The Fifth Glorious Mystery // The Coronation of the Blessed Virgin Mary
Fruit of the Mystery // Eternal Happiness
Reflect
I have been a faithful Catholic since I was baptized as an infant and, as difficult as it might be to believe, prior to my invitation to travel to Lourdes, France, I had never heard of Our Lady of Lourdes. I never knew that the Virgin Mary appeared to Saint Bernadette in 1858, identifying herself as the Immaculate Conception, and revealing a spring of healing water that has led millions of pilgrims to travel to France praying to be healed.
Since traveling to this famed apparition site, I have been fascinated by how Our Lady appears to her earthly children. To Saint Bernadette, a poor uneducated child, Our Lady appeared as a “girl in white, no bigger than myself.” In La Vang, Vietnam, she appeared in 1798 as a mother wearing a traditional Vietnamese dress, holding the child Jesus. On a hill in Tepeyac, Mexico, she appeared to an indigenous peasant, Juan Diego who pick some flowers to present to the archbishop. The Virgin bundled the flowers into Juan’s tilma which left a miraculous, colorful imprint of an indigenous woman.
The Virgin Mary has always appeared to her sons and daughters as a woman from their local region and culture and comes to them as a familiar soul. She never appeared as a regal queen with a crown or robe like the earthly queens we see coronated in distant countries. No, her coronation as Queen of Heaven and Earth is modeled after her Son’s Kingship. A King born in poverty, Who grew to heal and proclaim the living Word of God and died on a Cross for our sins so that we might have eternal happiness in Heaven with God forever.
Mary’s coronation reminds us of how God intended our lives to be from the beginning. Since God breathed life into our first parents, God’s plan has always been a paradise for us with Him forever. May the Coronation of Our Lady—who continues to reach out to her children on earth through apparitions and in Heaven with a welcoming embrace—be our guiding light to eternal happiness with God.
Let Us Pray
Hail, holy Queen, mother of mercy, our life, our sweetness, and our hope. To you we cry, poor banished children of Eve; to you we send up our sighs, mourning and weeping in this valley of tears. Turn, then, most gracious advocate, your eyes of mercy toward us; and after this, our exile, show unto us the blessed fruit of your womb, Jesus. O clement, O loving, O sweet Virgin Mary. Pray for us, O holy Mother of God, that we may be made worthy of the promises of Christ. Amen.
For Discussion
What Marian apparitions are you familiar with (Lourdes, La Vang, Guadalupe, Fatima, Knock, etc.)? What do her message and appearance reveal to you in regard to how she is inviting you to eternal happiness in Heaven with God?
Mary’s coronation is a foretaste of the heavenly glory we hope to attain. How can we bring the heavenly reality of eternal happiness to our family, friends, and world today?
Praying the Rosary
Throughout the Prayer Pledge and beyond, we really encourage you to pray the Rosary! Since we will be looking at the fruits of the Mysteries of the Rosary, it only makes sense to actually pray it!
Here is a guide on how to pray the Rosary.
I like this podcast and this podcast for praying the Rosary.
Hallow also has a marvelous Rosary meditation.
And if you want to go even deeper in to the Rosary, check out Mystery!
By Their Fruits: The 2021 Prayer Pledge // Day 29 #BISblog #prayerpledge //Click to tweet