The Rosary

The purpose of the Rosary is to help keep in memory certain principal events in the history of our salvation. There are twenty mysteries reflected upon in the Rosary, and these are divided into the five Joyful Mysteries, the five Luminous Mysteries, the five Sorrowful Mysteries and the five Glorious Mysteries.

The question is sometimes asked, why, of all the incidents in our Lord’s life, the Rosary only considers these particular twenty. The mysteries of the Rosary are based on the incidents in the life of Our Lord and His Mother that are celebrated in the Liturgy. There is a parallel between the main feasts honouring our Lord and his Mother in the liturgical year, and the twenty mysteries of the Rosary. Consequently, one who recites the twenty mysteries of the Rosary in one day reflects on the whole liturgical cycle that the Church commemorates during the course of each year. That is why some of the Popes have referred to the Rosary as a compendium of the Gospel.

Pope Saint John Paul II suggested the recitation of the Rosary as follows: the Joyful mysteries Monday and Saturday, the Luminous on Thursday, the Sorrowful on Tuesday and Friday, and the Glorious on Wednesday and Sunday. As an exception, the Joyful Mysteries may be said on Sundays during Advent and Christmas, while the Sorrowful Mysteries may be said on the Sundays of Lent.

Below you will find a series of PowerPoint and PDF resources for a Scriptural meditation on the various mysteries, along with instructions on how you might use them as a group either online or in-person.

There is the option to pray the full rosary or individual decades. The individual decades were written to be prayed with during an hour long prayer group for example.