The simplicity and profundity of the Rosary
Now, I would like, along with you, my brothers and sisters, to examine the simultaneous simplicity and profundity of this prayer, to which the Most Holy Mother invites us, urges us, and encourages us. In reciting the Rosary, we penetrate the Mysteries of the life of Jesus, which are at the same time the Mysteries of his Mother.
This can be seen clearly in the Joyful Mysteries, beginning with Annunciation, through the Visitation and the birth on that night in Bethlehem, and later in the presentation of the Lord, until he is found in the temple, when he was already twelve years old.
Although it my seem that the Sorrowful Mysteries do not directly show us the Mother of Jesus - with the exception of the last two: the Via Crucis and the Crucifixion - how could we even imagine that the Mother was spiritually absent when her Son was suffering so terribly in the Gethsemane, during his scourging and crowning with thorns?
And the Glorious Mysteries are in fact Mysteries of Christ, in which we find the spiritual presence of Mary - and first of all is the Mystery of the Resurrection. The Holy Scripture does not mention the presence of Mary when it describes the Ascension - but must she not be present, if immediately afterward we read the she was in the Upper Room with the Apostles themselves, who had just said farewell to Christ as he rose to Heaven? Together with them, Mary prepared for the coming of the Holy Spirit and shared in the Pentecost of his descent. The last two Glorious Mysteries direct our thoughts toward the Mother of God, when we contemplate her Assumption and coronation in celestial glory.
The Rosary is a prayer about Mary united with Christ in his mission as the Savior. At the same time it is a prayer to Mary - our best mediator with her Son. It is, finally, a prayer that in a special way we say with Mary, just as the Apostles at the Last Supper prayed with her, preparing to receive the Holy Spirit.
October 28, 1981