Summary
Pope St. John Paul II urged the Church to “rediscover the Rosary in light of Scripture”—to pray it not merely with our lips but with our hearts. In this talk, Mark Hartfiel unveils the Rosary as a prayer that draws us into the life of Christ through the eyes of Mary, helping us encounter God’s Word more deeply.
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Reflective Study Guide Questions
“With the Rosary, the Christian people sits at the school of Mary and is led to contemplate the beauty on the face of Christ and to experience the depths of his love. Through the Rosary the faithful receive abundant grace, as though from the very hands of the Mother of the Redeemer.”
Pope St. John Paul II
1. How do you feel about the Rosary? Do you pray it? If not, why? If so, do you pray it in a way that allows for true contemplation of Christ, following the example of Our Lady?
2. What is your relationship to Mary like? How might you grow closer to her and what can you learn from her this Advent?
3. Consider the Israelite’s longing for the Messiah. What can you learn from their waiting as you wait for the second coming of Christ? What expectations are you holding onto in your relationship with God? How can you begin to surrender those to make way for God’s perfect plan?
4. What does the joy and hope brought by Incarnation mean for your life right now? How can spending time meditating on the Joyful Mysteries of the Rosary help teach you these lessons?
Text: Rediscover the Treasure of the Rosary in Light of Scripture
Hi, I’m Mark Hartfiel, Vice President of Paradisus Dei. I’m blessed to be the current developer of the That Man Is You! men’s program and the creator of “The Mysteries of the Rosary” video series. I’m excited to journey with you in a very unique way this Advent. We’re going to contemplate the five joyful mysteries of the Rosary, because the joyful mysteries are perfectly suited for Advent.
Opening Prayer
Let’s begin in prayer. In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, amen. Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be Thy name. Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done on the earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us. Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil, amen. In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, amen.
An Appeal From Saint John Paul II
If you read Saint John Paul II’s apostolic letter on the Rosary, in the very last paragraph, he urges us to rediscover the Rosary in light of Scripture. He says, “May this appeal of mine not go unheard.” And when I read that statement for the first time, I felt a personal calling. And so this is what we have set out to do, to rediscover this treasure, to rediscover the Rosary in light of Scripture. John Paul II set before the Church a new vision. He said, “To contemplate the face of Christ, and to contemplate it with Mary, is the program which I have set before the Church at the dawn of the third millennium.”
To contemplate the face of Christ with Mary, my friends, is the Rosary. When we turn to Our Lady and pray the Rosary, the goal is that her contemplation would become our contemplation. That Our Lady was the first Christian contemplative and we find her throughout Scripture pondering these things in her heart. And so, when we pray the Rosary, the soul sits at the School of Mary, and Our Lady teaches us the art of prayer at the School of Nazareth. Pope Paul VI said, “How I would love to return to my childhood and attend the simple yet profound school that is Nazareth.” John Paul II goes as far as saying, “Mary’s life was a rosary.” Well, what does that mean? It means that her life itself was a contemplation of Christ, and J.P. II called the Rosary his favorite prayer. He says it’s the beginning of the contemplative life. And so I’ve taken the liberty to add to J.P. II’s statement that if Mary’s life was a rosary, then Saint Joseph’s life was also a rosary, a contemplation of Christ with Mary.
For 30 years right there in Nazareth, in his home, Joseph saw the face of God in his child. He could wake up literally every morning and say, “Good morning, God.” And so, yes, Mary’s life was a rosary and Joseph’s life was a rosary. May your life and may my life become a rosary, a contemplation of Christ. And it’s in our contemplation of Christ, especially through the Scriptures, the divine Word of God, that we begin to grow in divine intimacy with our Lord.
A Christocentric Prayer
And so now, naturally, the Rosary is very Marian in nature, but John Paul II said the Rosary at its heart is a Christocentric prayer, because it has the depths of the Gospel message in its entirety. And this word, you know, “Christocentric”, it’s a nice, big theological term, but it’s very simple. It just means that Christ Himself, Christ is at the center. That Jesus is at the center of every single Hail Mary. Jesus is at the center of the home in Nazareth. And when John Paul II says we must rediscover the Rosary in light of Scripture, it means that we must rediscover Jesus and place Jesus at the center. The center of our lives, the center of our prayer, the center of our contemplation, the center of our conversations.
This is why Sister Lucia of Fatima can say, “There is no problem, no matter how difficult it is, whether physical or above all spiritual, in the personal lives of each one of us, of our families, that cannot be solved by the Rosary.” Why is this true? Because Jesus is at the center. And so, before we jump into the first joyful mystery, in order to fully appreciate the joy of the Annunciation, we’re going to try to enter into the longing and the waiting of Israel. That some of the hardest moments in our lives come from the disappointment of expectations being unfulfilled. And we’ve all experienced this before, right? We get excited about this or that, and then, when it doesn’t work out, we’re devastated, right? And this happens so often, we tend to, without even knowing, lower our expectations and excitement about things just so we don’t get disappointed or brokenhearted again and again. We kind of guard our hearts when it comes to expectations.
Well, Israel had the greatest expectation of all time. A Messianic expectation. A Savior, a Redeemer, a King to come to deliver them, to set them free from slavery and bondage and captivity. And this expectation, this holy expectation, was set by God Himself, and so they continued to wait. We read from David in the Psalms, “My soul waits for the Lord more than watchmen for the morning.” He says, “Oh God, Thou art my God. I seek Thee, my soul thirsts for Thee. My flesh faints for Thee, as in a dry and weary land where there is no water.” We have to enter into this longing of Israel in order to try to understand, right? David says his flesh faints for God. It’s like a child waiting for Christmas morning, but it never comes. Not in your lifetime, not in your children’s lifetime. For generations upon generations. From Abraham to David, we have 14 generations. From David to the Babylonian exile, another 14 generations. And from the Babylonian exile all the way to the time of Jesus, another 14 generations. That’s 42 generations of waiting on the promises of God, waiting on the Messiah to come and to deliver them.
A Vigilant Waiting
You know, in our lives, we pray and we want an answer, like, right now. The chosen people of God had to endure a type of holy patience. You see, God’s ways are not our ways, His time is not our time. Advent is the liturgical season of waiting. Waiting upon the coming of Christ. The baby, lying in the manger, wrapped in swaddling clothing in Bethlehem. But Advent is more than just a liturgical season leading to Christmas. It’s not only about the commemorating of the most sacred historical event, the Incarnation, which occurred 2,000 years ago.
Our lives themselves are also a type of Advent, a vigilant waiting for the final coming of Christ. A longing for eternal glory, eternal union with God, a resurrected body reunited with our souls, where the entire body of Christ is perfectly united in Christ. For ancient Israel, God promised He would establish this throne of His kingdom forever, the Davidic Kingdom, and finally, this baby is born. Could Jesus be the One? Could Jesus be the Messiah? They long to see the face of God. Could the long wait finally be over? You see, my friends, our God is a God who always keeps His promises.
Nonetheless, we have to learn to set our expectations aside, to lay them down at His feet, to be prepared to be surprised. No one could have expected what took place. A young virgin, a carpenter, a star, Bethlehem, Egypt, Nazareth. God had been preparing His people not just to meet, but to exceed their expectations. They would get to meet the Creator in the flesh, not just to save them from Roman taxation and oppression, no, but to save them from their sins. In all of their longing and their waiting, Israel was far from perfect, yet God’s plans did not get upset by their sin and their infidelity.
No, He comes on occasion of our sins, and so we need to hear this in the midst of our expectations. God is faithful. And Isaiah’s famous prophecy came 700 years before the Incarnation. “Therefore, the Lord Himself will give you a sign. Behold, a young woman, a virgin, shall conceive and bear a son, and shall call His name Emmanuel.” Emmanuel, God with us. Don’t let His name get lost on you, that Christianity is unique. God exceeds our expectations. Every other religion is man seeking after God.
In Christianity, our God comes down to us. He comes seeking after us, to seek and to save the lost, to restore the 12 tribes of Israel, yes, absolutely, and to bring salvation to the entire world. Jesus comes to save us for heaven, and He comes to bring us a supernatural joy that transcends the tribulations of our world even now. Our Lady was the first to discover this joy. The joy of the world entered into her womb, she gave birth to the joy of the world. When we pray the Rosary, when we enter into these joyful mysteries specifically, we get to sit at the School of Mary and she teaches us the secrets of Christian joy.
Jesus Is The Center of Every Hail Mary
My prayer is that no matter what circumstance you are personally going through right now, any pain, any struggle, any longing, waiting, if your flesh faints for God, that you would be able to seek Him and find Him, that you would discover and rediscover every day the very source of joy, Jesus Christ. The Scripture says, “Those who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength.” Wow. When we wait for the Lord, we renew our strength. “They shall mount up with wings like eagles. They shall run and not be weary. They shall walk and not faint.” Wait upon the Lord. Our God is faithful.
We’re going to journey through Advent byway of the joyful mysteries of the Rosary, why? Because Jesus is the center of every Hail Mary. John Paul II says the name of Jesus is the center of gravity in every Hail Mary, the hinge of the Hail Mary. He’s the reason for the season. He’s the one we long for. The greatest fruit of this journey will be our own personal transformation. You see, you and I live in a time of great crisis. I know that’s an understatement. So many in our world are tormented and suffer with desolation and despair. Maybe we ourselves even experience this at times. And when our interior life becomes kind of completely caught up in its own interests, there’s no longer room in our hearts for others or God’s voice is no longer heard, and the desire to do the good fades and the quiet joy of God’s love is no longer felt. Yet the Gospel that we’re called to rediscover is exploding with joy. “Rejoice!” is the angel’s greeting to Mary. John the Baptist leaps for joy in his mother’s womb. Our Lady proclaims, “My spirit rejoices in God my Savior.” Jesus Himself rejoices in the Holy Spirit. The disciples rejoiced at the sight of the risen Christ.
When we get to the acts of the apostles, wherever the disciples went, there was great joy. Even in times of great persecution, Scripture says they continue to be filled with joy. You see, everyone wants pleasure. More deeply, everyone wants happiness. But most deeply, everyone desires joy. On this journey through Advent, may we rediscover the Rosary, these joyful mysteries in light of Scripture, and become an explosion of joy for others. In our next reflection, we’re going to enter into the first two joyful mysteries, the Annunciation and the Visitation.
Closing Prayer
Let us close in prayer. In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, amen. 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, amen. In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit,
About Mark Hartfiel
Mark Hartfiel is the Vice President of Paradisus Dei and host of the Mysteries of the Rosary video series featured on EWTN, Formed, and Wild Goose TV. Mark is currently the developer of content for the That Man is You! men’s program which is hosted in 1,000 parishes throughout the world.