fifth glorious mystery

Honor Mary by Asking for Her Help

In his article, Prayer takes Practice, Fr. Ed Broom lays out five ways to improve your prayer life. For the TL;DR crowd, the summary is:

Conviction — Have faith that prayer is actually important
Confession — Mend your relationship with God whenever you sin
Set a time and place to pray — Routine helps you pray consistently
Mass and holy communion — Mass and the Eucharist are the greatest prayers in the world
Seek our Lady of the Rosary — Pray the rosary to bring about peace

I want to focus on that last point — seeking out our Lady of the Rosary (naturally, this is a rosary prayer blog after all). On Aug 22nd, we celebrate the Queenship of the Blessed Virgin Mary which we pray in the Fifth Glorious Mystery of the rosary. When we pray the rosary we are in essence “crowning” our Heavenly Queen. Mary wants nothing more than for us for to have a close relationship with her son, Jesus Christ. We honor and crown her whenever we show faith and conviction that our relationship with Jesus matters to us.

But having conviction and faith is not easy. Think about it. You may brood for days over a friend’s disagreeable Facebook post. You can get into a funk at work or at home when it seems like nothing is going smoothly. Many of us get tied up in knots over our finances. But how much time and energy do we devote to thinking about the state of our relationship with Jesus? Do we put more energy into worrying about Facebook posts than finding time to go to Confession? Do we spend hours on our hobbies and minutes in prayer?

If you feel like you are falling short in improving your prayer life, I suggest starting with the fifth point on that list. Pick up a rosary and earnestly tell Mary that you need her help. Tell her you need the courage to go to Confession. Tell her you need help to be more engaged at Mass. Tell her you need help praying on a more regular schedule. Tell her you need more faith and conviction that prayer actually means something. Praying the rosary will make all the other items on that list easier to accomplish.

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You crown Mary through the rosary when you earnestly say, “I need your help!” Speaking as a parent, I feel honored when my kids need my help no matter how trivial the matter. I’m lucky that my kids are young because it will feel odd when the day comes when they no longer need my help. Mary isn’t satisfied with the title of a queen but with nothing to do. She wants us to come to her with all our worries and problems so she can help us.

And let’s face it, we all need Mary’s help because having a perfect relationship with Jesus is nearly impossible because of the active attempts by Satan to derail us and our own weakness towards sin. But God knows this challenge and doesn’t leave us in a hopeless situation. He gave us a Heavenly Queen in Mary and the means for her to help us through the rosary. Honor Jesus by honoring Mary by asking for her help through rosary prayer.

Modernity and the Secularization of Reason

Honor Mary for What She Does, Not Just Who She Is

We just finished Mary’s month of May. I hope it was a spiritually fruitful month for you. I want to talk about the Catholic devotion to Mary and how that connects to rosary prayer. This would have been a better article to publish at the start of May rather than in June so I apologize for the untimeliness.

Mary, Queen of Heaven (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The Catholic Exchange did a great job of distinguishing the devotion we give to God (latria), what we give to the saints (dulia), and what we give to Mary (hyperdulia).

Latria basically means adoration. Traditionally, it refers to the worship and homage that we give to God and God alone.

Now, Catholics believe that we should not only honor those who excel in the things of this world, but that we should also honor those who excel in the things of the spiritual world (for example, in their devotion to God, their obedience to his will, and their charity to others). That’s why we honor the saints — men and women who, during their earthly life, excelled in their pursuit of holiness. Honoring the saints does not detract from God any more than honoring athletes does. In fact, when we honor saints, we are honoring God, too, for it is by his gifts, and for his glory, that saints are able to excel in holiness in the first place.

And in recognition of Mary’s pre-eminent holiness, the special recognition we give to Mary is called hyperdulia: the greatest amount of honor we can give to any created person.

When we pray the Fifth Glorious Mystery of the Rosary, Mary Crowned Queen of Heaven, we acknowledge her deserving hyperdulia devotion. She was not only exalted in her earthly life by being chosen as the Mother of God, but further exalted in Heaven by being crowned queen. And this is only fitting given that her son is King of Heaven.

We shouldn’t get lost on the honor bestowed on Mary by both God and humanity. We may think that God singling someone out, like he did Mary, would be like winning an award. Some of us may picture it like receiving a certificate you can frame and hang on the wall to show off to your friends that you have God’s seal of approval. But honoring Mary because God honors her misses an important fact. We don’t honor Mary solely because something passively happened to her but we also honor her active response to God’s plan.

English: Diploma — If only we could have something so concrete to know if we’re in God’s Grace. Oh wait, there is! It’s called CONFESSION.

God singling out Mary for that very special role came at a price. But because of her faith, it was a price Mary was more than willing to pay. It’s not like Mary could lead a normal life after the Annunciation. She led a life of perfect obedience to God’s plan even if that meant not understanding her son’s ways and eventually watching him die on the cross.

Mary lived a life of perpetual virtue which couldn’t have been easy. While she was immaculately conceived and free from original sin, she was not divine like Jesus. So living a life of perfect obedience and virtue had to have been challenging for Mary who possessed but overcame all the weaknesses inherent in being human.

When we pray the Fifth Glorious Mystery, we should ask our Queen Mother for the strength to imitate her and live in obedience to God’s will. When we give her hyperdulia devotion we should stand in awe of what she was able to do with her life and what we can do with her help and an active effort from us. Praise Mary, not just because of her status in Heaven, but also because of the effort she put forth in her earthly life as a model of what God asks of all us.

What the Gospel and Rosary Teach Us About Good Works

This upcoming Sunday’s Gospel is from Matthew. I’m only including the part I’m going to reflect on in this article.

When he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees
coming to his baptism, he said to them, “You brood of vipers!
Who warned you to flee from the coming wrath?
Produce good fruit as evidence of your repentance.
And do not presume to say to yourselves,
‘We have Abraham as our father.’
For I tell you,
God can raise up children to Abraham from these stones.
Even now the ax lies at the root of the trees.
Therefore every tree that does not bear good fruit
will be cut down and thrown into the fire.
I am baptizing you with water, for repentance,
but the one who is coming after me is mightier than I.
I am not worthy to carry his sandals.
He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire.
His winnowing fan is in his hand.
He will clear his threshing floor
and gather his wheat into his barn,
but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire.”

In this Gospel passage, John the Baptist makes a distinction between piety and good works. The Pharisees and Sadducees considered themselves good people because they followed the Mosaic law to the letter. But John implies in his comparison to a tree not bearing good fruit that just following rules or having a certain status does not lead to salvation. One must follow up with good works, charity, and compassion.

Saint John the Baptist and the Pharisees (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Good works, charity, and compassion were the cornerstone of Jesus’ ministry. He came into this world, not as someone of status and authority, but as a servant who ministered to those people society had excluded. Jesus repeatedly taught that what matters most to God is what someone does, not what their title is. Whether it was teaching the golden rule or telling the parable of the poor woman who gave all she had to charity, Jesus’ ministry centered around instilling the value of good works and sacrifice. Inversely, those who only followed rules and sought status and honor He routinely called hypocrites.

This past Thursday’s Gospel from Matthew echoes a very similar message:

“Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’
will enter the Kingdom of heaven,
but only the one who does the will of my Father in heaven.”

Notice how Jesus is saying that just accepting Him as the Savior is not enough. You have to follow up with action what you proclaim in your words. To put it in more modern terms (but now maybe ridiculously outdated), you have to walk the walk, not just talk the talk.

When you hear and read this Gospel, meditate on the Second Joyful Mystery of the rosary, The Visitation. Think about Mary in this mystery, someone who recently learned that she was to be the mother to the Massiah. What does she do? Does she flaunt the fact that an angel visited her? Does she go about looking for an elevated stature in the community? No. Instead, she travels to visit her cousin Elizabeth and helps her through her pregnancy although she herself was pregnant. Mary’s initial action after the Annunciation was one of charity.

Also, consider the Fourth Glorious Mystery of the rosary when you reflect on this Sunday’s Gospel. Mary was assumed into Heaven and now acts as our intermediary to her son, Jesus Christ. Even when bestowed the title Queen of Heaven (Fifth Glorious Mystery), she has never stopped actively guiding us through the minefield of life. She protects us from evil, helps those who ask for her assistance, and has continually appeared to many delivering a message similar to John the Baptist in the Gospel — Jesus loves you and wants you close to him, but you must make the effort to love Him through good works, charity, and compassion.

Speak Up! — What Rosary Prayer Teaches Us About Stating Intentions

Do you remember one of the early scenes in Million Dollar Baby where Client Eastwood’s character kneels in prayer next to his bed? He says something to the extent, “Lord, you know what I want, there’s no use in me repeating myself.” Boy, how often can I relate to that sentiment! I sometimes think to myself that God knows everything and definitely knows my intentions and my needs better than myself so why go through the exercise of formulating them in prayer? The Gospel reading from 10/6/16 addresses this dilemma.

Last Thursday’s Gospel reading included this popular verse from Luke:

“And I tell you, ask and you will receive; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks, receives; and the one who seeks, finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened.”

The Regnum Christi website’s meditation on this Gospel reading talks about how we fall into the sin of pride when we don’t explicitly ask God for help through prayer. From their website:

When I Don’t Ask for What I Need, I Treat God as My Servant: When we expect God to give us all we need without asking, are we not placing the whole burden of our salvation on him and nothing on ourselves? Are we not in a sense being lazy? “You know what I need, Lord. Just give it to me, take care of it, while I focus on my own interests.” Not only is this laziness, it is pride, treating God like a servant whose role is to provide whatever I need. We forget he is God. Certainly God is generous and loving, willing to give us everything that is good for us; but he is still God, and he deserves our respect, adoration, and especially our gratitude.

The rosary connection to this Gospel reading is the Fifth Glorious Mystery — Mary’s Coronation as Queen of Heaven. Traditionally, the mother of a king held tremendous prestige because while a king may have multiple wives, he only has one mother. The king’s mother was referred to as the gebira. It makes sense then that Christ, being King of Heaven, would coronate his mother Mary as Queen of Heaven.

The chief responsibility of the gebira was to act as a mediator and speak on behalf of the king. When we pray the rosary, we acknowledge Mary as our mediator of our needs and intentions to her son, Jesus Christ. But she can better mediate on our behalf when we consciously and humbly come to her and ask for her help in prayer.

Crowned Madonna, Rokitno, Poland, 1671 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Think of Mary like a doctor and you are the patient. Mary is here to help you and she will do whatever she can to cure the illness of sin and bring you into God’s grace. However, she will be better able to help you if you are forthright and honest with her by humbly stating your needs in prayer. The better the patient you are, the more effective Mary can be in her role as your Queen of Heaven. When you can formulate your intentions in prayer then you will be able to understand how God responds to your request.

If you know what ails you spiritually, speak up! Because if can’t form the request in your head, how will you recognize the heavenly response?

How Rosary Prayer Teaches the Glory of Humility

I’m a lector at my parish. One of the perks of serving as a lector is that my parish provides me with a workbook for the readings that contain explanations and commentary. Reading this book during the week helps me obtain a deeper understanding of the readings at Sunday Mass. I want to start providing you insight into the Sunday Gospels and how they relate to the rosary. This way, when you pray the rosary, you can integrate the Sunday readings into your meditation as well. Think of this as doing your Sunday Mass homework.

The Gospel for Sunday, August 28, 2016, is:

On a sabbath Jesus went to dine
at the home of one of the leading Pharisees,
and the people there were observing him carefully.
He told a parable to those who had been invited,
noticing how they were choosing the places of honor at the table.
“When you are invited by someone to a wedding banquet,
do not recline at table in the place of honor.
A more distinguished guest than you may have been invited by him,
and the host who invited both of you may approach you and say,
‘Give your place to this man,’
and then you would proceed with embarrassment
to take the lowest place.
Rather, when you are invited,
go and take the lowest place
so that when the host comes to you he may say,
‘My friend, move up to a higher position.’
Then you will enjoy the esteem of your companions at the table.
For every one who exalts himself will be humbled,
but the one who humbles himself will be exalted.”
Then he said to the host who invited him,
“When you hold a lunch or a dinner,
do not invite your friends or your brothers
or your relatives or your wealthy neighbors,
in case they may invite you back and you have repayment.
Rather, when you hold a banquet,
invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind;
blessed indeed will you be because of their inability to repay you.
For you will be repaid at the resurrection of the righteous.”

When I initially read this Gospel passage, I felt like I was reading the biblical equivalent of an Amy Vanderbilt etiquette book on how to politely find your place at a banquet table. The reading confused me because it seemed like Jesus was giving his disciples a social hack for getting to a place of honor in a disingenuous way. Is it not false humility to sit at a lowly spot of the table expecting the host to come and fetch you and put you where you think you deserve to be? I can almost picture that fake humble person sitting next to the stereotypical “chatty lady,” not even listening to her but scanning the room making sure the host sees him so he can “rescue” him from the dregs.

The confusion lifted when I realized that Jesus asks us to behave as the guest and the host! Jesus talks about the host not looking for reciprocity or acknowledgment for his efforts. But that is also the same requirement for the guest who takes the lowest spot at the table. He should not be looking for the host to save him from his situation but rather, accept and enjoy his situation regardless of the outcome. After all, the guest should be thankful and grateful that he was invited to the feast at all. We too should be grateful for all the blessings God bestows on us even when it seems like others have it better.

The people who are truly humble and accepting of their situation are ultimately the happiest. They are not always looking for something better but find contentment with what they have. That is because they do not come with any preconceived notions of their importance but they just do what needs to be done. They do not worry about who notices them or if they will receive a certain level of reward. In a sense, the humble person is free from the burden of self-imposed expectations or entitlement. When you do not feel entitled to that place of honor, being elevated to it makes it that much more glorious.

Just about every mystery of the rosary teaches some aspect of humility and the glory that comes out of it. The rosary itself is bookended by these two traits by the First Joyful Mystery and the Fifth Glorious Mystery. In the Annunciation, Mary humbly accepts God‘s plan for her. She does not turn God down or try to reshape His request into something she would prefer. God is essentially upending Mary’s life but her humble reply is, “Here am I, the servant of the Lord; let it be with me according to your word.”

When we walk and talk with Jesus through the rosary, we finish with Mary being crowned Queen of Heaven. Like the person sitting at the lowest spot of the banquet table only to be seated at the place of honor so was Mary glorified after her lifetime of humbly accepting God’s plan for her and the pain and sorrow that it entailed. She is our model for our ultimate elevation to a place of honor in Heaven when we live in earnest, humble service of God’s plan for us.

When you pray the First Joyful and Fifth Glorious mysteries of the rosary, pray and ask yourself:

Am I living a sincerely humble life or showing a fake sense of humility as a means to more selfish ends?
Am I content and satisfied with all God has given me or am I expecting something better?
Am I looking to Mary as an example of humility?
Am I showing humility by putting my trust in God’s plan or am I trying to avoid or amend it?

10 Reasons to Pray the Rosary

This image was selected as a picture of the we... — This image was selected as a picture of the week on the Czech Wikipedia for th week, 2007. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

As any regular reader of RosaryMeds can see, I like motivating people to pray the rosary. All too often I go to other rosary websites that just list rosary commentary and meditations. Don’t get me wrong, rosary meditation ideas are very important as I have written two books on them. But we also need to find motivation and the will to pray the rosary. Otherwise, the rosary will just collect dust like that exercise equipment everyone tends to have in the back of their closets.

I came across this article about ten reasons to pray the rosary. For the tl;dr crowd (too long; didn’t read), they are:

Mary asked us to pray the rosary at Fatima
Mary’s title is Our Lady of the Rosary
Pope St. John Paul II asked us to pray the rosary
The rosary is a powerful prayer for family unity
The rosary is a powerful prayer for world peace
The rosary protects youth from the deluge of filth propagated by modern media
The rosary orders our lives that have been disordered by sin
The rosary gives us peace of mind and soul
The rosary is a walk through the Gospel
The rosary gives us strength to conquer seemingly impossible challenges

Now I’m going to talk to all of you who already pray the rosary regularly. Look at those ten reasons to pray the rosary. The rosary isn’t something we should keep to ourselves. I’m sure all of us know someone who needs the receive the benefits of rosary prayer. When you pray the Fifth Glorious Mystery of the rosary ask Mary, Queen of the Rosary, to motivate that specific person in your life to pick up and pray the rosary. Even if you think the person you have in mind will never turn to the rosary, it never hurts to ask. What do you have to lose?

How the Rosary Helps Control Anger

I read this article on the Catholic News Agency about just how toxic anger can be in a marriage. It starts:

Of the countless Catholic couples who have come through Father T.G. Morrow’s office in Washington D.C. for marriage counseling, two remain imprinted in the priest’s mind even today.

In many ways, these two Catholic couples were the ideal; they were open to life, they formed their children in the faith and they frequented the sacraments.

But both of these marriages fell apart. The culprit? Anger.

“Anger is a poison,” Fr. Morrow, a moral theologian and author of “Overcoming Sinful Anger” (Sophia Press, 2014) told CNA. “If a husband and a wife are angry with each other a lot, it destroys the relationship. It makes it so painful that people want to get out of that relationship.”

I’m going to broaden the conversation to not only talk about anger, but general self-imposed unhappiness. I think a lot of anger stems from losing sight of what’s really important. When we put a little perspective on our lives it’s almost humorous in hindsight what we get so upset about. We get all tied up in knots over traffic, a late flight, a sink of dirty dishes, a slow loading web page, no cell signal, etc. And why? How is stewing over all these little annoyances going to make life any better? How is lashing out at someone over a pet peeve going to foster the good in that relationship?

Angry Talk (Comic Style) (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

As I wrote in the introduction to The Rosary for the Rest of Us, one of the main benefits of praying the rosary is that it offers me the proper perspective on life. The rosary reminds me that our world isn’t perfect, but that’s okay because this world is only temporary. We are meant to spend eternity in the joy of God’s heavenly kingdom. Rosary prayer is all about focusing on that glorious kingdom to come, not dwelling on the imperfect worldly kingdom that is.

I picture our Mother Mary in Heaven shaking her head in disbelief when she sees what we get so upset about. She must think what I think when one of my kids melts down over nothing. The other day my three-year old son had a fit because I dared serve him a waffle cut in half instead of whole. My explanation that the waffle would taste the same didn’t comfort him. All I could think was, “Really? All this unhappiness over a cut up waffle?” I think Mary must be sitting in Heaven also asking herself, “Really?” Because from her perspective, we must come across like little three-year olds — bringing so much unhappiness on ourselves over ultimately trivial problems. Even the “big” problems in life such as finances and health are as significant in the heavenly perspective as a waffle cut in half.

Let’s look at the Fifth Glorious Mystery of the rosary. When we meditate on Mary crowned Queen of Heaven, let’s ask for her intercession, especially when it comes to controlling anger and gaining a more heavenly perspective. She wants nothing more than for us to live for her son, Jesus Christ. And when we humbly ask for her help, she will gladly offer it. But the key is that we have to understand what holds us back from truly living for Heaven. We must realize that when we’re angry about the trivial aspects of this world, we really don’t have a heavenly perspective because we are worrying too much about the here and now.

I’m not saying that keeping a heavenly perspective is easy. If it was then there really wouldn’t be much need to regularly pray the rosary. But because living for God’s kingdom is difficult, we have the rosary, our gift from Mary Queen of Heaven, to help manage our anger and keep us focused on what’s really important.

I’ll leave you with this last piece of advice from the Catholic News Agency article. If the Golden Rule is about treating others as you want to be treated, then I believe this should be the Silver Rule:

“People get angry about little, trifling things,” Father T.G. Morrow said. “You have to say “Is this worth getting angry about?” If not, then you have to let it go. Just forget it.”

Want more help controlling anger and living happier? My free e-book of rosary intentions can help.

Building Your Spiritual Emergency Fund One Prayer at a Time

2015 has started out rough for me. I have a car that is failing its smog check (okay, that’s trivial but still annoying). Our old water heater broke and flooded the walls, insulation, and floors of the surrounding rooms. I am going through my annual January cold (seriously, I think the cold virus is pro-choice because it hits me every year around the Walk for Life). And my parent company announced that they are shutting down my office as part of a downsizing effort. That’s just my immediate family’s issues on top of the usual difficulties of raising children. I then have to pile on the challenges various members of my extended family face as well. And yet, while I would have every reason to freak out, I’m strangely at calm with my situation right now. Why?

I think a lot of my calm and acceptance of my situation comes from me praying the rosary regularly. I’m not saying this to brag or to somehow come across as being holier than others. I’m saying this as a testament to the power of prayer. You really have to think of routine prayer as building a spiritual “rainy day” fund. Financial experts are always saying that you should save money in an emergency fund for unexpected expenses. So prayer is the emergency fund for your soul.

View image | gettyimages.com

I know many of us turn to prayer mostly when times get tough. But that is like only starting to save money after the car broke down or the floors are already flooded. Not having reserves makes a difficult situation even harder. So if you don’t have those spiritual reserves to dip in to, turning to prayer for the first time in an emergency almost adds to the burden instead of relieves it.

First there’s the logistical hurdles. Prayer is frustrating when you haven’t practiced it because it will be hard to get into that state of mind where you are calm and relaxed enough to have a truly open heart to the Holy Spirit. You’ll be fumbling over words and thoughts instead of getting into the zone and being receptive to how God is leading you. Second, spirituality accumulates like water in a well — the more you pray the deeper that well becomes. Sometimes you really just need that large gulp of grace to get you through a difficult situation. But if you haven’t prayed regularly, you are dipping into a shallow spiritual well that won’t give you the grace you need.

It’s never too late to start building your spiritual emergency fund. All it takes is five free minutes and a rosary (or your fingers if you don’t have a rosary). It starts with a single Our Father or Hail Mary or just a free form meditation. In finance, there is the idea of compounding interest and exponential returns. You can start with a very small amount of money and over time it can grow to a large amount through compounding. The same goes with prayer. Building your spiritual emergency fund can start with a small amount of prayer but if you regularly invest some time here and there, those small prayer moments start to add up to one large pool of grace.

This leads me to the Fifth Glorious Mystery of the rosary, Mary’s Coronation as Queen of Heaven. She’s the one that compounds our prayers into something more substantial. There is a reason why Mary is known as the Mediatrix of Grace. She’s takes our prayers and intentions and places them before her son, Jesus Christ, after she’s cleaned them up and clarified them. Remember, Mary has a particularly interesting role as being both human like us and going through the human experience but also being singled out as a purified vessel for the Son of God. So it makes sense that she has the unique role in Heaven of hearing our intentions and, in a way, translating them and amplifying them to God. Like a good mother, she understands all our little faults of being human. It doesn’t matter how ineloquent or small your request is, Mary Queen of Heaven will act as your intermediary, your advocate, and your broker in Heaven.

Crowning of the Virgin by Rubens, early 17th c... — Crowning of the Virgin by Rubens, early 17th century (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Again, no matter how small your spiritual emergency fund may be, start building it up with a prayer here and a prayer there. When you pray the rosary, don’t think of it as a daunting task of 53 Hail Marys, 6 Our Fathers, and a several other prayers. Just focus on one prayer at a time for however much time you have. Mary and the Holy Spirit will take it from there. And over time, you will have that deep well of faith to dip into when times get tough or to give to others who need it in their time of need.

Pope Benedict’s Retirement — A Transition, not An End

Like many people, Pope Benedict‘s announcement of his retirement came as quite a shock to me. I once attended Mass at St. Peter’s Basilica and saw the pope from about ten feet away as he walked past me in a procession. And although I only caught a glimpse of him, I did feel this sense of God‘s glory radiating from him. It’s hard to explain, but I understood in that instant how carefully God chooses His shepherds to lead His people. And as shocking as this news is to me, I also understand that it’s also God at work when one of his shepherds knows he has run his course. We must keep Pope Benedict in our prayers as well as the Catholic Church because this unprecedented event is going to get a lot of attention, especially from sources that may not like or understand the Catholic faith.

We need to be careful where we receive our information regarding Pope Benedict’s retirement. When it comes to understanding the core principles and foundation of the Catholic faith, the mainstream media has a lot to learn. They deal mostly in the realm of politics and so they will treat the pope’s announcement like they would a politician resigning. And usually, a politician resigns only when he has something to hide or is trying to dodge responsibility for his actions. And so the media will be looking for any shred of circumstantial evidence to fit their narrative whether it be the priest abuse scandal, gay marriage, contraception, or any Catholic document that they can sensationalize and turn into a story to fill their 24/7 news cycle. We live in a world where people in powerful positions tend to cling to that power to the bitter end (a few people in Washington D.C. come to mind). The media will never understand why someone in such a powerful position would choose to voluntarily step down.

I believe the truth is much less sensational and extremely humbling. I won’t claim to be an expert on Pope Benedict, but I have read some of his writings and what people have written about him. He does seem to be a very humble servant of the Catholic faith and will do whatever is necessary to promote God’s glory through the Church. And if that means stepping aside to let someone who is more capable of leading the Church in this modern era so be it. It takes a lot of humility for him to conclude that he is not the pope the Church needs right now. I like Pope Benedict and wish he would stay since he is one of the great modern thinkers and defenders of traditional values. But as a Catholic I yield to the pope’s authority even when he decides to relinquish that authority.

I think we need to pray for the conclave of cardinals that will choose the next pope. As we live in a world that becomes more secular, events like the choosing of a new pope become that much more peculiar, misunderstood, and portrayed as being out of step with society. Non Catholics (and misinformed Catholics) will see the election of a new pope like the election of a political leader. They see a new pope as someone who can simply eliminate what they view as mistakes of a previous “administration.” You will hear the usual uninformed questions like, “Will the next pope be softer on contraception and divorce? Will he allow women ordination? Will he allow married priests?” Basically, we will hear the wish list of the secular world as they cover the choosing of the next pope.

This will be a difficult time for Catholics. The world is a lot more hostile towards organized religion, particularly Catholicism (and we haven’t done ourselves any favours recently with all the priest abuse cover ups). It has even changed drastically in the last eight years since Pope Benedict was chosen as pope since the world has become that much more connected but also more polarized. We should pray and meditate on the Fifth Glorious Mystery of the rosary — The Coronation of Mary. We ask the Queen of Heaven for guidance, resolve, and the wisdom to see the glory of God’s Church through the distractions and obfuscations of the modern world. God raised Mary up as a queen because she listened to God and obeyed His will. We pray for the acceptance of Pope Benedict’s decision and the hope that it will bring about a greater good. God gave us Pope Benedict and it’s not like He’s taking him away from us. God is merely leading him to a new role where he will do the most good by giving him more time to think, write, and most importantly, pray. And so we also pray that we show that same openness to God’s will and the humility to follow the road God puts before us as our mother Mary and Pope Benedict did.

BREAKING: Pope Benedict to Resign (whnt.com)
In hindsight, Pope Benedict’s resignation seems almost predictable (catholicnews.com)

Rosary Meditation: The Fifth Glorious Mystery

Today’s rosary meditation is the Fifth Glorious Mystery — The Coronation of Mary. In this decade we see Mary awarded the honor of Queen of Heaven for having wholeheartedly accept God’s call. This is Her rightful place for having faith is God’s plan in The Annunciation, spreading the joy of God in The Visitation, giving birth to Jesus, and ultimately accepting the sorrow of His crucifixion and death. Mary is now in Heaven and amplifies and purifies our prayers and presents them to Her son, Jesus Christ. Mary’s coronation gives Her many titles — Queen of Peace, Queen of Angels, Queen of Saints, and Queen of the Rosary.

Coronación de la Virgen, óleo sobre lienzo. 17... — Image via Wikipedia

Today’s rosary meditation is the Fifth Glorious Mystery — The Coronation of Mary. In this decade we see Mary awarded the honor of Queen of Heaven for having wholeheartedly accepted God‘s call. This is Her rightful place for having faith in God’s plan in The Annunciation, spreading God’s joy in The Visitation, giving birth to Jesus, King of the World, and ultimately accepting the sorrow of His crucifixion and death. Mary is now in Heaven and amplifies and purifies our prayers and presents our needs to Her son, Jesus Christ. Mary’s coronation gives Her many titles such as the Queen of Peace, Queen of Angels, Queen of Saints, and Queen of the Rosary.

Mary is the Queen of Peace. Like many people, when I think of peace I think of a world without war and conflict. And while that is a lofty goal and something worth praying for, Mary and the saints want us to dig deeper. We cannot have peace in this world with each other unless we have an inner peace with God. She wants us to work towards this internal peace by reconciling our ways with God’s ways. She calls us to align ourselves with the teachings of Jesus Christ as handed to us through the Church. This means putting aside worldly desires of money, power, fame, popularity, and anything else that might distract us from doing God’s will. Mary knows that we cannot have real peace as long as there is conflict in our hearts between our love for Jesus and our love for earthly desires.

Mary is the Queen of Angels. We must remember the angels in our prayers, particularly our guardian angels who protect us. While we may not be aware of it, angels fight against the forces of evil every day to protect our souls from Satan and his minions. Mary understands the precious gift of being in God’s grace and desires all of us to be in communion with Jesus Christ. She directs the angels to fight for us because She does not want anyone to lose the gift of grace, especially for the momentary and trivial pleasures of this world.

Mary is certainly the Queen of the Rosary. The rosary is our way of communicating with God. We pray it remembering all the sorrows, joys, and glories of Jesus Christ. When we pray the Joyful Mysteries we pray for the strength to accept God’s plans for us as Mary did. When we pray the Sorrowful Mysteries we pray for the strength to remain faithful in the face of great suffering. In the Luminous Mysteries we pray for the strength to live according to Jesus’ teachings. And in the Glorious Mysteries we pray for the strength to live for our eventual resurrection and judgment. Mary gives us a great gift in the rosary because we can use it to reflect on all dimensions of our faith. It reminds us to thank God for all He gives us, ask for forgiveness of our sins and shortcomings, and ask Him for strength to live according to His Truth.

Let us pray that we take full advantage of the rosary to reflect and meditate on our faith. May we look to Mary to guide us and help bring us closer to Her son, Jesus Christ.

Peaceful Places (lifescript.com)
Pray Rosary for the Unborn Starting Today! (catholicsview.wordpress.com)
ONE MILLION ROSARIES FOR UNBORN BABIES prayer event begins today May 7th. (deaconforlife.blogspot.com)
Holy Mary Images (catholicsview.wordpress.com)
“Queen of Heaven, rejoice, alleluia…” (beliefnet.com)

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