Why Not the Luminous Mysteries?

Donald P. Goodman III

We are often asked why our materials on the Holy Rosary (such as the simple guide to the Rosary and the Rosary devotional) do not include the so-called “luminous mysteries”. The simple answer to this might be, “Because we want the Rosary as it was handed down to us, and traditionally the luminous mysteries were not included.” However, as some have questioned this decision, both out of curiosity and sometimes out of hostility, this little post should help to answer the question.

The Short Answer

Because it's not traditional, and it essentially breaks the Rosary, which is no longer “Our Lady's Psalter”, thus ending one of its oldest and most important elements.

The Long Answer

See below.

Table of Contents

Introduction: Where Did the Rosary Come From?

This is not an extensive scholarly article; this is merely a summary of research that has been done much more exhaustively elsewhere. But a brief history of both the traditional origin of the Holy Rosary, and the historical facts that can be otherwise ascertained, are in order.

The Traditional Account: St. Dominic Receives the Rosary from Our Lady

Traditionally, it is said that St. Dominic, earnestly seeking to refute the Albigensian heretics prominent in southern France in his day, prayed to Our Lady for her assistance. In answer to his prayer, the Blessed Virgin taught him the Rosary and told him to spread its devotion among the people, which he did; and the rest, as they say, is history.

However, none of the contemporary biographers of St. Dominic mention this story, or indeed make any reference that can be even obliquely interpreted as referring to the Rosary. To the modern historian, this means that the story is a myth, that it almost certainly didn't happen; however, that conclusion clearly doesn't follow. For one thing, if this devotion was preached only to laymen, rather than to other monks or clerics, it's likely that his contemporary biographers wouldn't mention it; they were much more interested in his actions against the heretics, his rule for his order, and so forth. Second, there are actually excellent reasons for believing this account to be at least partially true. We will look at only one: the constant testimony of the liturgy and pontiffs of the Church.

The tale is very clearly established in the liturgy of the Church as well as in papal documents. For example, in the traditional breviary for the feast of Our Lady of the Most Holy Rosary, the fourth reading states the following:

[Dominic] cried for help with his whole soul to that Blessed Maiden, whose glory the falsehoods of the heretics so insolently assailed… [i]t is said that he had from her a word, bidding him preach up the saying of the Rosary among the people, as a strong help against heresy and sin… That this same Dominic was the founder and prime mover thereof hath been said by Popes in diverse letters of the Apostolic See.

This last note, that popes have also agreed with this attribution of the Rosary to St. Dominic, can perhaps be best illustrated by the great Leo XIII, in his encyclical Supremi Apostolatus Officio; there, Leo states that St. Dominic worked to spread “that devotion which he was the first to institute under the name of the Holy Rosary.”

So the tradition of St. Dominic receiving the Holy Rosary seems well established[*]; interested readers are encouraged to seek the full justifications for this conclusion in the linked reference. That doesn't mean, of course, that all the elements of the Rosary were entirely new when she gave it to him. There were, of course, historical precedents; and historically, we can determine at least the following.

Historical Facts about the Origins of the Rosary

We know historically that many of the elements of the Holy Rosary go back to before St. Dominic, some very much before. The use of beads to count prayers, for example, goes back thousands of years, well predating Christianity in general, and in fact spreads through many religions. The number of the beads varies, but the use of the beads is very widespread.

In Christianity, these were frequently used to measure how many psalms have been said, since the psalms are the Christian prayer par excellence. For this reason, the number of beads has largely been one hundred and fifty. (Other strings of beads have been used, of course; one had seven groups of seven, for example. But one hundred and fifty is the common configuration.)

For the lay faithful, however, the psalms are often too burdensome, or the believer may not know them or not have the texts available. So, in imitation of the one hundred and fifty psalms, one hundred and fifty shorter prayers were said in their place. Originally, this was commonly the Our Father; when the Hail Mary became commonplace, however, it often took the place of the Our Father, allowing the faithful to have their own sort of psalmody that was still within their means and knowledge. This practice was widespread by at least the twelfth century, and may well be considerably older.

Because this practice of praying one hundred and fifty Hail Marys derived from the number of psalms, the Rosary has long been known as “Our Lady's Psalter”; indeed, Pope St. Pius V's Consueverunt Romani Pontifices explicitly calls it “the Psalter of the same Blessed Virgin Mary” (Psalterium ejusdem B. Mariæ Virginis). This notion of the Rosary being Our Lady's Psalter is therefore a vital aspect of the devotion.

And here we already have most of the Holy Rosary as we know it, eight hundred years ago.

The last element of the Holy Rosary, the meditation on the mysteries, is younger, but still of very impressive antiquity. If we believe the traditional tale, it dates back to St. Dominic, some seven and a half centuries ago; if we don't, then the concept goes back historically at least to Dominic the Prussian, a Carthusian monk, who introduced the idea in the early fifteenth century. His mysteries were not those that we currently pray, but the idea of contemplating mysteries during the prayers was certainly established by his time.

So, to sum up the antiquity of the elements which make up our modern rosary, as verifiable by secular history:

The use of beads to count one hundred fifty prayers.

The beads, nearly as old as prayer itself; the number, well-established in Christianity for time immemorial.

The prayers primarily being counted are the Hail Mary.

The twelfth century, or eight to nine hundred years ago. Explicitly called “Our Lady's Psalter” as early as 1569.

The meditation on certain mysteries during this prayer.

The fifteenth century, or approximately six hundred years ago.

So the Holy Rosary, as a complete devotion, is at least six centuries old. The customary story about Our Lady giving the rosary to St. Dominic may be incomplete, but if so, it's incomplete because elements of the Holy Rosary are actually older than St. Dominic, not younger; they arose before he was born, perhaps as much as a century before.

Furthermore, it's important to note that the Holy Rosary is not a papal invention. By the time any pope made public mention of the Rosary, the prayer was already well established. The Pope recognized the Rosary, encouraged the Rosary; he did not formulate the Rosary or regulate the Rosary.[*] In its elements, it is a creation of the Christian faithful themselves, developed over centuries into a complete and perfect whole; in its full form, it may well be a creation of Our Lady herself.

The Holy Rosary through the Centuries

So we have examined the origins of the Holy Rosary; let us nw examine its nature, at least how it has been for the vast majority of its history.

The Rosary's origins establish it to be, by nature and by more or less universal agreement, “Our Lady's Psalter,” a sort of psalmody dedicated specifically to the Blessed Virgin, where each psalm is a Hail Mary, and during each sequence of ten Hail Marys a mystery is named and meditated upon. While there was some variation early on (mostly with the fifth glorious mystery), the configuration of the mysteries is as follows:

Joyful Mysteries

1. Annunciation / Incarnation
2. Visitation
3. Nativity
4. Presentation
5. Finding in the Temple

Sorrowful Mysteries

1. Agony in the Garden
2. Scourging at the Pillar
3. Crowning with Thorns
4. Carrying of the Cross
5. Crucifixion

Glorious Mysteries

1. Resurrection
2. Ascension
3. Descent of the Holy Ghost
4. Assumption
5. Crowning of Mary

Again, while there was some variation (for example, in some places, the fifth glorious mystery was the general resurrection of the dead), this set of mysteries was remarkably consistent for a popular devotion that arose on its own and which had never been authoritatively formalized. At least by the time of the Protestant Revolt, this sytem was everywhere firmly established.

This traditional set of mysteries was so firmly established, in fact, that a great mass and variety of devotional material grew up around it. Most importantly, of course, the work of St. Louis Marie de Montfort, spanning from True Devotion to Mary to The Secret of the Rosary to his Total Consecration to Our Lady, built a great system of devotion to Our Lady focused centrally on her psalter. But while these were the most important, they were far from the only ones. Our own The Holy Rosary: A Devotional is based off an old work by Michael Gray of the archdiocese of Portland, but far more important works were dedicated to the Rosary under the aspect of these fifteen mysteries; some popular, some profoundly scholarly.

For only one example, the legendary Edouard Hugon published his Sanctity through the Rosary (in the original language, Le Rosaire et la sainteté) in 1948. The work could not possibly express the holiness and efficacy of the Rosary in stronger terms:

[T]he Rosary is the epitome of all Christianity. All that we believe is contained in it. In the very first Mysteries we meet with the Blessed Trinity and the Incarnation. The Rosary is… the memorial of the life, passion, death[,] and resurrection of Our Lord. We dwell on the truths of our last end in the Glorious Mysteries, where they are unfolded in a striking and practical manner. The Rosary, then, is theology, but theology which prays, adores, and says by each of its dogmas: Glory be to the Father, to the Son, and to the Holy Ghost.

In addition to works of devotion like St. Louis de Montfort's and Hugon's, we have many papal statements of the greatness of the Holy Rosary in the above fifteen-decade form. We have already mentioned Pope St. Pius V, whose Consueverunt Romani Pontifices declared the Rosary to be “the Psalter of the same Blessed Virgin Mary” (Psalterium ejusdem B. Mariæ Virginis) and attached to it special indulgences. While it would be far too great a labor to name every time the Roman pontiff had noted the Holy Rosary, one will be particularly instructive. Leo XIII, in Supremi Apostolatus Officio in 1883, noted that

[I]t is clearly evident that this form of prayer [the Rosary] is particularly pleasing to the Blessed Virgin, and… is especially suitable as a means of defence for the Church and all Christians.

Leo XIII considered the Holy Rosary (again, in its fifteen-decade Our Lady's Psalter formulation) so incredibly important to the Church that twelve of his encyclicals were on the topic!

And it is worth noting the paean written by St. Louis Marie de Montfort, in The Secret of the Rosary, on this format of the Holy Rosary, with its fifteen mysteries:

They are fifteen flaming torches to guide our steps throughout this earthly life. They are fifteen shining mirrors which help us to know Jesus and Mary and to know ourselves as well. They will also help light the fire of love in our hearts. They are fifteen fiery furnaces which can consume us completely in their heavenly flames.… These are the fifteen fragrant flowers of the Mystical Rose Tree; devout souls fly to them like wise bees, so as to gather their nectar and make the honey of a solid devotion.

Such was the high perfection in which the popes, the saints, and all devout Catholics held the Holy Rosary, Our Lady's Psalter.

The Holy Rosary as Practiced Through the Centuries

It was, of course, always encouraged to pray all fifteen mysteries, one full Our Lady's Psalter, at a given time. This takes about an hour normally; much, much less time than to pray the literal Psalter, but still a good amount of time to spend in contemplation of the mysteries of our salvation. However, even this is often beyond the time commitments or fruitful patience of the layman, and consequently a less demanding custom arose.

Most Christians praying the Holy Rosary are praying five decades, rather than fifteen; that is, one-third of a Rosary in a given sitting. This takes about twenty minutes, and is within the reach of nearly everyone. To the question of which five mysteries to pray on a given day, a simple system has long been in force:

Monday and Thursday

Joyful Mysteries

Tuesday and Friday

Sorrowful Mysteries

Wednesday and Saturday

Glorious Mysteries

Sunday

Either the Glorious Mysteries again, or the mysteries corresponding to the current season. E.g., the Joyful Mysteries during the Christmas season; the Sorrowful Mysteries during Advent and Lent; the Glorious Mysteries during the Easter season; and so forth.

This system is ingenious for a few reasons. First, in many cases it allows the Holy Rosary to correspond to the liturgical season. Second, it ensures that on the appropriate days of the week, appropriate mysteries are prayed. For example, on Fridays, the day of the Crucifixion, the Sorrowful Mysteries are prayed; on Saturdays, traditionally Our Lady's day, the two mysteries that concern her most centrally (the Assumption and her Coronation) are prayed. Third, it ensures that every week two full rounds of Our Lady's Psalter are completed, with an additional third added for the extra day.

All this was rolling along very nicely; the Rosary even survived the tumult of the period following the Second Vatican Council. The architect of the Novel Rite, Annibale Bugnini, had a plan for butchering the Rosary, which was rejected by Pope Paul VI. It is important to reflect on this point: Pope Paul VI, who had no trouble whatsoever drastically altering the form of the rite of Mass itself, refused to change the form of the Rosary. While the Mass is incomparably more important, most of the faithful experience the Rosary much more often; it is daily central to their experience of the Faith, while comparatively few are able to enter daily into the Mass. The Rosary, Our Lady's Psalter, could not be changed; it would be far too disruptive to the life of the faithful.[*]

Enter the Luminous Mysteries

John Paul II released his apostolic letter Rosarium Virginis Mariæ in 2002, finally going where even Paul VI feared to tread: changing the Rosary.

Now, as observed earlier, the papacy hadn't produced the Rosary, nor had it regulated or reformed the Rosary, so its position on changing the Rosary is a bit difficult to discern. Nevertheless, John Paul made his declaration:

[T]he origin of the prayer… was based on the number 150, the number of the Psalms in the Psalter. I believe, however, that to bring out fully the Christological depth of the Rosary[,] it would be suitable to make an addition to the traditional pattern.

Let us consider these words carefully. Pope John Paul was fully aware, evidently, of the vital link between the number of Aves in the Rosary and the number of Psalms; and he had just spent some considerable paragraphs on how wonderful the Rosary is as a prayer. Nevertheless, he himself thinks that the Rosary, which was sanctified by countless saints, a dozen encyclicals of Leo XIII, the victory at Lepanto, the immensely fruitful missionary work of St. Louis de Montfort, and a literally uncountable stream of Christians who had prayed and contemplated its mysteries for eight centuries, isn't good enough yet; it needs the improvement of Pope John Paul II before it can “bring out fully [its] Christological depth”.

And so, though leaving whether to pray them “to the freedom of individuals and communities”, good John Paul established the so-called “Luminous Mysteries” of the Rosary:

Luminous Mysteries

1. The Baptism of the Lord
2. The Wedding in Cana
3. The Proclamation of the Kingdom
4. The Transfiguration
5. The Institution of the Eucharist

He also noted, of course, that the addition of a fourth set of mysteries made the previous daily progression of mysteries impossible to follow, so he proposed the following as a solution:

Joyful Mysteries

Monday and Saturday

Sorrowful Mysteries

Tuesday and Friday

Glorious Mysteries

Wednesdays and Sundays

Luminous Mysteries

Thursdays

Good John Paul gave no real justification for needing additional mysteries, other than pointing out that the Rosary doesn't include “the mysteries of Christ's public ministry between his Baptism and his Passion”. This is true, of course; but the Rosary could not possibly include all the mysteries of Christ's ministry, even with the addition of five new mysteries. Even with the addition of these luminous mysteries, the Rosary does not include the healing of the lepers; the walking on water; the institution of any of sacraments other than the Eucharist; the fasting in the desert; and so forth. It is simply impossible for the Rosary to include all the mysteries of Christ's life; we must simply include some, and the fifteen that we had always included seemed sufficient for one devotion for centuries.

So while no real justification for the luminous mysteries was given, other than that John Paul himself thought that they'd be a good idea and solved a problem that nobody had noticed existed,[*] the luminous mysteries were adopted by large numbers of Catholics purely on the strength of John Paul's recommendations. But are the luminous mysteries really a good idea? What, if anything, is wrong with this proposal?

What's Wrong with the Luminous Mysteries?

Well, nothing, per se; they are all worthy topics of meditation. But that is not the material point here. Nobody disputes that they are mysteries; the question is whether they should be (or even, according to some, must be) a part of the Rosary.

The answer is no; they should not be a part of the Rosary. In fact, when the Rosary is prayed with the luminous mysteries as well as the other fifteen, it cannot meaningfully still be called “the Rosary”; it's some other prayer with some other spiritual inspiration.

The Luminous Mysteries Break Our Lady's Psalter

We have already seen that the fundamental inspiration of the Holy Rosary is to form a special psalter for Our Lady, “Our Lady's Psalter”. We saw how it arose from the desire of the laity to pray the psalter and to give honor to Our Lady; we saw the Rosary explicitly called Our Lady's Psalter by Pope St. Pius V. That's what the Holy Rosary is: a type of psalter, with Hail Mary prayers taking the place of the psalms.

One of the greatest works of devotion on the Holy Rosary, St. Louis de Montfort's The Secret of the Rosary, points out that the Rosary

has always been called the Psalter of Jesus and Mary. This is because it has the same number of Angelic Salutations as there are Psalms in the Book of the Psalms of David. Since simple and uneducated people are not able to say the Psalms of David[,] the Rosary is held to be just as fruitful for them as David's Psalter is for others.

The Rosary being one hundred and fifty prayers is not just a happy coincidence; it is fundamental to what the Rosary is. When you lose that psalter aspect, you lose the Rosary.

Adding five more mysteries completely breaks this fundamental inspiration. We now have two hundred prayers, not one hundred and fifty; the underlying relation to the psalter is no more. With twenty mysteries, the Holy Rosary is no longer Our Lady's Psalter; it is therefore no longer the Holy Rosary, but some other devotion, even if we continue to call it by the same name.

The truly difficult aspect of this is that John Paul himself proposed these additional mysteries “without prejudice to any essential aspect of the prayer's traditional format”. But the addition of mysteries is a prejudice to the prayer's traditional format; it is completely and fundamentally at odds with that format. Of course, adding fifty more Hail Marys to the Rosary, ruining its one-hundred-and-fifty symbolism of Our Lady's Psalter, does prejudice an essential aspect of the prayer's traditional format; however, good Pope John Paul does not address, or even acknowledge, this prejudice in any way.

The Luminous Mysteries Break the Weekly Rhythm

We have seen that most people pray only five decades a day, and that a traditional sequence of mysteries arose determining which five mysteries would be said on which days. John Paul, of course, also proposed a sequence which would permit his new mysteries to be prayed along with the traditional fifteen. So what, if anything, is wrong with this new system?

The Luminous Mysteries Result in Fewer Rosaries

The traditional sequence of the mysteries ensured that two full fifteen-decade Rosaries were prayed every week, with an additional third thrown in on Sunday. Some Catholics choose to pray a full fifteen-decade Rosary on Sunday to make it three, but this was by far the minority view, so we will set that aside for the moment. The traditional sequence was two full Rosaries, plus a third of another, per week; for now, we will rest it there.

The new sequence is inferior because it doesn't ensure two full rosaries a week; there are less than two prayed, in fact. This is required by the nature of numbers: seven days a week, divided by four sets of mysteries, is less than two. There's really no way around it.

Furthermore, since the traditional sequence is ruined, one set of mysteries—the luminous themselves—are only prayed once a week. This means that, really, we are only praying one full cycle every week, with three-quarters of the full unit prayed twice.

Fewer Rosaries is not as good as more; this sounds trite, but it's the case. Our Lady has made it very clear to us that she wants us to pray more Rosaries, not less. Of course, we could all pray a full Rosary every day, with either system, but that is not the common practice in use in either case. To establish a system deliberately that results in fewer Rosaries is truly counterproductive.

Saturday as Our Lady's Day is Damaged

Saturday has always been considered a day specially devoted to Our Lady; indeed, in the traditional Office, when no other feast overrides it, Saturday receives a special office for Our Lady on Saturday, Sancta Maria in Sabbato. No one disputes this; indeed, John Paul justified moving the Joyful Mysteries to Saturday because “Saturday has always had a special Marian flavo[]r”, and argued that the Joyful Mysteries are “mysteries in which Mary's presence is especially pronounced.”

He's not entirely wrong, of course; Our Lady's presence is pretty pronounced in the Joyful Mysteries. However, all of those mysteries are fundamentally Christological:

Annunciation / Incarcnation

Enough said: the fundamental mystery here is that Christ, the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity, was made flesh in the womb of Our Lady. No one would deny Our Lady a vital role here, and fruitful meditation on this mystery certainly includes meditation on her acceptance of her role in our salvation. But the mystery is about Christ.

Visitation

This is really about Our Lord's first coming to His people, which He did while in the womb of His Mother, Mary. It includes the rejoicing of John the Baptist at the proximity of Our Lord, and it is itself an act of virtue on the part of our Blessed Mother. But once again, it is Christ coming to His people that is the mystery.

Nativity

Obviously, the central role of this mystery is Christ being born in humble circumstances for our salvation. Mary is involved; we will think about her; she is important for our understanding of the mystery. But is is about Christ fundamentally, and not primarily about her.

Presentation in the Temple

Here we contemplate Christ coming to the temple after His birth to be presented to the Father, and the lack of the price paid for His redemption from the temple, demonstrating that He belongs to the Father, and in fact is one with the Father. He is presented by the hands of Mary, but He is the center of this mystery.

Finding the Temple

Again, while it is Our Lady who found Him in the temple, the import of the mystery is that Christ was there, that Christ was about His Father's business, that Christ grew in wisdom and understanding before God and man, and that Christ submitted Himself to them. Mary (and St. Joseph, of course) are important parts here; but the mystery is about Christ, not fundamentally about them.

Two mysteries of the Rosary, though, are primarily about Mary; Mary is the central piece of these mysteries. Of course, in a certain sense every mystery of the Rosary is about Christ; none of them have any importance without Him. But she, Our Lady, is especially prominent in two mysteries, which consist in her glorification for Christ's sake. They are the final two Glorious Mysteries: the Assumption and the Coronation of Mary.

Yet, despite the Assumption and the Coronation being her (literally) crowning glories, the luminous mysteries move them permanently away from Saturday, her special day! This makes no sense.

The Glorious Mysteries should be on Saturday, Our Lady's Day, so that her greatest glories may be remembered then.

The Proposed Weekly Rhythm Makes No Sense

The traditional weekly rhythm for the Rosary is very logical: it goes, twice over in a week, the order of Christ's own life. The Joyful Mysteries, containing His Incarnation, Birth, and early life; the Sorrowful Mysteries, containing His Passion; and the Glorious Mysteries, all that happened thereafter. Monday, early life; Tuesday, suffering; Wednesday, glory; Thursday, back to early life; Friday, suffering; Saturday, glory.

The luminous mysteries throw this entirely out of whack. On Sunday, we must pray the Glorious Mysteries; otherwise, we are only praying them once a week. We have already seen that this prevents observance of the liturgical year in the Rosary. But this is often the custom even with the traditional Rosary; still, things get worse from there.

Monday through Wednesday, all is well; we have the same pattern as in the traditional Rosary. Early life; suffering; glory. On Thursday, though, we are thrust into the middle of Christ's life, with the luminous mysteries. We then proceed to His suffering on Friday, and then backwards, to His early life on Saturday. Then, as if this temporal whiplash wasn't enough, we proceed directly past His middle life and suffering all the way back to His glory on Sunday!

The total abandonment of sensible chronological order when the luminous mysteries are introduced is a real problem.

The Luminous Mysteries Prevent Observance of the Liturgical Year in the Rosary

We have seen that many Catholics use Sundays as a day to pray the mysteries which correspond most to the liturgical season; e.g., during Advent and Lent the Sorrowful Mysteries are prayed, during Christmas and Epiphany the Joyful, during Easter and Pentecost, and the time after, the Glorious. While not universal (many Catholics also simply pray the Glorious Mysteries on Sundays, since it is the day of the Resurrection), this is a common practice, and one very praiseworthy, since it unites the Catholic more closely with the liturgical year.

The addition of the luminous mysteries makes this a much less attractive option. Because the Glorious Mysteries are no longer prayed on Saturdays, it is difficult to justify not praying them on Sundays: that would relegate them to only one day a week, which gives them overly short shrift.

So these new mysteries make a salutary practice more or less impossible, a clear mark against them.

The Luminous Mysteries Detract from the Symbolism of the Three Traditional Groups of Mysteries

The three traditional groups of mysteries have a great many symbolic meanings, which the introduction of a fourth set completely destroys. We'll examine a few of them here.

The Epiphany and the Gifts

We know that, at the Epiphany, the Magi came to Christ and offered Him three gifts: gold, frankincense, and myrrh. These three gifts signified the three aspects of His life: gold, because He is a king; frankincense, because He is God; and myrrh, because He was to suffer. Three gifts, three aspects of life.

The three traditional groups of mysteries are remarkably correspondent to these three aspects. While the correspondence is not perfect, and there is substantial overlap, this is a valuable source of reflection.

The Joyful Mysteries are the gold brought by the Magi: the signification of His kingship. We see Him fulfilling the prophecies of the King Who is to come: that a Virgin would conceive; that He would be born in the City of David; that He knew the law of Moses as required of the Davidic kings.

The Sorrowful Mysteries are the myrrh; there is no elaboration needed here.

The Glorious Mysteries are the frankincense, as we see Him cap His ministry with the aspects of Godhood. He rose from the dead, a thing possible only for God. He ascended into Heaven, free now from any bodily necessity. He sent a Paraclete to be His Minister to His people on earth. And He can glorify others in Heaven, taking His Mother up with her body and soul, and crowning her as Queen in Heaven, an authority only available to God.

When the luminous mysteries are added, there is no correspondence here; the symbolism is ruined. No Our Lady's Psalter; no three stages of Christ's life. This is, again, a negative.

The Three Persons of the Trinity

There isn't any comment really necessary here; the three sets of mysteries honor the Three Persons of the Blessed Trinity. Lest I be accused of being too trite here, St. Louis de Montfort recognized this in The Secret of the Rosary.

It is also representative of the Church Militant, Church Suffering, and Church Triumphant; but shortly we will see this more clearly.

The Life, Death, and Glory of Christ

The Joyful Mysteries represent the life of Jesus: the life that He spent in quiet obscurity in Nazareth, happily dwelling with His Mother and foster-father St. Joseph, learning and plying the trade of the carpenter, enjoying the most perfect family life. This is our example for the vast majority of us: to life an ordinary life well.

The Sorrowful Mysteries represent the death of Jesus: the horrifying suffering which He endured for our salvation.

The Glorious Mysteries represent the glorification of Jesus: the glorious Resurrection, the Ascension into glory, the corresponding glorification of His Blessed Mother, the sending of His Spirit to guide His Church.

Once again, introducing a fourth set of mysteries destroys this symbol.

The Three Stages of the Interior Life: Purgative, Illuminative, Unitive

The Psalms, after which the Rosary is, of course, patterned, have traditionally been divided into three groups: the first, for the purgative life; the second, for the illuminative life; and the third, for the unitive life. These are also the three traditional stages of the interior life in general, or the three stages of perfection, by which we advance to join with God.

In the purgative stage, the soul has gained justification, but still needs to purge itself of wicked passions, venial sins, and similar imbalances. The soul therefore undergoes suffering, whether voluntary or imposed; mortification of the body, fasting, austerities, conformity of the will to the Will of God. Perhaps counterintuitively, this corresponds to the Joyful Mysteries of the Rosary. The soul contemplates in these mysteries the peaceful life of Christ in the ordinary paths of life. This stage is the acquaintance of the soul with the Divine, like a “spiritual courtship”. We desire what we see and pursue it, but there are still many things to which we are attached.

In the illuminative stage, the soul still falls into venial sin, but it has largely detached itself from gravely disordered passions. The contemplation of the Passion of the Lord is proper to the illuminative stage of life, though obviously it is greatly profitable in the other stages, as well, particularly the purgative. We begin to understand that the spiritual life consists of sorrow as well as of joy, that our mortifications sometimes seem to bear little if any fruit. If the purgative stage is the “spiritual courtship”, the illuminative stage is the “spiritual betrothal”, where we are firmly attached and preparing for spiritual marriage. This stage, then, is associated with the Sorrowful Mysteries, since it is by tribulation that the soul's continued purgation of wordly attachments brings it toward union with God.

Finally, in the unitive stage, the mind is at peace and union with God; this is the “spiritual marriage”. The Glorious Mysteries are uncontroversially the set associated with this stage. The soul has traveled through the acquaintance of the purgative stage, arisen from the sorrows and tribulations of the illuminative stage, and has arrived at the peace of possession of the Divine. The soul has risen from the death of tribulation; it has ascended toward the Divine and received the Holy Spirit, which has descended upon it; and it glories with Our Lady in her proximity to her divine Son.

We see the same pattern in the three stages of our own salvation. During life, in the Church Militant, we are in the purgative stage. While in Purgatory, in the Church Suffering, we endure tribulation to advance toward union. And then, of course, in Heaven, the Church Triumphant, we are in the unitive stage, as one with our Creator.

There are elements of all three stages in all Christian lives, of course, but the mystics all hold to this pattern. Yet the introduction of the luminous mysteries mean we no longer see this correspondence in our spiritual lives as we proceed through the Rosary (twice, and then some, each week). Instead, we see no correspondence to the spriitual life; yet another aspect of the devotion is gone.

The Third Luminous Mystery is Substantially Out of Character of the Others

No matter what the new mysteries were, adding additional mysteries to the Holy Rosary, already a perfect devotion, would have been a bad idea. But the third luminous mystery, the proclamation of the kingdom, is strange and out of character from the others.

The mysteries of the Rosary are specific, individual events that occurred at definite times. However, this “mystery” isn't really a mystery, per se; it's a general theme of the preaching of the Gospel throughout Christ's life. When one mystery among twenty should be so general and vague, rather than a concrete, specific instance, the theme and character of the devotion is broken.

The Luminous Mysteries Make Historical and Traditional Devotional Materials Obsolete

As we noted above, huge amounts of devotional and spiritual materials have been written about the Holy Rosary; almost all of it, including the greatest works of devotion, were written for a Rosary of fifteen decades. St. Louis de Monfort, Hugon, and countless others have guided the faithful for centuries through the Holy Rosary, and all had a Rosary of fifteen mysteries.

The addition of a new set of mysteries makes all this obsolete; at best, incomplete, and at worst inaccurate. This is a huge loss for the spiritual lives of the faithful, a loss entirely avoidable, should we just leave the Holy Rosary, which is not broken, alone.

The Luminous Mysteries Make Full Physical Rosaries Unwieldy

A minor point, to be sure, but nevertheless worth making. Most of us carry five-decade Rosaries; but the fifteen-decade Rosary does exist. It is large, sometimes worn as something like a cincture over a habit, or displayed on a wall as a gesture of piety, but it exists. The luminous mysteries make these Rosaries obsolete; they are neither shortened conveniently like a five-decade, nor complete like a twenty. They are just useless. To make a twenty-decade Rosary, on the other hand, would be quite unwieldy. There is no upside here.

The Luminous Mysteries Make Praying a Full Rosary at a Time Too Burdensome

As mentioned, praying a full traditional rosary of fifteen decades takes about an hour, an amount of time that many cannot spare on top of their other duties. But sometimes, perhaps on Sundays or special feasts, they may; perhaps during a long commute, or during a lunch break, the convenient unit of time of an hour may be seized for contemplation and prayer, and this is a very worthy practice.

The addition of a fourth set of mysteries extends the time of prayer to an hour and a third, should the whole prayer be said at once. This adds an additional burden to the faithful, one that means an hour is now insufficient. This will often make the praying of the entire Rosary too burdensome.

Conclusion

So the luminous mysteries should not be prayed as part of the Holy Rosary. They essentially break the Rosary, making it into something else entirely; they turn the Holy Rosary which has been handed down into a different prayer, one which bears a resemblence to the true Rosary but which still just isn't it.

The Holy Rosary wasn't broken when it was received by St. Dominic; it wasn't broken when it was preached by Blessed Alan; it wasn't broken when Christendom prayed it for victory at Lepanto; it wasn't broken when it was praised by Leo XIII; it wasn't broken when Paul VI refused to mangle it; it wasn't broken in 2002; and it's not broken today. It is a perfect prayer, the perfect embodiment of Our Lady's Psalter, and augmentation with additional mysteries ruins it rather than improves it.

The Holy Rosary is not broken; don't try to fix it. Pray it as it is.

Replies to the Common Objections

Whenever bringing up the luminous mysteries, one will inevitably be accosted by the same objections in their support. Some are misguided; some mistake the nature of our objections to them; some are straw men; some are simply wrong. We'll go over the most common replies to our position here.

What's Wrong with Meditating on These Mysteries?

Obviously, nothing; everyone should meditate on these mysteries. But they should not be meditating on these mysteries in the Rosary; that is the material point.

This is perhaps the most common objection made to those who oppose the luminous mysteries: the claim that we are somehow opposed to the mysteries themselves. But that is a straw man. We would be equally opposed to any similar addition; we oppose their addition into the Rosary, not meditating upon them simply.

There are dozens of chaplets and devotions which focus on different aspects of our Faith; there is a Franciscan “rosary” with seven decades, for example, for the seven joys of Our Lady. It would have been totally unremarkable to recommend a chaplet in which these five “luminous” mysteries, or any set of mysteries, are the subjects of meditation. But it was unnecessary to break the Holy Rosary by attempting to shoehorn new mysteries into it.

But the mysteries haven't always been the same!

Absolutely true! Though they have been mostly the same (a remarkable achievement, given how organically the Rosary developed, free from central direction or formulation), there has been some variation in a few of the mysteries.

But there has never been variation in their number. The fifth Glorious Mystery perhaps was sometimes this, sometimes that; but there have always been fifteen mysteries, because that gives rise to one hundred and fifty Hail Marys, which is necessary for the Rosary to be Our Lady's Psalter.

It doesn't matter that, early on, some people had a slightly different set of fifteen mysteries (remember that we've all had the same ones for centuries, even so); they still had fifteen. That's how many keeps it a psalter.

But we change the Rosary all the time! Didn't Our Lady of Fatima ask us to add the Fatima prayer to the end of every decade?

Of course, and we add it. And some Catholics add prayers to the end of the Rosary, too, after the Hail, Holy Queen. It is generally customary at this point to pray St. Michael's prayer then, and prayers for the intentions of the Pope are pretty universal.

But these do not alter the fundamental structure of the Rosary. With or without the Fatima prayer, the Holy Rosary consists of one hundred and fifty Hail Marys, in honor of the hundred and fifty psalms, and contemplation of a given mystery during each unit of ten such. It is fundamentally Our Lady's Psalter, for that reason.

When we start to add mysteries, though, we're breaking the whole point: it's no longer Our Lady's Psalter. It's now something else.

Doesn't the Pope have the Authority to Change the Rosary?

This is a tough question. The Rosary is a popular devotion. The Pope has the authority to suppress devotions which are contrary to the Faith, and to promote those which are conducive to it; but does he have the authority to suppress a devotion which he himself admits is, in fact, conducive to the Faith? Does he have the authority to require that the faithful adopt a private devotion?

Interesting questions that we do not have to answer here. Whether the Pope has authority to change the Rosary or not, he himself declared that his proposed addition was optional. There is nothing wrong with agreeing with him that it is optional, and rejecting his proposed changes for whatever reason; either because they do not comport with local practice, or because our devotions are quite caught up in the traditional practice, or because the proposed changes are simply a bad idea.

Isn't it better to contemplate these mysteries than to chain ourselves to numerical symbolism by insisting on one hundred and fifty prayers?

This question ignores the fact that there are many, many reasons to reject the additional mysteries without even considering the number of one hundred and fifty, as explained above. But even on its own terms, the answer to the question is “no”. Let's examine.

Let us consider a triangle. A triangle is a perfect shape all by itself; there is nothing wrong with it. It has three sides, it has three angles, the sum of the angles inside it is equal to two right angles. It's a triangle; it's fine.

But then someone sees the triangle, likes it and thinks it's great, but has a problem: it's crooked. He wants a straight shape. So he adds another side to the triangle; he makes sure it's the same length as the other sides. He says that this additional side better gets across the two-dimensional nature of the polygon.

What he has made is perfectly valid; what he added, the side, is good. But it's no longer a triangle.

Similarly, there is nothing whatever wrong with the luminous mysteries; in fact, they are good and holy and should be contemplated. They are like the extra side above. But when we add them to the Holy Rosary, we no longer have the Holy Rosary; we've got some new, four-sided creation.

So asking whether we should be “chained to numerological significance” is like asking whether a triangle should be chained to three. The answer is yes: that's what a triangle is. Similarly, the Rosary is Our Lady's Psalter; that's what it is. A different number makes a different thing.

Do You Just Hate St. John Paul II?

No. But that doesn't mean that every idea that popped out of his head was brilliant. He made mistakes, too; this was one of them.

Isn't it Prideful to Reject a Suggestion from a Sainted Pontiff?

It might be, and it might not be; are there non-prideful reasons for rejecting such a suggestion? I suggest that there are many; and provided that the non-prideful reasons are the reasons, then no, it is not prideful to reject a suggestion, even from a sainted pontiff.

That said, what John Paul did was decide that a devotion which was eight centuries old, spread over the whole world, had produced countless and even miraculous fruits, and had been praised unreservedly by his own predecessors was, in fact, imperfect; that nobody had noticed this imperfection for a full eight hundred years; but that he, John Paul II, had noticed it, and was just the man to fix it. One might determine that such a view is, itself, prideful.

When faced with the united and unbroken devotion of centuries of Christians, explicitly endorsed by the hierarchy dozens of times, even popes should approach with a healthy dose of humility.

In any case, this objection is always raised very selectively. If one were to point out that this logically requires us all to attend the Traditional Latin Mass, since Pope St. Pius V not only suggested it but also mandated it, suddenly the piety of a suggestion from a sainted pontiff becomes debatable. Less drastically, a whole slew of popes recommended specifically the fifteen-decade Rosary, including Pius V and Paul VI, who have also been sainted; is it prideful to accept the recommendation of one over the recommendations of countless others?

* An excellent exploration of this legend, and why we should believe it, can be found in the book by Fr. A. M. Skelly, O.P., St. Dominic and the Rosary.

* It is often claimed that Pope St. Pius V, in Consueverunt Romani Pontifices, formalized the fifteen mysteries we now know. Your author believed this himself; however, he reviewed the original text of the bull and could find this nowhere in it. He is forced to conclude that the bull merely recognized what existed; it did not establish it. (It also, of course, instituted a variety of indulgences and benefits for the Holy Rosary.)

* Obviously, the change in the form of the Mass was far more disruptive than changing the Rosary could have been; but the fact that this perception was there speaks volumes on the importance of the Holy Rosary.

* It is often pointed out that John Paul didn't actually invent these mysteries, and that is partially true. George Preca, a Maltese priest that John Paul himself canonized, proposed the addition of five “mysteries of light” in 1957. These were not exactly John Paul's luminous mysteries; they were: (1) baptism and the fasting in the desert; (2) Jesus revealing Himself as God by word and miracles; (3) the Beatitudes; (4) the Transfiguration; (5) the Last Supper. But they are obviously pretty close to what John Paul eventually proposed. Still, these mysteries had no real adoption anywhere in the world until John Paul's proposal in 2002, and the same criticisms apply to Preca's as do to his: there was nothing wrong with the Rosary, it did not need to be fixed.