Wildflowers for the Rosary

 Of course, you will immediately recognize the original prayers of the Rosary, as we have always known it. But then you will see that there is more here than than the familiar four sets of mysteries. Now there are mysteries for each day of the week, and they tell about more aspects of Jesus' life with us. 

Joyful Mysteries (Monday) 

It's time for the Messiah to come!

1. Annunciation to Mary 

     "... and you shall name him Jesus."

     - Luke 1:26-38 ~ "acceptance" 

2. Visiting with her cousin Elisabeth 

     "Blessed art thou among women" 

     - Luke 1:41-45 ~ "encouragement" 

3. Birth of Jesus 

     "... and laid him in a manger."

     - Luke 2:4-7 ~ "humility" 

4. Presentation of the First Born 

     "for my eyes have seen your salvation."

     - Luke 2:22-35 ~ "fulfillment" 

5. Discovery at the Temple 

     "I had to be in my Father's house"

     - Luke 2:45-49 ~ "belonging" 

Luminous Mysteries (Tuesday) 

His mission is authorized by the Father. 

1. Baptism in the Jordan 

     "This is my beloved Son"

     - Matthew 3:16-17 ~ "beginning" 

2. Wedding at Cana 

     "Fill the jars with water." 

     - John 2:5-7 ~ "joining" 

3. Proclaiming the Kingdom 

     "The Kingdom of God is at hand."

     - Mark 1:14-15 ~ "newsflash" 

4. Transfiguration 

     "and his face shone like the sun" 

     - Matthew 17:1-8 ~ "revealed" 

5. Beginning the Eucharist 

     "This is my body which is given for you."

     - Luke 22:14-20 ~ "sacrifice" 

Believing Mysteries (Wednesday) 

And Jesus did miracles among them: 

1. Healing the Sick.

      - a woman healed by touching His robe 

      "Who touched me?" 

      - Luke 8:43-48 ~ "healing" 

2. Including the Despised 

      - the samaritan woman at the well 

      "He told me everything I ever did." 

      - John 4:4-42 ~ "inclusion" 

3. Forgiving the Broken 

      - telling a cripple to rise up & walk 

      "Which is easier, to say ..." 

      - Matthew 9:2-8 ~ "forgiving" 

4. Power over Nature 

      - walking on water & calming the storm 

      "Why did you doubt?" 

      - Matthew 14:22-34 ~ "reassuring"

5. Promising Resurrection 

      - raising Lazarus from the dead 

      "...if you believe, you will see the glory..."

      - John 11:1-44 ~ "promises" 

Theological Mysteries (Thursday) 

How the disciples came to know him:

1. Rebirth into the Kingdom 

      - baptism of repentance and renewal 

      "... being born of water and Spirit."

      - John 3:3-8 ~ "transformed" 

2. Establishing the Church 

      - Jesus quizzes the disciples. 

      "Who do you say that I am?" 

      - Matthew 16:13-17 ~ "identity" 

3. Demanding our Trust 

      - Jesus released the doubters.

      "To whom shall we go?"

      - John 6:53-69 ~ "dividing" 

4. Revealing his Identity 

      - Jesus reveals His identity in public. 

      "I and the Father are one." 

      - John 10:22-42 (v.30) ~ "trinity" 

5. Our Connection to Jesus 

      - Jesus is our connection to God. 

      "If you abide in me, and my words ..." 

      - John 15:1-10 ~ "abiding" 

Sorrowful Mysteries (Friday) 

He suffered for our sins.

1. Agony in the garden 

     "let this cup pass from me"

     - Matthew 26:36-45 ~ "agreement" 

2. Scourging at the pillar

     "... and had him scourged"

     - Mark 15:15 ~ "rejection" 

3. Crowned with thorns 

     "Hail, King of the Jews!"

     - John 19:2-3 ~ "mockery" 

4. Carrying the cross 

     "carrying his own cross" 

     - John 19:17 ~ "suffering" 

5. Crucified to death 

     "Father, forgive them. They know not ..."

     - Luke 23:32-34 ~ "intercession" 

Holiness Mysteries (Saturday) 

He taught us the Way of mercy: 

1. The Greatest Commandments 

     - Love the Lord  with all your self. 

     "On these two commandments depend.."

     - Matthew 22:36-40 ~ "devotion" 

2. Impurity of Speech 

     - "What you eat does not defile you, 

      but what comes out of the mouth ..."

     - Matthew 15:11,15-20 ~ "purity" 

3. Corporal works of mercy. 

     "Whenever you did it to one of these, 

     my brothers and sisters, you did it to me."

     - Matthew 25:34-40 ~ "kindness" 

4. Preaching to the Crowds 

     - The Sermons on the Mount and Plain.

     "Be merciful, even as your Father..."

     - Luke 6:17-49 ~ "bearing" 

5. Claiming our First Concern 

      - Jesus casts off our worries.

      "Seek first the Kingdom of God"

       - Matthew 6:19-34 ~ "trusting" 

Glorious Mysteries (Sunday) 

His Kingdom is established in Heaven. 

1. Jesus' Resurrection from the dead 

     "He is not here. He has risen." 

     - Mark 16:5-7 ~ "vindication" 

2. His Ascension to Heaven 

    "He was lifted up while they were looking"

     - Acts 1:9-11 ~ "amazed" 

3. The Descent of the Holy Spirit 

     "tongues as of fire"

     - Acts 2:1-4 ~ "empowered" 

4. Mary's Assumption to Heaven 

     "Blessed is the womb that carried you..." 

     - Luke 11:27, 28 ~ "praise" 

5. Mary's Coronation as Queen of Heaven 

     "and on her head a crown of 12 stars" 

     - Revelations 12:1 ~ "glory" 

And yet these new days' mysteries are never meant to be obligatory. The Church has not given any official recognition or approval of them. They are extras, to be added only if you wish to do so. They are being offered only for two purposes: to teach more about the life of Jesus, and to simply bring more flowers to my Blessed Mother. Perhaps they don't look as pretty as the other roses. You may call them wildflowers. 

If we pray and meditate on these extra mysteries, we must not think that they are any improvement of the Rosary that others still pray. These prayers have been slowly developing for over a millennium, and it took 500 years for the practice to take an official form. Then recently, our Saintly Pope John Paul II chose to add a fourth set of mysteries. He knew that we all need encouragement to pray, and the Rosary is a simple thing to memorize for those who feel that they don't know what, or how, to pray. If you feel that adding three more sets of mysteries serves only to increase the burden, then don't add them. They are merely wildflowers, and not even grown from private revelations, but from an act of asking directly how more episodes could teach about Jesus. There are so many in the world who know so little about Him.

The idea of adding to the Rosary came from its traditional use as a teaching tool by friars in the Middle Ages. As they wandered from place to place, they would teach the poor how to pray, and spread the Gospel, by pointing to the beads on their Rosary. Then, our Pope set us his own example, with his own great devotion to our Mother Mary. By his authority, he gave us the Luminous mysteries, and recommended them to us, to remind us of important points in the Gospels. And that wonderful act yet served only to point out an emptiness. Four sets of mysteries would repeat irregularly in a week. Why would there not be an equally beautiful set of mysteries for each and every day of the week? And the question prompted its own answer. Just do it. Find the episodes that speak to your heart, and try them out. 

It was not an act of pride or vanity. These wildflowers may not mix well with your bouquet of roses. They are a poor offering, brought by a silly child who saw others bring special flowers to our Mother. Sister Faustina, who was declared a saint by John Paul II, also devised her own prayers to say on her Rosary. Of course, aspiring to imitate the saints is akin to trying to imitate Jesus, but anyone can seek to take refuge with the Holy Mother. 

All we have to do to come to Mother Mary is to desire to please Her, and listen to Her when she wants to teach us. She promises to help us to grow in obedience, so that we won't get our nice clothes dirty so often. And She takes care of us when we get scrapes and bruises, teaching us how to avoid them, or to call for help. Then She brings us to Jesus, and speaks for us, recommending us to his care. And that is where we want to be, as that is how we become his disciples. Up until that time, we were merely believers standing back in the crowd to hear Him talk.

So far, Mother Mary has been accepting of my poor offering. But Jesus admonished that adding so many new mysteries might seem too heavy a burden for those who already feel that their prayers are a chore. If that is indeed how you feel, then ignore them. Or only use them occasionally, as few as you wish. Surely, if you pray one set per day, you can decide to keep only the official ones, or you can bring wildflowers to our Mother once in a while.

A Counterculture for Transforming the World

 Beginning in the 4th century AD, when the Roman Empire legalized Christianity, we had to find a new way to witness for our faith. No longer did we have the threat of martyrdom in the arena hanging over our heads. Being a devout Christian no longer represented the willingness to sacrifice in order to follow our Lord. What did we have to give up, when it became a status bonus to follow the religion of the Emperor? And yet, clearly the world had not yet embraced the Kingdom of God. 

So in protest against the "worldliness" of the way that people lived throughout the Empire, a few brave souls decided to walk away from the cities. They wanted to find a place where they could concentrate on their search for God, first and only. They left behind the usual values of success and wealth, the rampant idolatry of the old gods, and the distractions of popular culture in order to "seek first the Kingdom of God." They gave up homes and family, jobs and status, even the respect and approval of their peers, and walked out into the wilderness to pray and fast. They sought to be personally transformed by a closer relationship with the Lord Jesus, in just the same way that Jesus walked away to the wilderness to pray after his baptism in the Jordan. They became hermits in the desert. 

Of course, they knew it would be hard. It's never easy to fast and pray. It takes lots of determination to defy conventional "wisdom" and to follow a way that the world views as "crazy." And there would be temptations. The Devil must divert those who choose to break a new path to God, lest they succeed and draw others behind them. Jesus Himself was tempted to get off the path, into materialism, hyper-spiritualism, or political power, but He saw those traps and avoided them. Satan would have temptations and traps for them, too, passions and extremism of all sorts, and some would give up in frustration, finding that they could not persevere alone. 

Plus, our Lord came to serve, so we have to find ways to serve also, and not just retreat from the world. His Presence was his witness to the Kingdom, because He is perfect, but our witness would be our absence, because we are not. Our service is to pray for the world, that it might be transformed into our Lord's Kingdom, and all souls might turn to Him and be saved. But first we have to be transformed ourselves, by His grace allowing us to remain in His Presence. One of his graces has been to let us gather together in small groups, like-minded, to pray together and help guide each other. 

In the early days of the Desert Fathers, those who were recognized as exceptionally holy became leaders, as the beginners came to them for advice. The saints, Anthony and Pachomius, organized their followers into communities of monks, on the principle that each would be a help to the others, to encourage and reprove each other along the path. The community would assign tasks to each for its collective upkeep, according to their skills. These were usually simple tasks, anything from weaving mats, to keeping bees, to cooking dinner, or copying scriptures for those who had nothing to read. The monks were expected to be able to continue to pray while they worked, and there were also times when the community would come together to pray, or to eat dinner together and listen to a reading from the Scriptures. 

In these early years, the monks would have been daily praying through the whole book of Psalms, as well as a daily liturgy including the Eucharist. At first, they used a bowl or bag of stones, 150 of them, to keep track of their progress, but later they found that a knotted rope was far easier to use and carry, so they could be away from their cells to work and not lose track of their prayers. Eventually, they would have every one of the Psalms safely in their memories, and could recite them all by heart. And of course, they would meditate on episodes from our Lord's life, and dwell on his sayings. 

Nearly from the beginning of this monastic development, Saint Anthony would have had a copy of Saint Athanasius' New Testament, which he compiled in 367 AD. This was the first list of the same 27 books that we know as canonical today. The two men were close friends, and Bishop Athanasius stayed in the desert with Anthony on several occasions. He later wrote Anthony's biography. If a monk could have had a copy of one of the Gospels, it would have been a most prized possession. For certain, it would have been a source of "holy reading" at the dinner gathering. 

Of course, every community needs a set of rules to prevent confusion and keep them on track. Saint Pachomius was the first to make up a Rule for his community. He called it "The Paradise," and it was so successful that he drew enough followers to fill eight monastic communities. Elsewhere, each community had its own Rule to follow, some more strict than others, but all involved some degree of asceticism. There was almost always a requirement to take vows of poverty, chastity and obedience. Thus, there were some who desired a monastic life, but who could bear neither the strictures nor the privations, and they wandered from one community to the next, seeking a "proper fit."

The abbots were well aware of this aimless wandering, and many stated that a monk would be better off to simply choose one place and stay put. As Saint Anthony said it, "A frequently transplanted tree cannot bear fruit." Finally, it was Saint Benedict who decided that any monk who wished to join his community would also have to take a vow of stability as well. This meant promising that he would stay in one place, until sent away by the Abbot. The Rule of Saint Benedict was so successful that it became the basis of most of the monastic communities in Europe. And since it was meant to be a humane, if simple way of life, a monk would rather stay in place than leave, unless the Abbot sent him in a small group to found another monastery. It was also Saint Benedict who established the canonical Hours of Prayer, or "Opus Dei" as he chose to call it. Eight times each day, including once during the night, the monks would come to chapel to pray, chanting a liturgy of Psalms. This is still the common practice of monks to this day. 

As not all novices applying for entrance into a monastic community were literate, especially during the "Dark Ages" between the sack of Rome in 405 and the rise of Charlemagne's Holy Roman Empire, and allowing for the scarcity of hand copied books, the practice of praying the whole book of Psalms began to wane. It was difficult to find a teacher to tutor one in reading, and no less challenging to acquire a text for study and memorization. Thus, many of the younger monks would make do by reciting other, better known prayers, like the Jesus prayer, the Our Father or a prayer to the Virgin Mary, and counting out 150, or more, of these each day. The long strings of knots then came to be called a Rosary, especially when a majority of the prayers were offered to Mary toward the end of the 7th century. There was no official rule to organize how the prayers were said, but combining the practice with meditations on various episodes from the Gospels was a natural extension of devotion. It also helped to forestall the criticism that one was merely piling up a multitude of words without meaning, which Jesus warned us against. 

Eventually, the Rosary that we know today began to emerge after the turn of the millennium. Its division into decades marked by beads made the practice much easier than reciting all of the Psalms from memory. And the shorter prayers, fewer in number, could satisfy the intention to pray without ceasing without the need for posession of a book. Soon, various mendicant orders, pursuing an apostolic vocation of preaching and service in the world, began to use the Rosary as a teaching device. 

Indeed, legend has it that, in the early 12th century, Saint Dominic received a vision of Mother Mary in which she requested that the faithful should pray the Rosary, and promised to intercede for us with Jesus and bestow many boons of grace on those who would persevere on a daily basis. The followers of Saint Francis also made habitual use of the Rosary in this way. The popularity of this practice swelled, not only among those with religious vocations, but also among the common people all across Europe. And in 1569, Pope Pius V, himself a Dominican, officially sanctioned the Rosary as a devotion of the Catholic Church. 

In 1683, a campaign of praying the Rosary was credited with gaining divine assistance for the armies of the Holy Roman Empire and the Polish-Lithuanian alliance in their battle to relieve the seige of Vienna imposed by the Ottoman Turks. Thereafter, praying the Holy Rosary has remained the weapon of choice for civilians to support their troops who have been deployed into conflict. And in 1917, in a vision at Fatima, Our Lady asked that we pray the Rosary for an end to World War I. If these prayers hold out the hope that our warlike inclinations can be ameliorated and curtailed, then perhaps the world can be transformed. 

And so we see a gradual transition. Those who once were discontented with the world are no longer abandoning its distractions and demands for commerce with conventional "wisdom." They are trying to evangelize any who will listen, and praying that the Gospel might now prove to be a leaven to cause the world itself to rise toward God. And a primary tool applied to this task is one conceived in the desert by hermits, and in the monasteries of the disaffected: the Holy Rosary offered to the Mother of God. Its decades of prayers remind the faithful to meditate on the life of our Lord Jesus. And perhaps we will thus be transformed into his likeness, and carry with us a little spark of the Kingdom of God. Then, some day, the Light may prove more powerful than the darkness, and the society of men may begin to resemble that of the angels in Heaven. "Thy Kingdom come, Thy will be done on Earth, as it is in Heaven." We must have faith, and hope, and love one another as Jesus loved us.