BEAD BY BEAD

BEAD BY BEAD:
MEDITATIONS ON THE ROSARY,
The Sorrowful Mysteries
BAR

The Sixth Mystery: The Agony in the Garden
The Fruit: Perfect Sorrow for Sin

1. After Christ had partaken of the Supper with His Apostles and conferred upon them their priestly powers and they were about to receive Holy Communion, Judas, resolved to betray his Master resolved not to partake of the Sacred Species if at all possible. He was able to depart without the other Apostles knowing and made for the pharisees and Jewish priests.

2. Our Redeemer left the Cenacle with the Eleven for the Mount of Olives by crossing the torrent of Cedron (John 18:1) and into the Garden of Gethsemane. He told the Apostles to wait for Him there (Matth, 26:36) while He went up further to pray; He left eight of them there, taking with Him Saints Peter, John and James.

3. Being with the three Apostles He raised His eyes up to the Eternal Father confessing and praising Him as was His custom; while interiorly He prayed in fulfillment of the prophecy of Zacharias, permitting death to approach the Most Innocent of Men offering Himself anew to the Eternal Father in satisfaction of His Justice for the rescue of the human race; and He gave consent, that all the torments of His Passion and Death be let loose over that part of His Human Being which was capable of suffering. From that moment He suspended and restrained whatever consolation or relief would otherwise overflow from the impassable to the passable part of His Being. so that in this dereliction His Passion and Sufferings might reach the highest degree possible.

4. The Eternal Father granted these petitions and approved this total Sacrifice of the Sacred Humanity.
This prayer was as it were the floodgate through which the rivers of His Suffering were to find entrance like the resistless onslaught of the ocean, as was foretold by David (Ps. 68:2). And immediately He began to be sorrowful and feel the anguish of His Soul and therefore said to the Apostles: "My Soul is Sorrowful unto Death" (Mark 14:34).

5. He threw Himself with His Divine Face upon the ground and prayed to the Eternal Father: "Father, if it be possible, let this Chalice pass from Me" (Matth. 24:38). This prayer Christ Our Lord uttered, though He had come down from Heaven with the express purpose of really suffering and dying for men; though He had counted as naught the shame of His Passion, had willingly embraced it and rejected all human consolation; though He was hastening with most ardent love into the jaws of death, to affronts, sorrows and afflictions; though He had set such a high price upon men, that He determined to redeem them at the shedding of His Life-blood. Since by virtue of His Divine and human wisdom and His inextinguishable love He had shown Himself so superior to the natural fear of death, that it seems this petition did not arise from any motive solely coming from Himself. ... This agony of Christ Our Savior grew in proportion to the greatness of His charity and the certainty of His knowledge, that men would persist in neglecting to profit by His Passion and Death (Luke 22:44).

6. His Agony increased to such an extent, that great drops of bloody sweat were pressed from Him, which flowed to the very earth. Although this prayer was uttered subject to a condition and failed in regard to the reprobate who fell under this condition; yet He gained thereby a greater abundance and secured a greater frequency of favors for mortals. Through it the blessings were multiplied for those who placed no obstacles, the fruits of the Redemption were applied to the Saints and to the Just more abundantly, and many Gifts and Graces, of which the reprobates made themselves unworthy, were diverted to the Elect. The human will of Christ, conforming itself to that of the Divinity, then accepted suffering for each respectively: for the reprobate, as sufficient to procure them the necessary help, if they would make use of its merits, and for the predestined, as an efficacious means, of which they would avail themselves to secure their salvation by co-operating with grace. Thus was set in order, and as it were realized, the salvation of the Mystical Body of His Holy Church, of which Christ the Lord was the Creator and Head.

7. As a ratification of this Divine Decree, while yet Our Master was in His agony, the Eternal Father for the third time sent an Archangel to the earth in order to comfort Him by a sensible message and confirmation of what He already knew by the infused science of His Most Holy Soul; for the Angel could not tell Our Lord anything He did not know, nor could he produce any additional effect on His Interior Consciousness for this purpose.

8. While Our Savior occupied Himself in praying to His Father for the spiritual salvation of the human race, the perfidious disciple Judas sought to hasten the delivery at Christ into the hands of the priests and pharisees. At the same time Lucifer and his demons, not being able to divert the perverse will of Judas and of the other enemies of Christ from their designs on the life of Christ their Creator and Master, changed the tactics of their satanic malice and began to incite the Jews to greater cruelty and effrontery in their dealings with The Savior. ... the devil was filled with great suspicions lest this most extraordinary Man be the Messias and The True God.
At the instigation of Judas they hastily gathered together a large band of people to apprehend the Most Innocent Lamb, Who was awaiting them and Who was aware of all the thoughts and schemes of the sacrilegious priests, as foretold expressly by Jeremias (Jer. 11:19). All these servants of malice, bearing arms and provided with ropes and chains, in the glaring torch and lantern light issued forth from the city in the direction of Mount Oliveto; while They were approaching, the Lord returned the third time to His Apostles and finding them asleep spoke to them: "Sleep ye now, and take your rest. It is enough: the hour is come; behold the Son of Man shall be betrayed into the hands of sinners. Rise up, let us go. Behold he that will betray Me is at hand" (Mark 14:41). They arose and Jesus went with them to join the other eight Apostles.

9. Judas advanced in order to give the signal upon which he had agreed with his companions (Matth. 26:48), namely the customary, but now feigned kiss of peace, by which they were to distinguish Jesus as the One Whom they should single out from the rest and immediately seize. The traitor then ran up to the Meekest Lord, and, as a consummate hypocrite, hiding his hatred, he imprinted on His countenance the kiss of peace, saying: "God save Thee, Master." By this so treacherous act the perdition of Judas was matured and God was justified in withholding His grace and help. On the part of the unfaithful Apostle, malice and temerity reached their highest degree; for, interiorly denying or disbelieving the uncreated and created wisdom by which Christ must know of his treason, and ignoring His power to destroy Him, he sought to hide his malice under the cloak of the friendship of a true Apostle; and all this for the purpose of delivering over to such a frightful and cruel death his Creator and Master, to Whom he was bound by so many obligations. In this one act of treason he committed so many formidable sins, that it is impossible to fathom their immensity; for he was treacherous, murderous, sacrilegious.

10. The soldiers asked Him if He was Jesus of Nazareth and He said "I am He." (John 18:5). They continued to wait as if not certain Whom it was before them. Jesus again said that he was Jesus of Nazareth. Peter, having possession of a sword, drew it and struck one of the servants, Malchus, of the high priest and cut off his right ear. And Jesus said to Peter: "Put up thy sword ... the chalice which My Father hath given Me, shall I not drink it?" (John 18:8-11). And they led Him away to Annas, the father-in-law of Caiphas the high priest.

HOME-----------MARY'S INDEX------------PRAYER INDEX

www.catholictradition.org/Mary/mystery6.htm