Reflecting on the Sorrowful Mysteries

During these days of isolation or distancing, prayer has certainly taken the forefront of our needs.  Making prayer come alive is a way to reflect on on these mysteries. 

Praying the rosary can certainly give us time to reflect on Mary, and the journey that took Jesus from infancy to finding him in the temple with the teachers of the Law.  As further reflections open to us in many events from Joy, to Sorrow, to Glory, perhaps we should take time and become companions to Jesus in the Sorrowful Mysteries.  It doesn’t require too much effort to go through each decade and allow the essence of each one to open a kaleidoscope of events we may feel as we pray.   

“The Agony on the garden”  Exclusion from those who have not been supportive!  During this time of pandemic isolation how many times has any one of us felt the exclusion from close acquaintances who under different circumstances would be understanding, but now for their own reasons seem to ignore our basic needs?  “I thought you were my friend, but now I don’t know you.”   Jesus felt the isolation when he asked his disciples;  “Could you not keep watch for one hour?”  (Mk. 14: 37b).  We might say to our friends “could you not see my need for companionship?”  A type of agony we all might endure.

“Scourging at the pillar”  The lashes upon any one, tearing flesh unmercifully!  There will not occur blood dropping to the ground as with Jesus’ torture, but when our very reaching out to those we care about, and those efforts being ignored, the feeling can be as a scourging of emotions and sensitivities  leaving one in a sense of total rejection.  Jesus felt this when he told Peter; “before the cock crows twice you will deny me three times.”  (Mk. 14: 30).  Has anyone denied us even inadvertently?    

“A crown of thorns”  Nothing worse than to be humiliated in front of your friends!  Pain, suffering to its fullest, spit upon; all these Jesus endured.  But, God was made to look lower than any human by humiliating him with a crown of thorns; not just the pain but so much disrespect and the sneering.  (Mt. 27: 27 -31).  Has anyone laughed at you lately?  Have you become the object of ignominy, and humiliated because of your thoughts and efforts?    

“Jesus carries his cross”  What was it Jesus told the crowds?  “Whoever does not carry his own cross and come after me cannot be my disciple.”  (Lk. 14: 27).  Surely we spent the past season of Lent reflecting on the Way of the Cross, but now as we think back on our own trek of rejection, humiliation, disrespect, we find we really do have a cross, or many crosses.  As I have written previously, to be in concert with the Resurrection, we must carry our cross.  And that can only come with much suffering.

"The Crucifixion”  One cannot say enough about the nailing of Jesus to a tree, shedding his precious blood and giving his Spirit up to his Father to redeem each of us.  Our reflection must end on finding ourselves at the feet of Jesus and allow the blood of him who died to become the peace we seek.  

Ralph B. Hathaway, May/June 2020