijah is connected
with the Jewish Feast of Booths or Tabernacles (Sukkot), when the
people would journey on pilgrimage to The
face of Moses shone with light after he had spoken with God. Jesus also
speaks with God face-to-face in prayer, and his face and clothes shine even
more brightly, for he is greater than Moses. He both speaks to God and is
God, in the mystery of the Trinity, for the Son is the face God turns
towards himself, and the face he turns to us. The
Eucharist [to
be devoted to Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament] Immediately
before Christ entered into his Passion there was the Last Supper, at which
he instituted the Eucharist along with the Episcopate. Thus the last of the
first ten Mysteries, referring to the Eucharist, immediately precedes the
first of the last ten Mysteries, which is the Agony in the Garden leading to
the arrest and trial of the Son of God. All
the Luminous Mysteries are enfolded in the gift of the Eucharist. Baptism
begins our initiation into the royal priesthood of Christ; the Eucharist is
its completion. “Eucharist”
means thanksgiving. The essence of divine and eternal life is a receiving of
existence or identity and a giving of thanks to God, which is a giving of
glory and praise to the maker and source of everything we have received and
that can be received. This eternal life is a participation in the love of
the Holy Trinity which is the archetype of all sacrifice and of every
marriage. The Eucharist is the wedding feast of the Lamb. It
is a Mystery of Light because it is the full communication of truth, the
Truth who is a Person, the Word of the Father, “the true light that
enlightens every man” (John 1:9), the light that the darkness has not
overcome. In
the Eucharist is the real presence of our Lord, the presence that nourishes
prayer, the presence that makes the Church. Through the consecration and
offering by the priest, the appearances of bread and wine become expressive
of a new divine intention. Christ no longer intends to give us a mere symbol
of himself – which bread and wine always are – but his very self in
reality. By making this intention apply to a specific piece of bread, a
specific cup of wine, he changes the reality while leaving the atoms and
molecules unaltered. The
Eucharist is the Holy Grail, the cup of mercy and healing and immortality,
containing the essence of all sweetness, the “one great thing to love on
earth”, the source of romance, glory, honour and fidelity (Tolkien, Letter
43), the fruit of the Tree of Life. 3.
Sorrowful Mysteries: The Passion of the Divine Bridegroom The
Agony in the Garden [to
repent of our sins] The saving Passion of our Lord begins in the garden of Gethsemane, to reverse the effect of a Fall that took place in the garden of Eden (and it will bear fruit in a third garden – see the first of the Glorious Mysteries). The Lord waters the ground with his sweat and blood, so that the seed he plants in the earth, in the sleeping disciples, will grow in the Church. He prays to his Father that the "cup" will pass him by, but submits to his Father’s will. Does he pray this as the second Person of the Trinity or as a human being? As God, his will is the same as that of his Father. As man, he has a human will too, for this pertains to his nature as man. The two are not in conflict, for although he has to make the act of submission, the resistance comes not from his human side but from the natural abhorrence that his human will has to master. The unity of the two wills, human and divine, is not a unity of identity – the human nature is not the divine nature – but a unity brought about by love. The suffering which his body and soul fear, this cup which he dreads, is the result of the Fall – of the separation that has opened up between God and creation. Man’s will has opened the wound; the will of Jesus must close it. The cup is once more the Grail, the vessel which contains the "blood" or life of Christ separated from his body. That blood is the bearer of the Holy Spirit. It is the sacramental substance that communicates divine grace to every part of the extended body of Christ which is the Church. The three Apostles Peter, James and John, who barely kept awake on the Mount of Transfiguration, now cannot stay awake and pray, as he asks. He prays the same prayer three times: once for each of them, for it is on their behalf, as representing all his followers, that he struggles. They sleep the sleep of the flesh (as Lancelot slept in the presence of the Grail). They cannot concentrate, cannot attend. "Pray that you may be spared the test." But they did not, and so the test will come. They have not understood the essence of what is now to transpire on the Cross. They were not awake to see the Lord accept the cup on their behalf, or be strengthened by the Angel. The
Scourging at the Pillar [to
mortify our senses] The
cords of the Roman soldiers strip away the skin and drown him in agony. The
beauty that God made for him, the beauty of his body, is marred and torn.
Every stroke corresponds to some just punishment for something we have done,
of which he is innocent. He resents nothing but feels everything. The
pillar to which he is tied represents the centre of the universe, the axis
around which it turns, the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, the
sacred mountain, The
soldiers may be doing their duty, following orders, or they may be enjoying
the job a little too much. Hardened by their work, they are hardened against
human feeling, and their consciences do not feel the blows from each stroke
of the lash, which falls on them though they do not realize it. The
Crowning with Thorns [to
love humiliation] The
middle Mystery of this series of five is the one that corresponds to the
Nativity, the Proclamation of the Kingdom, and Pentecost in the other
series. Jesus,
the one who sees all, is blindfolded by men and made into a joke for their
amusement, but this is only the reverse side of the mystery of his
glorification. It is what glory looks like when it is seen in the distorting
mirror of sin. He
is challenged by the soldiers to prophecy – who hit you then? He
knows but does not say, for he is ready to bury their wickedness in his
forgiveness, and they will know that forgiveness, burning with shame when
the knowledge comes. The
crowning is a real coronation, for in the acceptance of this mockery for
love of us he makes it golden, just as his wounds will shine after the
Resurrection. He
needs nothing to be king of the universe, only to be doing his Father’s
will. The
Carrying of the Cross [to
be patient under trials] He
tells us we must each carry our Cross, but that the burden will be light.
For him it is not light at all, since he feels the weight of it in order
that we might be comforted by his presence with us when we carry our own. If
it seems heavy to us, then we are not letting him bear it in us, as he has
done already. We think perhaps that we will spare him further pain, but
really we are refusing to walk with him, refusing his companionship. Such is
his love for us that the best way for us to console and assist him is to let
him comfort us. All
this is easy to say, and less easy to do. When the burden comes, it seems
impossible to bear, and so Jesus himself fell three times under it. In the
end Jesus had to be helped by another. No one is really alone. What
makes it worse is that the burden is something that will be our instrument
of torture. But for Jesus it is his throne and the instrument of salvation.
It is the doorway to heaven and the veil of the Father. It is his Mother and
his Brothers. The
Crucifixion [to
be forgiven our sins] Nailed
to the Cross are our sins. All that we have done wrong, all that we might do
wrong, is stabbed into the wood and fixed there. The interior of sin is
revealed for those who can bear to look. Jesus has made himself a mirror.
This is what we are doing to ourselves by choosing what seems pleasant over
the order of the universe that we know in our heart. There
are two thieves crucified on either side, one repenting and one rejecting.
It is the scene of the Last Judgement, when men will welcome or reject the
presence of God in their own hearts. Below are standing Mary and John, each
entrusted to the other by the Word of God. John represents all the
disciples, even those temporarily absent through fear and confusion. Mary is
giving birth to the Church. The
stream of blood and water that flows out from the dead Christ is akin to the
blood mingled with water that flows out from under the altar of the That
river of grace is caught, in the visionary world, by an angel, in a golden
cup, the Holy Grail. This sacred Vessel is the Church, the Blessed Virgin
standing beneath the Cross, the
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