The Rosary mysteries have been on my mind. I mentioned the Sorrowful Mystery in a recent private post, and it has stayed with me. For Catholics, the Rosary has long been taught as devotion, obligation, and daily invocation a practice meant to shape faith. I suppose I am what one might call a lapsed or suspect Catholic: raised in the cradle of the Church, it is the only faith I have known, yet I argue with it often and contest its claims with furor. I do not clothe myself in garments of holiness. Still, there is something deeper that keeps pulling me back, not ritual, not performance, but a soul-purpose connection I cannot dismiss.
It is not my intention to glorify or debunk, nor to preach. My compass is my internal voice, a sense of logic that leans on history, science, and data, but still leaves room for mystery. I ask: what is Mother? The womb of woman is the first source, the birthplace of humanity and the universe we belong to. Mary, whose name in its English form did not exist in biblical times, becomes the archetype. In scripture, the Son rises to be the Savior, conceived without human intersection, while the Mother’s role recedes into background reverence. Yet her presence Joy at the birth, Sorrow in the journey, Glory in the resurrection traces the eternal cycle of life itself.
Even science echoes this lineage: mitochondrial DNA, passed through mothers, links us back to an ancient embodiment of woman. The story folds into biology, myth, and ritual alike.
But let me stay closer to ground. The mysteries Joyful, Sorrowful, Glorious are not just chapters of devotion. They are the tenets of living. Every one of us knows them: the joy of beginnings, the sorrow of trials, the glory of renewal.
I have seen them enacted not only in scripture but in life. The agony, the carrying of the cross, the fall, the denial, the crucifixion and death these are not relics of an ancient text, they repeat themselves daily in those who suffer through disease, pain, loss, and the aching limits of the body.
