This article is part of the Marian Mondays Series, a weekly reflection on the mysteries of the rosary by Jonathan Conrad, owner and founder of The Catholic Woodworker. Subscribe to have these reflections and more sent straight to your inbox every week.
In the third Sorrowful Mystery, the Crowning with Thorns, we meditate on the moment when Roman soldiers crowned Jesus with thorns to mock and humiliate Him before His crucifixion.
Here’s how it’s described in the Gospel of Mark:
“They clothed him in purple and, weaving a crown of thorns, placed it on him. They began to salute him with, ‘Hail, King of the Jews!’ and kept striking his head with a reed and spitting upon him. They knelt before him in homage. And when they had mocked him, they stripped him of the purple cloak, dressed him in his own clothes, and led him out to crucify him.”
Jesus, the King of Kings, chose this crown of thorns over the crown He truly deserved in His earthly life. He did this so that we might never be despised, mocked, ridiculed, or misunderstood in our own lives more than He was in His.
It’s one thing to know this truth and it’s another to take it to heart in our own lives. And that’s where meditating on this mystery gives us the chance to reflect on the thorns present in our own lives, whether they’re moments of humiliation, suffering, rejection, or something more.
As I see it, there are the hard things in life that we’re excited about doing and then there are the true thorns: those things that anger and disgust us and cause discouragement. What are those thorns we don’t want and actively reject? Can we pray for the courage to bear them well and be sanctified through them?
And when these thorns feel like too much, we can take comfort knowing that Jesus has already won victory over sin and death. When we experience the things that Christ experienced, even if in only a small way, we can ask to receive the grace of moral courage to persevere as Christ did at His crowning.
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