Rosary
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On a fall morning in 1972, Mother Mary appeared to the Mother of the Flame Elizabeth Clare Prophet during her morning meditation in the prayer tower of the Retreat of the Resurrection Spiral in Colorado Springs, saying:
I want to give you a ritual of the rosary for Keepers of the Flame. It is to be a scriptural rosary for those who adhere to the true teachings of Christ as taught by the ascended masters and for the bringing-in of the golden age. It is to be used as a universal adoration of the Mother flame by people of all faiths. For, you see, the salutation “Hail Mary” simply means “Hail, Mother ray” and is an affirmation of praise to the Mother flame in every part of life. Each time it is spoken, it evokes the action of the Mother’s light in the hearts of all mankind.
Thus the rosary is a sacred ritual whereby all of God’s children can find their way back to their immaculate conception in the heart of the Cosmic Virgin. The New Age rosary is the instrument for mankind’s deliverance from the sense of sin and from the erroneous doctrine of original sin. For every soul is immaculately conceived by Almighty God, and God the Father is the origin of all of the cycles of man’s being. That which is conceived in sin is not of God and has neither the power nor the permanence of reality. All that is real is of God; all that is unreal will pass away as mankind become one with the Mother flame. The daily giving of the rosary is a certain means to this oneness.
Evolution of the Rosary
The pattern for the rosary can be traced to ninth-century Ireland, when monks chanted the 150 Psalms of David daily. The illiterate peasants, wishing to join in the devotion, were allowed to substitute the Lord’s Prayer (the Our Father) for each psalm. While in the East the invocations were to Brahma, Vishnu and Shiva and to Durga as the interpolator of the heavenly triumvirate, in Europe many devotees of Mary recited the angelic salutation of Gabriel, “Hail, Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee.”[1]
To this was added Elisabeth’s salutation to Mary, “Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb.”[2] Thus those who sought out the Virgin as the Mother of the Christ and the Mediatrix of the Father began offering their prayers to her as a bouquet of roses. In time these prayers became an important Christian ritual known as the rosary (from Latin rosārium, rose garden).
Later the phrase was added, “Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death.”
Mary as the “Mother of God”
Mother Mary explained her calling as the Mother of God to the Keepers of the Flame:
I AM a cosmic mother, and as much your mother as I am the mother of beloved Jesus. Some who are adherents of the Christian faith call me the Mother of God. To those of the protesting branch of orthodox Christianity, this seems a sacrilege. For men may well ask, “Who is worthy to be the Mother of God?” But this concept, when understood to mean the mother of the embodiment of the Divine Spirit, reveals the glorious truth that every mother who understands that which was spoken—“and the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us”[3]—may be the Mother of God.[4]
To mother means to give birth to, to give rise to, to care for and to protect. Therefore, to be the Mother of God is to give birth to, to give rise to, to care for and to protect his flame on earth. To mother the flame of Spirit in the plane of Matter is the calling of the feminine ray in both man and woman.
Mother Mary has spoken:
The Christ must be born in every man and woman. The Christ seed must be nurtured and expanded as the threefold flame of love, wisdom and power holding dominion over every ideological concept of man, over every teleological matter prescribed by cosmic law and ruling supreme as the master function of life. Then I (the God flame in me) automatically become (because the God flame in me is so consecrated) the Cosmic Mother of each son and daughter of heaven. Then you automatically become that to which you have consecrated the energies of your I AM Presence. That which I AM you can be also, if you will it so by the power and authority of the I AM.[5]
Later history of the Rosary
The Hail Marys later given by the European Christians strengthened the devotion to the Mother, encouraging the further expansion of the rosary in the thirteenth century. New forms of the rosary appeared. One hundred fifty Praises of Jesus, devotions which related the Psalms to Jesus’ life, were composed. And shortly after this form of the rosary was in use, 150 Praises of Mary appeared. When only 50 of the Praises to Mary were given, it was called a rosarium.
Throughout this period there were four distinct forms of the rosary in use: (1) 150 Our Fathers, (2) 150 Hail Marys, (3) 150 Praises of Jesus, and (4) 150 or 50 Praises of Mary. The first synthesis of these four forms occurred in the fourteenth century when Henry de Kalker, a Carthusian monk, synthesized the Our Fathers and 150 Hail Marys, grouping the Hail Marys into tens with one Our Father between each decade.
Further synthesis occurred in 1409, when Dominic the Prussian assigned a thought from the lives of Mary and Jesus to each of the Hail Mary beads. The Hail Marys were again grouped into decades with an Our Father between each decade. In 1470 Alan of Rupe spread this particular rosary throughout Europe, popularizing the use of this form to such a degree that it provided the foundation for the present-day scriptural rosary.
Picture rosaries became popular around 1500, when woodcuts were inexpensively reproduced for the first time. Because of the complexity of printing 150 pictures for the Hail Mary beads, a new rosary with 15 pictures (1 for each Our Father bead) was introduced. During the Renaissance, the 150 thoughts for each Hail Mary bead were used less and less, until only the 15 thoughts for the Our Fathers remained, surviving as the 15 mysteries used in the Catholic Church today. Supplementary prayers or meditations were usually read before each decade to augment the brief mysteries. A return to the medieval form of the rosary began in the twentieth century with the appearance of several series of Hail Mary meditations in Germany, Switzerland and Canada.
The rosaries released by Mother Mary
When Mother Mary came to Elizabeth Clare Prophet and told her of her desire to have devotees throughout the world give a Scriptural Rosary for the New Age, she first announced the seven mysteries for the seven rays, together with the prayer format that was to be used. These mysteries are:
- The First Ray: The Joyful Mysteries, which amplify the will of God
- The Second Ray: The Teaching Mysteries, which extol the wisdom of God
- The Third Ray: The Love Mysteries, which magnetize the love of God
- The Fourth Ray: The Glorious Mysteries, which show forth the purity of God
- The Fifth Ray: The Healing Mysteries, which demonstrate the truth and the science of God
- The Sixth Ray: The Initiatic Mysteries, which exemplify the ministration and service of God
- The Seventh Ray: The Miracle Mysteries, which bear witness to the transmutation, the freedom and the forgiveness of God
When these rosaries were completed under her direction, the Blessed Mother released The Masterful Mysteries for the eighth ray, which focalize the majesty and the mastery of God. In her third appearance, the Holy Virgin presented the mysteries and the prayer format for the five secret rays, which she said were to be given at eventide Monday through Friday. This set of rosaries are:
- The First Secret Ray: The Inspiration Mysteries
- The Second Secret Ray: The Action Mysteries
- The Third Secret Ray: The Revelation Mysteries
- The Fourth Secret Ray: The Declaration Mysteries
- The Fifth Secret Ray: The Exhortation Mysteries.
Mother Mary said that when a sufficient number of people would have established their daily ritual of reciting these rosaries, she would dictate the Fourteenth Rosary, “The Mystery of Surrender” which has been dictated and published.
Mother Mary also gave a new rosary for children called “A Child’s Rosary to Mother Mary,” with the following admonishments:
Beloved ones, I AM ever in your heart in the nearness of the flame. My desire to seal you in purity, in the will of God and in the perpetual awareness of the life that is in you can be fulfilled by your free will each day as you commemorate the rosary with me. I have placed into the heart of the Mother a rosary for children, which many adults will also find appropriate. This rosary will be an abbreviated rosary, somewhat shorter than the one that is given, so that none may have the excuse of not giving the rosary because it is too long but that all of you will be able to give at least a rosary each day that satisfies the request in the hour of Fátima.
The request for the giving of that rosary, then, is not exempted from the children of any age. For the children, the blessed children have immense hearts of light and are magnificent God-free beings at inner levels....
Beloved ones, let it not be again, then, that we must come to remind you of the daily giving of the rosary. These are not words. These are the energies upon which the very salvation of the United States of America, of this hemisphere and this planet rest.[6]
See also
For more information
Elizabeth Clare Prophet, Mary’s Message for a New Day. Includes complete text of the Scriptural Rosaries for the seven rays and the eighth ray.
Elizabeth Clare Prophet, Mary’s Message of Divine Love. Includes complete text of the Scriptural Rosaries for the five secret rays.
A Child’s Rosary to Mother Mary. Audio recording of all 62 of the child’s rosaries.
Sources
Elizabeth Clare Prophet, Mary’s Message for a New Day