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Foreign Mark Mary with Franciscan Friars of the Renewal and this is the Rosary in a Year podcast, where through prayer and meditation, the Rosary brings us deeper into relationship with Jesus and Mary and becomes a source of grace for the whole world. The Rosary in a Year is brought to you by Ascension. This is day 190. To download the prayer plan for Rosary in a year, visit ascensionpress.comrosaryinayear or text RIY to 33777. You'll get an outline of how we're going to pray each month, and it's a great way to track your progress. The best place to listen to this podcast is in the Ascension app. There are special features built just for this podcast and also recordings of the full Rosary with myself and other friars. No matter what app you're listening in, remember to tap, follow or subscribe for your daily notifications. Today we will be meditating upon and praying with the second joyful mystery, the Visitation. And as we began yesterday and we'll continue today, I'm going to begin the episode by reviewing some of what we've covered to this point, and then we will briefly be reminded of the four Rs and then go into prayer. The four Rs again are what truth is being revealed about God that you're being invited to receive? How can you respond? What grace would you like to request for the response? And then we rejoice. So a couple of the major themes that have stood out to me for the visitation are, first of all, looking at Mary as the new Ark of the covenant. If you remember, In Exodus chapter 40, God comes to dwell with his people in the form of a cloud upon the tent of Meeting and the Ark. The Ark was this place of God's dwelling of God's glory, the place where God met with his people, and it's where he leads his people and he brings them to victory. And in the Annunciation we saw Mary being overshadowed by the Holy Spirit, that as the Incarnation takes place in the womb of Mary. Now Mary is this new Ark, this new meeting place between God and His people. But specifically for the visitation, we looked at Luke chapter one, verses 39:56, and we saw all those parallels between the visitation in 2 Samuel 6 where David is leading the Ark back to Jerusalem, right? And there's these parallels that make it obvious that Luke is making this connection, that as Mary arose and went to the hill country. Also in 2nd Samuel it says David arose and went with all the people to bring up from there the Ark of God. David expresses his unworthiness before The Ark. And Elizabeth says, why is it granted me that the mother of my Lord should come to me? David dances before the ark, like John the Baptist leaps for joy. And so this is that first theme that's really important of the ark of the covenant. And the new ark is Mary's overshadowed. And that Mary herself, as Jesus lives in her womb, is this place of meeting, this place where God will lead his people to victory. And also in our visitation, we looked at, if you remember, how for some situations and some occasions, like prose is not enough, poetry is needed, and just speaking is not enough, but song is needed. And we reflected on this pattern in the visitation that begins with like, a conversation, but it leads to, right, Mary's magnificat, this poetic song of praise. And we see in the magnificat this great song of Christian praise and poetry, and that before the marvels of God, the mysteries of our salvation, we need more than just narrative, we need more than just prose. We need poetry, and we need song to fully express our hearts and our joy. If you remember back to the story about my brother who saw the dolphins, like, it's a dolphin, It's a dolphin. Like. Like Elizabeth's, blessed are you among women. And then we see Mary, like, overcome with joy into this song. And in the visitation is our own invitation to song, to song before the mystery of our salvation, before the presence of the Messiah, and before the beauty and the goodness of the Blessed Mother. And one last bit of reflection for review today is, if you remember, we looked at the writing from Saint Alphonsus Liguori on the visitation of the Blessed Virgin, and that he sees in the visitation Mary fulfilling her office as mother. And what is her office? Her office is that of exercising charity. And that Mary is a mother, and that her office, her role, her call, the movements of her heart are towards charity. We saw how Mary, out of charity, right, comes to Elizabeth to be with her, because this is who she is and this is what she does as mother. She comes to us and she wants to be with us, and she wants to console us. And there's that beautiful prayer, one of Mother Mother Teresa's favorite prayers. Mary, be a mother to me now. Mary, be a mother to me now. And so today we see Mary as the new ark. We see this invitation to joy and song before the Blessed Mother. And also we have this encouragement, this source of confidence that Mary is a mother who loves to mother us. And that in our times of need, we can call to her like Saint Mother Teresa. Mary, be a mother to Me now. So now we'll just take a little moment of. Of stillness. We'll linger here a little bit before going into these four R's, A little bit of a guide for prayer from your own prayer from our review today. What is the grace, the truth being revealed that you are invited to receive? How can you respond? And particularly aimed at that response. What is the grace that you need? What is the grace that you would like to request and then rejoice? Give thanks to the Lord for this time of prayer, the grace that has been given and the life of God that has been shared. And now, together with Mary, let us pray in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.