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We conclude our Patristic Rosary Project today with the:5th Glorious Mystery: The Coronation of Our LadyCan we be certain of our final judgment? Those who say they are run the risk of the sin of presumption. We must proceed always with humbly confident perseverance. Salvation is possible. Our Lord has taken our humanity to the heavenly throne, where it (and we in it) already are glorified. The saints the Church has discerned through our long earthly pilgrimage, demonstrate that virtue and perseverance is possible. They intercede before God’s throne for us. Our greatest example and intercessor is the Blessed...

We continue our Patristic Rosary Project today with the:4th Glorious Mystery: The AssumptionWe do not know if Mary died and was assumed body and soul into heaven or if she was assumed without dying. Either way, it was fitting that the Mother of God, who had never known the stain of sin, while requiring a Redeemer just like every other human being, should not experience the corruption of the grave. Our humanity is seated at the right hand of the Father in the divine Person of our Lord, but now also in the human person of our Lady. Christ is...

We continue our Patristic Rosary Project today with the:3rd Glorious Mystery: Descent of the Holy SpiritPentecost is the birthday of the Church, when the Holy Spirit breathes His own life into the Body and all the members. The descent of the Holy Spirit marks one of the ways in which Christ is faithful to His promise that He would be "with us always" (Matthew 28). The Scriptures describe the coming of the Holy Spirit, ru’ach, as a mighty wind rushing and as fire fifty days after the Lord’s Resurrection on a Jewish festival called the “feast of weeks” (Cf. Exodus...

We continue our Patristic Rosary Project today with the:2nd Glorious Mystery: The AscensionEverything about the life of the Lord is a blessing for us.  After His resurrection the Lord blessed the Apostles with His presence, gloriously risen.  When His earthly work with them was completed, He very explicitly blessed them.  "Then he led them out as far as Bethany, and lifting up his hands he blessed them. While he blessed them, he parted from them, and was carried up into heaven." (Luke 24:50-51).  Even the Lord’s departure from us was a blessing and it occurred in the midst of Christ’s...

We continue our Patristic Rosary Project today with the:1st Glorious Mystery: The ResurrectionThe Lord of life laid down His life. St. John Chrysostom (+407) explained: "When Jesus had cried out with a loud voice, he yielded up the spirit." This refers to what he had earlier said: "I have power to lay down my life, and I have power to take it up again," and "I lay it down of myself." So for this cause He cried with the voice, that it might shown that the act is down by His own power. [The Gospel of Matthew, Homily 88.1]  ...

We continue our Patristic Rosary Project today with the:5th Sorrowful Mystery: The CrucifixionWe come to the place of the Skull, Golgotha, where some traditions held Adam was buried. The New Adam is about to put to right the damage of the old Adam. This time, in defending His Bride from the serpent, the Bridegroom will be entirely faithful, even to the shedding of His Blood.St. Ambrose of Milan (+397) connect’s Christ crucifixion and Adam’s burial: The very place of the Cross is in the middle, as conspicuous to all. It is above the grace of Adam, as the Hebrews truly...

We continue our Patristic Rosary Project today with the:4th Sorrowful Mystery: Carrying the CrossIn the Gospel we read: "And he called to him the multitude with his disciples, and said to them, ‘If any man would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.’" (Mark 8:34) Christ has been interrogated, humiliated, excoriated, beaten, exposed to ridicule and condemned. The Jews called down His Blood upon their heads and choose to call for mercy for a criminal rather than their Messiah. Now the Lord will begin the last foot journey, though part of it...

We continue our Patristic Rosary Project today with the:3rd Sorrowful Mystery: The Crowning with thornsOne of the wonderful things which exploring the Fathers can teach us is how to savor each and every detail of the Scriptures. After many decades of Scriptural deconstruction and over-application of the historical critical method, with its "hermeneutic of suspicion" we can benefit from a refresher on how to approach Scriptures through the example of the Fathers. For the Fathers, the details in the accounts of the Scriptures were laden with significance. Let us listen for a moment to St. Hilary of Poitiers (+367) on...

We continue our Patristic Rosary Project today with the:2nd Sorrowful Mystery: The ScourgingThe Roman flail was a terrible thing, designed to do maximum damage. The Lord endured outrageous humiliation of His Divine Person as well as physical suffering beyond our understanding. Pilate, who made decisions based on polls, queried the Lord about His Kingship. Christ responded: "My kingship is not of this world" (John 18:36). The Bishop of Hippo, St. Augustine (+430) wrote what is probably the best commentary on John ever assembled. Here is an obervation on Christ’s dialogue with Pilate: 2. Hear then, ye Jews and Gentiles; hear,...

We continue our Patristic Rosary Project today with the:1st Sorrowful Mystery: The Agony in the GardenAs the Passover approached, the Lord would enter into His Passion, from Latin patior, "suffer". After the Last Supper, where Christ washed His apostles feet and preached and instituted the Eucharist, thus ordaining them the first bishops of the Catholic Church which He founded, He went out to the Garden the Gethsemane. There He would pray and suffer and experience the bitterness of betrayal.St. Jerome (+420) writes of the garden: Gethsemane is interpreted as the "very fertile valley" where the Lord ordered His disciples...

We continue our Patristic Rosary Project today with the:5th Luminous Mystery: Institution of the EucharistThe Eucharist, its celebration and the Sacred Species, is the greatest of the sacraments. It is the only of the seven which actually is that which it confers. It is like the great jewel of a heavenly centerpiece set about with other gems, each making the others more beautiful by their relationship. Holy Mass has been celebrated in one form or another in the Church since the Last Supper. The early Church bears witness to its celebration. Here is a famous passage from St. Justin Martyr...

We continue our Patristic Rosary Project today with the:4th Luminous Mystery: The TransfigurationThe Mystery of the Transfiguration was a matter of intense reflection on the part of the Fathers.Remember that this takes place some eight days after the Lord confers the keys on Peter by the Jordan at Caesarea Philippi.  The Fathers thought everything in Scripture was significant and they attached great meaning to numbers.  Let us see what the mighty Ambrose of Milan (+397) has to say about the timing of the Transfiguration in relation to the events at Caesarea Philippi: You may know that Peter, James and...

We continue our Patristic Rosary Project today with the:3rd Luminous Mystery: Proclamation of the KingdomThere are many moments in the Gospels we could use to illustrate this Mystery so we must make a choice.Consider what the Lord says in Mark 1:15, after John has been arrested when Christ is in Galilee: "The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent, and believe in the gospel."  In a sense, many of the things Christ says after this extend and exemplify the "good news", the "proclamation of the Kingdom".  Since I am dealing these days with many apples,...

We continue our Patristic Rosary Project today with the:2nd Luminous Mystery: The Wedding at CanaThe late great John Paul II wrote in his letter Rosarium Virginis Mariae wrote: 24. The Rosary is at the service of this ideal; it offers the “secret” which leads easily to a profound and inward knowledge of Christ. We might call it Mary’s way. It is the way of the example of the Virgin of Nazareth, a woman of faith, of silence, of attentive listening. It is also the way of a Marian devotion inspired by knowledge of the inseparable bond between Christ and his...

We continue our Patristic Rosary Project today with the:1st Luminous Mystery: Baptism of Jesus by JohnThe one God had sent to prepare the way and whom Christ Himself would describe as the greatest man born of woman, was a focus of much contemplation by the Fathers and we can only touch the surface of their comments.  Chromatius (+c.406), Bishop of Aquileia, wrote of the Baptist and his significance for us: Hence John prepared these ways of mercy and truth, faith and justice.  Concerning them, Jeremiah also declared, "Stand by the roads, and look, and ask for the ancient paths, where...

We continue our Patristic Rosary Project today with the:5th Joyful Mystery: The Finding in the TemplePious Jews would go to Jerusalem for the Passover so that they could bring a lamb to the Temple to be sacrificed at the right moment on the right day. Jesus Himself would be nailed to a Cross and die during the slaughter of the lambs in the Temple while the priests lined the stairs to the altar and sang Psalms. In the quiet of the ancient world, when Jerusalem was still on that holy day, Jesus could probabaly hear the crying of the lambs...

We continue our Patristic Rosary Project today with the:4th Joyful Mystery: The PresentationWe are made in God’s image and likeness and Christ came into the world to reveal man for fully to him (GS 22). We are radically in unity with Christ and, through Him, with each other. In this light, read the words of 3rd century Alexandria writer Origen (+254): So, when He died, we died with Him, and when He rose, we rose with Him. Likewise, we were also circumcised along with Him. After His circumcision, we were cleansed by a solemn purification. Hence we have no need...

We continue our Patristic Rosary Project today with the:3rd Joyful Mystery: The NativityChrist came into the world in "the fullness of time" (Gal 4:4). His First Coming was foreseen from all eternity and His Nativity was prepared from the beginning of the history of our salvation. The manner of His birth is significant. St. Leo I, "the Great" (+461; whose Christmas sermons deserve entries apart!) wrote in a letter: His God in that "all things were made through Him and nothing was made without Him." (John 1:3) He is human in that He was "made from woman, made under the...

We continue our Patristic Rosary Project today with:2nd Joyful Mystery: The VisitationCommenting on Luke 1:39-45, the when Mary journeys to visit her cousin Elizabeth, St. Augustine of Hippo (+430) speaks of the infant John, to be known as the Baptist, leaping in the womb at the sound of Mary’s voice: We see instances of leaping no only in children but even in animals, although certainly not for any faith or religion of rational recognition of someone coming.  But this case stands out as utterly uncommon and new, because it tool place in the womb, and at the coming of her...

Because October is dedicated in a special way to the Most Holy Rosary of the Blessed Virgin Mary, during the month I, as a dedicated patristiblogger, will work my way through the Mysteries of the Rosary offering some comments from the Fathers of the Church.  Let’s jump right in! 1st Joyful Mystery: The Annuniciation Commenting on Luke 1:26-38, the announcment of Jesus’ birth, St. Ambrose of Milan (+397) makes a connection between Mary and the Church.  : And, therefore, the Evangelist, who had undertaken to prove the incorrupt mystery of the incarnation, thought it fruitless to pursue evidence of Mary’s...