15 May Mysteries of the Devoted Masculine
Joyful Mystery of the Devoted Masculine
Sitting in a sacred grove, under the Tree of Life, the Maiden Mary conceives of the Holy Spirit.
Joseph of Nazareth weds Mary to shield her from the brutal force of the empire that would otherwise see an unmarried, pregnant maiden stoned to death. Joseph midwifes as Mary labors and he catches her son in his bare hands. With the guidance of angels her leads her and her newborn child to safety as they flee the campaign of the extermination of innocents. Joseph stands beside Mary when she sovereignly presents her son to the community. And, as the foster father of Mary’s child, he rears his wife’s son and trains Yeshua in the art of woodcraft. However, after the boy’s adolescence, after he was lost and then found in the temple, and before Yeshua begins his ministry, Joseph disappears from the story.
Sorrowful Mystery of the Devoted Masculine
Yeshua, finds himself alone in the garden, without his mother, without his foster father, without his lover. His disciples sleep while he agonizes in solitude. The sorrows of the empire are many, but foremost is the loneliness of strategic, systemic isolation. Captured, betrayed, humiliated, and tortured, Yeshua walks the path to his own death. He is adorned with the crown of forgetting which will erase all memory of his mother’s lessons. He carries a crossbeam of wood which he will be fastened to.
The man, as magnificent as a magnolia in full bloom, is felled.
Glorious Mystery of the Devoted Masculine
After the Crucifixion, Joseph of Arimathea retrieves Yeshua’s body and lovingly swaddles the son of Mary in fresh linen and spices. He places Yeshua’s corpse into the hollow earth, like a seed, and rolls a stone in front of the hole.
Legends tell us that Joseph of Arimathea carried a vessel containing the blood and sweat of the son of Mary overseas to what is now England. Possessing the relics of Yeshua, Joseph of Arimathea struck the earth with his staff and the wood took root, sprouted leaves, and blossomed.
The Great Mother’s Tree of Life is eternal. What is cut from its roots will rise again. “As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be. Amen.”