Saturday, February 4, 2017

THE MYSTERY OF THE ROSARY PART I




The Rosary has been cherished by the Catholic Church for centuries.  The recitation of The Rosary begins with the Apostle's Creed,which includes the basic tenements of our faith; the Our Father, the prayer Jesus himself taught us to pray; the Hail Mary, the prayer that gives honor to his mother and asks her for intercessions on our behalf;  the Glory Be, which praises the Trinity of God; the Fatima Prayer, which Mary taught at her appearance in Fatima and requested it to be added after each decade.  The Rosary is concluded with the Hail, Holy Queen (Salve Regina).  Saying The Rosary involves the praying of five decades--each decade includes the Our Father, ten Hail Marys, the Glory Be, and the Fatima Prayer,.  A decade is introduced by the announcing of the Mystery of that particular decade.  During the recitation of each decade, the individual meditates on the mysteries of Jesus' life and those of his first disciple, the Blessed Virgin Mary. In the past, a complete Rosary was actually praying a rosary three times in order to complete a set of 150 Hail Marys, this was called the "poor man's psalter".  A psalter is a book of the 150 Psalms which was, and still is used for the daily recitation of prayers. Because most of the faithful were illiterate in the early years of the Church, The Rosary was developed for them as their daily prayers.  





The Rosary, for hundreds of years, had three sets of Mysteries (Joyful, Sorrowful and Glorious), recently, Pope Saint John Paul II added a fourth set of Mysteries (Luminous) that illuminate the life and teachings of Jesus. The Rosary has long been prayed by Catholics and its beginning was a way for the illiterate masses to come to know the life of Jesus. Even for those who could read, Bibles were not mass produced until after the printing press was invented (around 1440) before then they were meticulously copied page by page, book by book, by devoted monks. So the rosary and its mysteries became a valuable tool of learning and praising Jesus by the masses.  

The word rosary comes from the Latin word meaning "garland of roses".  Practically everyone knows what a rosary is...even if they aren't Catholic they know they are prayer beads that Catholics own.  The vast majority of Catholics have  a rosary, some even carry it with them all the time even if they don't ever pray it.  Why is that?  What is it about the rosary that is so ingrained in Catholics that it has become a part of their lives in some way or another?  That is what I call the Mystery of the Rosary.

I grew up going to Catholic elementary school which was called grade school back then--first to eighth grade.  Everyday during the months of May and October, after a shortened after-lunch recess, we all paraded into the church to pray The Rosary and to have the Benediction of the Blessed Sacrament.  In second grade, when I received my First Holy Communion, I, along with everyone else, received my first rosary.  It was a beautiful pearl white.  In Eighth grade, at graduation, every graduate received a rosary as a graduation gift from the school...it was a sparkling blue crystal one that was stored in a box that looked like a graduation cap.  I still have that rosary today. 

I prayed the rosary often when I was young.  The Mass was in Latin in those days, so since I didn't really know what was going on during the Mass, I would read my Mass missal in the first five minutes or so, then pull out my rosary and pray that during the rest of the Mass....I wasn't the only one.  Most everyone said a rosary during the Mass... it seemed like the thing to do.

You would think that after all those years I would still be praying the rosary...after all it had become a habit...but around 8th grade, Vatican II happened, and English replaced Latin and the Mass got a lot more interesting... so since then I rarely prayed the rosary...except at the beginning of a road trip or before taking off on an airplane.  Although I rarely said the rosary anymore, I have a great collection of them; one from the Vatican that looks like red rosebuds and even smells like roses, (my favorite one these days), one from the Holy Land made from olive wood, one commemorating St. John Paul II (actually I have 2 of those) several I have received in the mail.  I have a very large wooden one that hangs on my bed, and another one that graces the frame of my picture of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. I have a drawer in my desk with two or three in them and one that hangs in my car.  I also have two bracelet rosaries.  It seems like a Catholic can never have too many rosaries.   


Out of the blue, about a year ago,  my husband and I decided to start praying The Rosary everyday....missing a few days here and there, but always coming back and picking it up again.  Why do we do it?  Another mystery?  We have found that praying The Rosary has such a soothing effect on us both, twenty minutes of calm.  We don't pray The Rosary like we did as kids...now we pray a Scriptural Rosary, one that reads passages from the Bible that reflect on each mystery of The Rosary.  We have found it to be more meaningful, easier to meditate on the mysteries, and even on the words of  the actual prayers. We pray it out loud, the way it was meant to be prayed, at least that is what I believe, as the resonance of the words as we pray our own parts helps in the meditation. 


Mistakenly called a Marian Prayer, The Rosary is in reality a meditation on the Life of Jesus. Praying The Rosary and meditating on its Mysteries helps us to grow in the virtues that each Mystery  of the Rosary proclaims.  As those who practice true meditation know, there is a calmness of mind, heart and spirit that results in meditation.  The Rosary provides that type of meditation with an emphasis towards God and directing one's life towards God. The rosary contains 20 mysteries that proclaim 20 lessons in life, love, virtue and God's plan for us.



In Part II, I will discuss each mystery of The Rosary and the values it contains.  And from that we will understand what the true Mystery of the Rosary is.



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