The Rosary in a Year (with Fr. Mark-Mary Ames) - Day 203: God’s Relentless Pursuit

Episode Date: July 22, 2025

“My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” Christ’s cry from the cross reveals not despair, but a prayer that carries the weight of human suffering to the heart of the Father. Fr. Mark-Mary draws connections to the prodigal son and the good thief, illustrating God’s relentless pursuit to bring His children home. The crucifixion becomes the fulfillment of God’s covenant, declaring that death, sorrow, and injustice will not have the final word, but life, mercy, and resurrection will. Today’s focus is the mystery of the Crucifixion and we will be praying one decade of the Rosary. For the complete prayer plan, visit https://ascensionpress.com/riy.

Hi, I'm Father Mark Mary with Franciscan Friars of the Renewal, and this is the Rosary in a Year podcast where through prayer and meditation, the rosary brings us deeper into relationship with Jesus and Mary and becomes a source of grace for the whole world. The Rosary in a Year is brought to you by Ascension. This is day 203. To download the prayer plan for Rosary in a Year, visit AscensionPress.com forward slash Rosary in a Year or text R-I-Y to 33777. You'll get an outline of how we're going to pray each month and it's a great way to track

your progress. The best place to listen to the podcast is in the Ascension app. There are special features built just for this podcast and also recordings of the full Rosary with myself and other friars on behalf of myself and the whole team here at Ascension. We wanted to take this opportunity to thank everyone who's helped support this podcast financially. Your support is so appreciated and helps us to reach as many people as possible. And if you haven't already, please consider supporting us at ascensionpress.com forward slash support. Today we will be meditating upon and praying with the fifth

Today, we will be meditating upon and praying with the fifth sorrowful mystery, the crucifixion and death of our Lord. Now before we pray with this mystery today, let's take a moment to call to mind what we have prayed with and meditated upon up to this point. Back when we were in many ways just beginning our journey, back at day 43, we had some time of prayer, particularly with Pope Benedict XVI's reflection on Jesus during the crucifixion. As you recall, our Lord, while nailed to the cross, He prayed Psalm 22, My God, My God, why have you forsaken me? This cry of despair, but also this revelation of hope. And if you recall, Pope Benedict XVI, he saw in this prayer of Jesus, Jesus bringing all

of the world's anguished cry at God's absence before the heart of God himself. He writes, he takes their cry, their anguish, all their helplessness upon himself. And in so doing, he transforms it. There's an invitation again today to bring to Jesus crucified, to unite your own prayer to this prayer of Jesus, my God, my God, why have you forsaken me? And in so doing this, like bringing your cry, your anguish, your experience of absence or

silence from God to the heart of God himself. But with hope, with confidence as Jesus does, we call to mind that throughout His passion, Jesus remains in dialogue with His Father. So this is your experience today again. We bring it with Jesus before the heart of the Father. But we remain here. We wait on Him. Now, secondly for our view today, in the conclusion of the short mini-series in which we journeyed through the sorrowful mysteries

interwoven with a variety of meditations on the parable of the prodigal son, I call to mind this prayer, this reflection of how the Father in the parable is always looking for his son, attentive for his son, and as soon as his son appears on the horizon, the father runs to him and embraces him and cries with him and kisses him and restores him to his dignity and brings him home. And how I see in this very much, lived in salvation history as Jesus, nailed to the cross at Calvary,

says to like dismiss the name that tradition gives to the cross at Calvary, says to, like, dismiss the name that tradition gives to the good thief, like, today you will be with me in paradise. We see this search, and we see Jesus as the pursuit of the Father for his Son, in this case the good thief, coming to him, taking upon himself the consequences of sin to bring him home. And what this reveals to us about the heart of Jesus is how deeply God is invested in us. How deeply God cares. And if you remember, there's the rebuke that some of the apostles receive in the boat during

the storm when they come to Jesus and say, like, do you even care? And the answer to this question, a question that rises up in the hearts of man again and again and again, particularly as we encounter personal suffering or suffering of loved ones, is God, like, do you care? And the answer to this question we find definitively answered in Christ crucified who reveals to us the heart of the Father. Do I care? I care this much. I care enough to become man, to take upon myself human frailty and sin, upon myself, human frailty and sin, to be arrested, mocked, rejected, scourged, crowned with thorns and crucified.

I care this much. I am passionate about you. And I am here with you. And I am taking what you experience upon myself to be here with you so you are not alone but also to bring you home. And so in our prayer we see Jesus answering this question, God, do you care? The answer to that question is found in Christ crucified. And then lastly for today, if you recall in our meditation with Pietro Gagliardi's fresco,

the crucifixion, if you recall, that's the image that had the big rainbow, which seemed to be completed by the outstretched and crucified arms of Jesus. And what we see depicted here so beautifully is that Christ crucified. is that Christ crucified in His crucifixion, like fulfilling what the rainbow symbolizes in salvation history, like this promise of God, the promise of God that death will not have the last word, but life will. And if you will be see in the cross and the crucifix, the fulfillment and completion

of that sign of God, the rainbow, that Christ crucified and eventually risen is the sure sign of our hope and of God's fidelity. That Christ crucified speaks to us this promise from the heart of the Father. Death, suffering, pain, injustice, tears, will not have the last word. will not have the last word, but glory and life and justice and mercy and truth and resurrection.

So now we'll just take a moment of prayerful rest and leisure here. And now we'll follow this roadmap of prayer, the four Rs. Today in this moment, what is the grace being offered, the truth being revealed, that you are being invited to receive. How can you respond? What is the grace that you would like to request at the service of this response? And now rejoice. Give thanks to the Lord for this time of prayer, the grace given, and the divine life shared. And now together with Mary, let us pray. In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name.

Thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. Amen. Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee. Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus. Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death. Amen.

Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee. Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus. Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death. Amen. Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee. Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of Thy womb, Jesus. Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death. Amen. Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee. Blessed art Thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus. Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death. Amen. Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee. Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit

of thy womb, Jesus. Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death. Amen. Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee. Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus. Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death. Amen. Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee. Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus. Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death. Amen. Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee.

Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus. Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death. Amen. Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee. Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus. Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death, amen. Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee. Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus.

Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death. Amen. Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit, as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end. Amen. In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. All right. Thanks so much for joining me and praying with me today. I look forward to continuing this journey with you again tomorrow. All right. Poco Poco, friends. God bless you all.