The Rosary in a Year (with Fr. Mark-Mary Ames) - Phase 5 Bonus: Introduction to Phase Five: “Building Up the Decades”

Episode Date: July 28, 2026

Fr. Mark-Mary is joined by Dr. Edward Sri as they discuss practical tips for growing your devotion to the rosary and persevering through dry periods in prayer. Dr. Sri shares inspiring stories about Pope Saint John Paul II's Rosary devotion and discusses how modern distractions challenge our ability to pray, while offering advice on creating more spaces of prayer in everyday life. As a husband and father, Dr. Sri describes how he incorporates the Rosary in family life, and shares some suggestions for anyone to become more focused in prayer. For the complete prayer plan, visit https://ascensionpress.com/riy.

Hey, I'm Father Mark Mary with the Franciscan Friars of the Renewal, and this is the Rosary in a Year podcast. Today we are back with another bonus episode because we are beginning a new phase. This is phase five, which is called Building Up the Decades. And I'm very, very grateful that we are joined today by Dr. Edward Sri. Oh, thanks so much for having me, Father. I think I've maybe mentioned this to you in one of our previous conversations, particularly early on in some of the initial episodes. I was pulling from a number of your books that you've written on the rosary or mysteries of the rosary. You're obviously somebody who has spent time studying it and its biblical roots and marrying devotion. And so just before we kind of get into maybe the main body of our episode as part of an introduction to your own background with the rosary, do you have any maybe favorite stories or kind of about the rosary in general for saints or out there or from your own personal life that you can give a bit of a testimony about? Oh, I mean, there's of course the famous. battle, you know, of Lepanto where the

where the Rosary Feast Day came from. Maybe a fun story that's not as well known. I'll share and then I can give a story from my own life. But story from JP2. You know, JP2 was in the underground seminary and they were looking, you know, for people. And the Nazis came in and invaded his house. And, you know, he hid in one closet. and he was praying.

And it was the one closet where that was the only thing that they didn't search. And they would have found him. I mean, the world would be such a different place. I don't know if I'd be here. I mean, JP2's been such a big part of my life, probably yours and many others. In his autobiography that George Weigel wrote, which is very detailed, it doesn't say exactly what he was praying. But it did say he was praying. And I've got to believe he was praying his favorite prayer.

Because, you know, he talked about the very beginning of his pontificate, how he put the whole, of his pontificate in the rhythm of the rosary. And he shared about how the rosary was so important to him in moments of trial and moments of suffering that he always turned to the rosary throughout his life and found great strength there. So that's a fun story not as well known. Maybe my own life, you know, nothing really dramatic other than just how maybe I grew in my own rosary devotion. I was blessed. I grew up in a good Catholic school and a good Catholic parish, you know, in a time where maybe a lot of people weren't promoting the rosary. Our parish was, I think it was a priest maybe in confession, suggested every night,

pray a decade of the rosary. And so as a little kid, I remember in seventh grade, starting to pray one decade of the rosary every night. And I kept that up throughout my high school years. Before I go to bed, I always do one decade. And I like to say, I don't know how my devotion is to Mary, but I know she's been very devoted to me. And I'm thankful for that priest and others who've spoken in.

And I think just by keeping and clinging to that decade of the rosary and continuing that in college, it just kept me closer to God than I would have otherwise. Maybe it kept me out of more trouble than, you know, I got into trouble. Maybe it would have been a lot worse without just Mary being close to me. So I've always had that sense of the importance of the rosary and started growing my later college years and young adult years and starting to pray, putting the decades together as we're going to be talking about and praying the rosary as a whole. But a big turning point in my life in the rosary was when John Paul II, toward the end of his pontificate, gave us those new mysteries of the rosary. And he gave us a beautiful document, an apostolic letter about the rosary. And it just transformed the way I think about it.

It was just so beautiful talking about how the rosary is so Jesus-centered. It's all about Jesus. The Hail Mary we're reciting is all from Scripture. and that even if we get distracted and our mind wanders, we're saying very holy words. They're the words of God. I like to think of it as, you know, God inspired this amazing book called the Bible. And the prayers of the rosary, the Our Father, the Hail Mary of the Glory Be is from Scripture.

And what we're doing is I can extemporaneously pick my own words and speak to God about how I love him and thank him and praise him and ask him for help. And I do that. When we all should do that, right? But how beautiful it is that we use the most perfect words, the words of sacred scripture inspired by God that are like love letters from our Heavenly Father. God spoke these words to us in the scriptures, the Our Father, much of the Hail Mary, much of the Glory B. He spoke those words to us. And then we, it serves as a model, but we speak those beautiful divine words back to our bridegroom, our beloved Jesus. And just like, I think JP2 didn't say those things.

exactly in that letter, but it opened up like the biblical and crystal-centric understanding of the rosary that really changed my rosary from like a devotion, like a pious devotion. I knew it was good and important to like, okay, I got to pray this. But it felt, you know, like something I had to do kind of like a chore, you know, and I knew it was good for me and, you know, but it felt like a chore. And it really changed it to a loving relationship. And I'd say ever since then, the rosary's just been a source of joy, of comfort, of strength and my own moments of trial and suffering. and discernment in my life. And it's not always easy,

and there is an element where it could still be a chore. But I find greater joy and peace and a deeper encounter with Jesus through this prayer from the writings of JP2. Yeah, thanks, Dr. Street. And I think just to kind of touch on a few the points that you said, is I do think, first of all,

the apostolic letter on the Most Holy Rosary that you referenced, it really is gold. And early on in some of the episodes, I did reference it, but I'll just offer an encouragement, certainly to our readers. you can find it for free kind of online.

And it's a quick read and it's very accessible, but it's also just so deep and rich and informative and encouraging. If you haven't taken the opportunity to read that apostolic letter from Pope St. now Pope St. John Paul II, I'd certainly encourage it. And also I think what you said is very encouraging as well

is that the idea of like, how's your devotion to Mary? Well, I don't know, but she's always been quite devoted to me. I know that, you know? And there is a degree of like, how are you doing with this? And many people, some people are in a process. Some people don't have an active devotion to Mary or they're growing in it. But the good news is, like, first and foremost, she loves you, right? And she is already now devoted to you as the best of mothers. And we're going to just, and like, I think to start there and to receive that gift is a beautiful thing. I would say the harder part was later in my rosary praying. You know, I'm an adult. I'm a theologian, finished my doctorate. raising kids. And okay, I know the rosary is important, but man, it feels like a chore. I think that's probably, you know, where, you know, I grew the most. And that was, you know, and I would do it, but I felt like it was like something I had to check off a box as opposed to something that was, you know, life giving or something that was really a personal encounter with God. So I think that was,

And I, it's not like ever, like, doubted the rosary or got mad about it, but it did. It wasn't like, my heart wasn't always in it. It was just like, this is a good thing to do because I'm Catholic. And so I should do this. And I know it's important. But, and I think that, by the way, I'll just pause there. I do think that's not bad. Like, in other words, like, sometimes we do, you know, like, I just have to go clean up at my house.

I have to take out the trash. I have to, you know, clean up dirty diapers sometimes. You know, like when those things happen, you just have to do that in life, you know, and it's good for us. But I'm so thankful. That's where that turning point for me with that letter from JP2 just opened up so many new windows and ways of praying the rosary. And so now I kind of find myself just instinctively, you know, I'm walking through an airport.

I'm driving my car and have a little moment and I can just go click to listen to something or I just kind of sense and I just need to put my life in the rhythm with Christ. And the rosary does that. has that way of slowing you down, which I'm sure you've talked about. You know, and it's busy, crazy world. You know, it just slows you down a bit, be in touch with Jesus, who's at the center of every Hail Mary. I find that just so soothing in my life.

For times when I'm anxious, I can be anxious about something and really worried and, you know, panicking about something. And I go, okay, I mean, just, I need to calm myself down. And I find the rosary as a great gift in those moments. Or just simply, you know, just to kind of reorient my mind. mind. You know, I've been busy at work thinking about a lot of things. I'm transitioning, getting ready to go see my wife and kids as I'm driving home. And I find, you know, I'll do a decade or two of the rosary just to kind of help me be the husband, the dad I need to be as I'm

walking through that door. Not saying I do that every single day, but I do it many times. I turned to it more of like a resource for my soul as opposed to, oh, this is something I need to get done. That was probably my biggest growth turning point was, not just a check the box thing, but finding it as an encounter, something enriching for me. And JP2, he was the one that opened that up for me. That's actually going to be one of the main or an important theme, I think, for our conversation today. And this is a little bit of a good segue into the background of kind of the worldview behind this phase. Just recognizing that more and more, like our concentration muscle,

like our ability to focus and to focus for an extended period of time, it's just a lot of the just being undercut so many ways. And so instead of just beginning with like condemning it, sort of recognizing this is where a lot of people are, this is what I've experienced in my own life. So let's go ahead and start just praying one decade at a time as opposed to the whole thing, especially if praying for 15 minutes is going to be hard. We'll start there and then we'll build up. So just kind of with that kind of background, do you have any thoughts or encouragement or insights about that? Yeah, no, thanks for highlighting that. I think that's really important. And by the way, hold on one second here.

I'm just kidding. Because this is this device here just trains us to be so distracted all the time. It's intentionally designed to make us addictive to constantly go from one thing to the next to click. And like you can't get any work done. You can't pay attention to people. And it's going to be really hard to pay attention to God. And, you know, we just have to realize this is the world we're living in right now. And this is a challenge.

You know, I have an iPhone and I use it all the time. I can't imagine not using it, but I also know how much of a pull it has. And I often like to say, you know, like when you're, when you have those pockets in your day, a pocket of little space of time, in between a meeting, you're at a red light, you're, you know, waiting in line. What's your, what's your instinct? Is it to grab your phone? I have that, you know, that's a sign it has some kind of hold on me and attachment.

Instead of grabbing the phone, maybe just in that moment, you know, I can pull out the beats. instead. In my pocket, I don't have to like show everybody, but I can just have the beads in my pocket or just use my 10 fingers and just do a decade. And then I could go check social media or something else. I just wonder like a little discipline in the midst of my day can help me, you know, grow and being able to sit with God and quiet at other times. I remember talking to a student at a big state college in the Midwest last year. And he was telling me how hard it was for him to pray. And we were talking about the rosary, but just like sitting and quiet, praying period. Can I ask a question, not about prayer, but how often do you check your phone? And he just laughs. I go like,

how often a day do you check your phone? You're just laughing. How often every hour? And he keeps laughing. How often every minute? And he just keeps laughing. And he goes, I'm checking it all the time, just constantly looking at my phone. And I suggested, you know, as I just smiled at said, you know, maybe the way you live your life outside of prayer is disposing you internally, that's going to affect the way you live your time in prayer. And so maybe like if you're wanting to have a little more of that experience of being able to sit in silence, can I find some times in the day where I'm not checking my phone, where I want to, but I resist? Because if I'm always like wanting to click and be entertained and, you know, have something in front of me to, you know, kind of grab my attention,

it's going to be hard just to sit in silence, you know. Maybe before, you know, you go to bed at night. Maybe you just say, okay, I'm going to, I'll use my phone while I'm downstairs or I'm in my kitchen. But when I go up to bed, I'm just going to unplug just to be a little bit and quite not, and I'm not praying. I'm just brushing my teeth. But if I can practice a little bit of like finding some spaces without the constant noise and distraction in the midst of my day, then I think we'll find that when I actually do pause to try to string a few decades together, it'll be just a little bit easier. But I also would just say not to be discouraged either, you know, that we're human beings, we're not angels. Even before the iPhone and social media, people got distracted.

Their minds wandered. And, you know, and that's going to happen. And this is one of the big things I took from JP2 in his letter on the rosary was just how, like the words were saying themselves are holy. And I know, we want to contemplate. We do want to enter into, you know, more meditative prayer. on the mysteries of Christ's life. That's the ideal. But I wouldn't want the ideal

to keep me from something really good. Just simply saying, Our Father, who art in heaven. Those words are beautiful. Even my mind's wandering. I'm thinking about what's for dinner tonight and thinking about some project at work

or what somebody's thinking of me. But just simply saying those words, it does something for my soul and to not be discouraged. Oh, shucks, I didn't concentrate enough this time. You know, I was too distracted again. Like, to know that the first. the fact that you took the time to just be with God, you chose to be there. That alone is good for the soul.

And then God rejoices that you're trying. I think about like my kids when they try to clean up a mess. Sometimes be a lot easier if I just clean it up. But I know like if they're trying, that's good for them. And I rejoice. Oh, look, they were trying to help. You know, and even though it's still messy. And I might feel like my prayer is messy. This decade was a complete disaster. That's how might feel. But God saw I was trying and he rejoices in that. Yeah, absolutely. And there's that popular saying, it's like, it's okay if you're not okay. But the little addition I like to make, it's like, it's okay if you're not okay. But it's also like okay if you want to be okay, you know. And so there's a certain degree of like it's a reality. Like it's okay if your rosary or your

prayer was very distracted. But also like if you want, it's okay if you want to like grow and having less distracted prayer, right? And so there is a bit of like a balance and a dance to this of recognizing where you're at in our humanity, but also just like, hey, you know, if you want to grow in your capacity to be focused and be still and to drink deeply of what the Lord's offering, like that's a good thing too. And you don't just have to totally be resigned to a radically distracted prayer necessarily. And that's, again, part of like my hope for folks who are making this journey is like we might be starting at a. a lot of places and it's okay if the rosary is a struggle. It's okay if meditating and being

still is a struggle. But also like it's okay. It's okay if you want to grow to love the rosary and you actually want to be able to be still and to go deep with it. So this is what we're going to be doing. We're going to be slowly but surely building up our prayer. And part of the experience, the practicals of this is that up to this point for the majority of each episode has been really some sort of offering or teaching or meditation, reflection, kind of from me. And now I'm going to step away from that. And we're going to be kind of, I'm going to be guiding folks, but now the individuals themselves are going to be doing sort of the heavy lifting. And two images of this is it's almost like, all right, you've been going to class and you've been getting your lectures,

but now it's time like for you to study. Now it's time for you to assimilate this. right? And because like a doctor who's going to be performing surgery, it's not enough for them to have just gone to all of the lectures and the presentations. They actually have to know it and they have to have assimilated it so that they can use it. Any thoughts that you have from from your own experience as somebody who's studied a lot or your own experience as like a father where there is a time in your children's lives as they grow older where you're a little bit less hands-on and a lot more of like entrusting your sons or daughters to kind of take ownership of of something, which is what I kind of am hoping that this phase is like.

Yeah, I think that's a great example from family life. My fourth child was launching to college this year. So we're going to halfway, halfway through four out of our eight will be launched come August. And each of my older four have all owned their faith, you know, as they emerged into adulthood in their, you know, high school years especially. And they all have kind of grown in their devotion to the rosary is one thing. You know, they have their own personal private prayer, you know, meditation, some kind of adoration with the Eucharist, loving, you know, God and their faith.

But the rosary has been a mix of that. And we prayed the rosary as a family growing up. Sometimes it was very pious and we're sitting around the hearth and it's all beautiful and everyone's well behaved. And other times, you know, the toddlers going around making everybody. laugh and we were not like this the whole time. We're praying Hail Mary and laughing about what the toddler's doing or sometimes one's siblings bothering the other one and it could be a messy rosary. And now with kids at all different ages, I mean, we've got the high school kids, we've got the little kids. I sometimes call it the three family circus rosary, you know, where I can be upstairs in the hallway

praying the rosary. My high schoolers are, you know, packing their lunches and my longer ones are in the bed and we're just trying to have some kind of really, but I want to really have. Like some, like the rosary be the heart of our home. But I think what's happened is, you know, the older kids, they've somehow have found the rosary on their own. And they don't always join us. Like I have like one of my daughters will like not join us for the family rosary. Go, oh, dad already prayed it this morning when I got up.

Like just on her own. Just prayed the rosary. Got up early. I'm like, wow. Okay. I wonder that I'll continue as she gets older and needs more sleep. But it's a beautiful thing. You know, and I think as an analogy, our Heavenly Father, you know, may want us to start just getting the habit.

And that's why this program is so helpful to go slow, to develop the habit of a decade, to then develop, you know, starting to string decades together, you know, getting a lot of hands on. I remember when I first started getting into the rosary in my young adult years, you know, having little booklets that had little reflections. And I was using that all the time. I rarely ever use a booklet anymore. Like there is a sense of now I'm just encountering God in the midst of it, meeting him where I am at today. And I think that's healthy. Nothing wrong with going back to a booklet, of course. But same thing.

You've been guiding, you know, this group here, you know, and that's been very enriching for them. But now you're kind of letting them start to walk and let the Lord actually speak to them and let their own minds and hearts imagine the mysteries of the rosary think about, you know, listening to what. what God might be saying to them. And that's, you know, that's always more powerful than any booklet, any video, any program like this, is that real personal encounter with God himself. And giving your whole self, wherever you are with your joys, your sorrows, your fears into the rosary and then allowing God to meet you in the midst of that, that's the real, you know, I think gold of the rosary is going to be found. Yeah. And I think we see some of this like pedagogical style in,

how our Lord accompanied like the disciples, right? There's parts where he's walking with them and then there's parts where he sends them out. He says, okay, I'm giving you this authority and now you go and live it, and then he comes back and they kind of process it together. We've made it a tradition of taking our postulence who are the new men in formation

on this 21-day outdoor backpacking trip with an organization called Core, which is out of Wyoming Catholic College. And part of it is like there's guides there. And part of the early phase is them teaching you, and them guiding you and showing you how to use the map and set up the tent and, you know, ration water and cook your meals, etc. And then there's a point where we send the men off, like who have received this sort of formation and training into what they call like solitary travel.

Where they're getting out, it's like, we're behind you. The leaders are a little bit behind you, the priests are a little bit behind you, but you're going to navigate it yourself. And part of the fruit of that is that kind of confidence that comes in like, oh, I have this. Like I know how to do it. I can kind of do this alone. And I think this is a process that a lot of people go through in a variety of states of life is there's a phase of mentoring and then there's a phase of like, actually you don't need us anymore. You've got this. You have the tools and now go ahead and just and put them to work. There are going to be some where, okay, like this is kind of new and I'm learning and now I'm being set off to kind of grow and to kind of take ownership of

it on my own. And I think one of the experiences kind of harkening back to something that you shared earlier is, okay, like, we've made a journey up to this point. And folks who have made it this far have been, like, really, really disciplined. And that's, and it's awesome. But there's a point now where we go from one decade to two decades, the three decades, the four decades to the full rosary in our final phase, where there might be that experience of this feels like work. This feels laborious. This doesn't feel fun anymore. Just some of your own wisdom of experiencing, like, I don't really want to do this, but I kind of, I'm going to, I'm going to. do it and how you've worked through some of those perceived obstacles. Yeah, this, you know,

this is like the marathon of all Catholic devotions. It just keeps going on and odd. And it could be overwhelming, which is why I really love how you've started with you started slow, gradually building up just like you don't go to the gym and say, I'm going to bench 250 pounds. You know, you got to gradually work up. So that being said, I bet there's going to be a number of people here that, you know, when they start adding a second decade, they're going to be, because they've loved the first decade so much, they're going to find great joy. And they're going to, I'm ready to do three. Let's go. You know, and if that happens for you, praise the Lord. That's awesome. But I do think there'll be many of us that'll go, oh, wow, okay, now it's five minutes. Oh,

now we're talking 10 minutes, you know, and it's, and my mind's wandering. And one of the things that discourages us the most, I think, when we start to grow in prayer as a whole, whether it's adoration with the Eucharist or the rosary or the mass is discouragement. You know, the devil will get in there and just go, this is boring. You're not good at this. Like, you're clearly too distracted. You're not meditating. Everyone talks about meditating on the mysteries, and you're just not capable of that.

You know, why bother anymore? If you ever have those thoughts in your head, they're probably not coming from God. They're coming from the devil. This is actually a point St. Catherine of Sienna makes is that the devil often uses discouragement to get us to stop praying to get us to think our prayer is not pleasing to God. Now, that being said, you want to, how do I, I still want to get better. You know, I want to grow. I desire to find this enriching, to encounter God more, to find that strength that JP2 and comfort that he described, you know, how do I do that? You know, I will say in my own life, you know,

there are times I can remember going, oh, this is amazing. I just love you. I get my young adult years. This is just, you know, I'm getting so much out of it. have little seasons like that. And then there'd be other seasons where it was just a chore and it was, it was hard. And I think that's a great moment of testing that God will often give us a period of consolation in some kind of prayer and we enjoy it. And it's like a sweetness to get us to keep coming back. But then there's other seasons where he withdraws that sense of maybe his presence, the delight,

the consolations that are there. But he's often doing that to test us, to test our hearts. Are you still going to come? Are you coming just for what you get out of it? Or are you still going to be here with me? You know, so I think the saints will often say the idea of persevering and being faithful is so much more important than any feeling we might get out of the prayer. You know, those come and go. Just like in marriage, like there's many times, you know, like I look my wife in the eye, love you.

This is awesome. It's date night. Let's go. There's other times like we do. just have to, you know, work together side by side, get the kids down for bed and we're exhausted and, you know, but it's just like, are we going to be there for each other? Are we going to be faithful? And that's what I would say is we're moving into this next phase. Whatever you experience, you know, persevere, whether it's the great joy and you thank the Lord for it or you find it hard,

know, know, that, again, just like if you're at the gym and you just added on 20 pounds, you know, to your weightlifting. That may not be, maybe you thought you were at your threshold, where you were before. So you just add it on. That's a lot. Okay. It's going to be hard. Maybe I just need to add on 10 pounds and work my way up, you know, whatever that is. But just anticipate it's likely going to be hard. And like it being hard is not anything wrong. It's not unusual. But you'll never get to find the freedom of getting 20 more pounds in the gym in lifting if you don't start moving in that direction. And that's what we're doing in this phase. is starting to move in that direction of adding it on.

And just as, you know, whether it's running or whether it's the gym or any other, like maybe what you were describing going out into the wilderness, like at first it's hard. But after you do it a while, it gets better. And it will over time, you'll cultivate that spiritual muscle. And it will get better. I think that idea of persevering and not thinking, oh, it's hard. I stink. I better just give up.

I'm not good at this. Or it's hard. I don't like it. So I'm just going to give up. Like I would just anticipate for most of us It's going to be difficult. It's going to be a challenge. And will I just, can I persevere through it?

And I love a couple of those examples. I do think the, I do think it like the analogy works of comparing what we're doing to a marathon or to like an experience in the gym, right? Similarly, if some one of our friars is really like thinking about trying to do a half marathon. So one of the first things you do is like you get like a running plan and you start out much pretty slow you know and then you kind of build up towards like the dates and and the 13 point whatever miles it is but also I think with that like one of the things that will

happen is that oftentimes like if you're kind of if you're if you're faithful to those initial phases in like the gym and the workout and the plan and the diet there's going to be some quick growth right like very quickly and it's going to feel good it's like okay you know what I was struggling with two miles yesterday or like two weeks ago this week I just ran five miles and I feel great. But then as you persevere in it, like some of the growth, it's going to actually slow down quite a bit. And so then that can be a little bit of a discouraging experience of like, okay, you know what? Like actually today, you know, I'm six months into this and today my run didn't feel as good as it did last week, you know? And so that's just part of the

experience and I think that's human. But also I just love what you say because I do think the primary like enemy lie that's going to try and undercut this is discourage. is okay, I'm doing it and I'll just distract it the whole time. Or it's not, you know, I'm supposed to be like going deeper and be more focused and I'm actually being less focused. We just have to be particularly aware of discouragement and discerning where that voice is coming through and not not paying attention to it. And so I really appreciate you, you just acknowledging that and pointing it out. And it's just one last thing. And then we're bringing in for a landing is I think sort of the goal is this kind of like attuning the rhythm of our own life to the rhythms of the gospel and in many ways the rhythms of the rosary and he talked about how like john paul the second he wanted like his pontificate to take the rhythm of the rosary can you share a little bit of like what what that means yeah i think what you have is in these decades of the rosary you know when you start pulling them together these five joyful mysteries you're thinking about the joyful mysteries of jesus's

birth that God wants to be close to us. He loves us so much and he became one of us. You know, first in Mary's womb, then in Mary's womb, going to Elizabeth and the visitation, then being born in Bethlehem and the Magi and the shepherds coming and then being presented to the temple. And then even going there as a 12-year-old boy, again, displaying his wisdom to the elders in the temple and to Mary and Joseph in a difficult way. way, being lost for those three days. But that, but that, which we're looking at, you're getting an arc of the idea of the joy around how much God loves us and just wants to be so close to us.

And then you've got the five luminous mysteries, walking through Christ's public ministry, you know, the light of the world shining in darkness, you know, the darkness of our own sorrows, our own isolation, our own sufferings. You see him all his healing ministry, reaching out to all those that are outcasts, whether it's the lepers, the sinners, the tax collectors, and the paralyzed, and we can see ourselves in those stories. Where do I feel paralyzed? Where do I feel my life is in darkness?

Where do I feel like I'm an outcast? I feel lonely right now. Like the God is shining light and coming in. He's also shining in light in those dark places that we know we need to change, those areas that whether it's hurt in our lives that he wants to heal or areas of sin, bad habits, ways I look at the world, false stories, I tell about myself and others, and God was challenging me to repent. You know, he's shining light in my own interior darkness. And that's beautiful.

Then you've got the sorrowful mysteries of his passion and death where you're seeing love. As J.B.2 said, when you look at Jesus, his whole life, he's love incarnate. But when you look at his passion and death, that's where you get the fullest of his love. You see his patience, his forgiving those who are mocking him and crucifying him. you see his gentleness, you see his sacrifice, his courage, his trust of the Father. There's so much being revealed there. And then you get the resurrection joy in the glorious mysteries, you know, from Christ himself in the resurrection ascension, the gift of the Holy Spirit in our lives and how we share in that resurrection. And then we get the prime example of the joy of the resurrection in Mary that she triumphs over death and her assumption and is crowned as Queen of Heaven and Earth, which is what we'll have, we'll all have.

have our crowns if we're faithful and finish the race well, as St. Paul says. But anyway, but that whole arc, like we just walked through from the coming of Jesus to kind of like our own resurrection of the dead. Like that, that's the story of salvation. And that's the greatest story. And while, you know, it might be fun watching Star Wars or a Marvel movie or whatever, or your favorite YouTube short, you know, and these are fun, but the most important story is this story of salvation. And this rosary breaks it down into these small pieces. So regularly different days of the week, I'm regularly putting before my mind the story that matters most. I can get caught up in my favorite EPL soccer team or what's happening in the news and politics and the latest movie and social media.

And I need to have before my mind regularly these mysteries of Christ's life. And this is, I think, what JP2 means is, you know, what we put in our mind really matters. It starts to shape our imagination. It shapes what we perceive as good. It shapes what we, our desires, what we want to run after. And if I keep putting before my mind the images of Hollywood and the secular age, you know, I'm going to fall short. Nothing wrong with Hollywood necessarily. they can put out good things.

And you can find good things coming out of social media as well, right? But most of it is at best neutral and not raising our spirits up to God. Whereas the rosary, having this regularly just as a part of my life starts to shape, okay, this is what matters most. This is what I want to run after. I want my life to be in the rhythm of the story of salvation, the story of Christ. So I find this to be just a helpful way to pull back, kind of keep and ponder these beautiful mysteries of our faith. So I can remember what matters most in life.

As folks pray the rosary and live life, like kind of a bit in the lens of the rosary is you do experience that. Like, okay, kind of wherever I'm at today, like there's a, I can find a home for how I'm feeling in the rosary, in some of the mysteries, in the joy, in the sorrow and whatever it is, and the need for healing, et cetera. And I think that's a great consolation and also a source of grace for us and a place to kind of really bring whatever it is to the Lord and prayer and to our lady and entrusted to her motherhood. So Dr. Stree, thank you so much for being here. You know, you've been a part of a lot, particularly in the church in the U.S. in the last couple of decades. And you have done this as so far as perseverance and some hard work and some sacrifice and some fidelity for a long time. that's borne a lot of fruit for so many people's lives. So just thank you, thank you for that.

And thank you for joining me. And to all of our listeners, thank you so much for joining me. I look forward to continuing this journey with you in this next phase. Poco, poco, poeco, little by little, we're going to make it. All right, God bless y'all.