Skip to content
1765 Regina Begin the Thirty Days

Regina Tools free, private, no account

The Holy Rosary.

Today’s mysteries, prayed bead by bead: the Scripture of each one, the grace to ask for, Latin if you wish, and an intention for every decade.

What the Rosary is

The Rosary is a prayer of the Gospel. While the lips say the Our Father and the Hail Mary, the heart looks at one mystery of the life of Christ at a time, with his mother beside us. St John Paul II, taking up a phrase of his predecessors Paul VI and Pius XII, called it “a compendium of the Gospel” and asked that it be prayed in families (Rosarium Virginis Mariae 1, 41). It asks for nothing but time, and it fits the shape of a woman’s day: a decade on a walk or while the house is quiet, a few in the car, all five on a quiet evening.

The Church is a bride and a mother, and Mary is her perfect image. To pray the Rosary is “to contemplate with Mary the face of Christ” (St John Paul II, Rosarium Virginis Mariae 3): to keep his words and ponder them in your heart as she did, and to bring the people you love into that gaze, one decade at a time.

How to use this tool

  1. Open today’s mysteries. The tool chooses them by the day of the week, the order St John Paul II proposed: Joyful on Monday and Saturday, Sorrowful on Tuesday and Friday, Glorious on Wednesday and Sunday, Luminous on Thursday. On the Sundays of Advent, Christmas and Lent it follows a common custom and says so (an older form of this custom is printed in Lasance, With God, 1911, p. 709). On a solemnity whose mystery is in the Rosary, such as Christmas or the Assumption, and through the Octave of Christmas, it sets the mysteries of the feast. You can always choose other mysteries.
  2. Offer each decade. Under “Your intentions,” give each decade to someone: the people you love by name (your husband or your children, if you have added them to your profile), the holy souls, your own needs, or anything you type.
  3. Pray. Each prayer has its own screen. Tap Next, or tap a bead on the ring to move. Turn on Latin, the Scriptural Rosary (a verse of Scripture before each Hail Mary) or Contemplate (the words fall away and only the mystery and the beads remain).
  4. Keep your record. Every finished decade is counted. Five decades in a day, in one sitting or through the day, keep that day. A missed day ends a run and the next day begins a new one; your longest run stays. The record is only a help to perseverance: the Church warmly commends the Rosary but obliges no one to pray it, and asks that no one be made to feel guilty for not praying it (Directory on Popular Piety and the Liturgy, 2001, 202).

How to pray the Rosary

Make the Sign of the Cross and say the Apostles’ Creed. Say one Our Father, three Hail Marys (many offer them for an increase in faith, hope and charity) and a Glory Be. Then for each of the five mysteries: name the mystery, say one Our Father, ten Hail Marys and a Glory Be; many add the prayer “O my Jesus,” which Sister Lucia said Our Lady taught the children of Fatima in 1917; Fatima is a private revelation the Church has approved, so the prayer is welcome but never required. After the fifth decade say the Hail, Holy Queen, its versicle, and the closing prayer, and end with the Sign of the Cross. The Litany of Loreto is often added after the Hail, Holy Queen; it is its own prayer, not part of the Rosary (Directory on Popular Piety and the Liturgy, 2001, 203).

The twenty mysteries

The Joyful Mysteries

  1. The Annunciation (Luke 1:26–38)
  2. The Visitation (Luke 1:39–56)
  3. The Nativity (Luke 2:1–20)
  4. The Presentation in the Temple (Luke 2:22–40)
  5. The Finding in the Temple (Luke 2:41–52)

The Luminous Mysteries

  1. The Baptism of the Lord (Matthew 3:13–17)
  2. The Wedding at Cana (John 2:1–11)
  3. The Proclamation of the Kingdom (Mark 1:14–15)
  4. The Transfiguration (Matthew 17:1–8)
  5. The Institution of the Eucharist (Luke 22:14–20)

The Sorrowful Mysteries

  1. The Agony in the Garden (Luke 22:39–46)
  2. The Scourging at the Pillar (John 19:1; Isaias 53:5)
  3. The Crowning with Thorns (Matthew 27:27–31)
  4. The Carrying of the Cross (Luke 23:26–32)
  5. The Crucifixion (John 19:17–30)

The Glorious Mysteries

  1. The Resurrection (Matthew 28:1–10)
  2. The Ascension (Luke 24:50–53; Acts 1:6–11)
  3. The Descent of the Holy Ghost (Acts 2:1–11)
  4. The Assumption of Mary (defined by Pius XII, Munificentissimus Deus, 1950)
  5. The Coronation of Mary (Apocalypse 12:1)

The fruits named for the Joyful, Sorrowful and Glorious Mysteries are those printed in Fr F. X. Lasance’s prayer book With God (1911). St John Paul II proposed the Luminous Mysteries in 2002, leaving them to the freedom of each person and community (Rosarium Virginis Mariae 19); no fruits for them come down from older tradition, so the ones in the tool are ours, drawn from his own description of each, and the tool says so.

Questions

Which mysteries do I pray today?

By the weekly order St John Paul II proposed: Monday and Saturday Joyful, Tuesday and Friday Sorrowful, Wednesday and Sunday Glorious, Thursday Luminous. He wrote that this order is “not intended to limit a rightful freedom,” so any mysteries may be prayed on any day. On a solemnity whose mystery is in the Rosary, such as Christmas or the Assumption, the tool sets that feast’s mysteries first, because the liturgy of the day comes before the weekly order (Directory on Popular Piety and the Liturgy, 2001, 200); through the Octave of Christmas it sets the Joyful Mysteries.

Can I pray just one decade?

Yes. Choose “Pray one decade.” Decades prayed through the day add up, and five keep the day.

Where is my record kept?

On your device, in your browser’s storage. Nothing is sent to us unless you turn on Regina Key sync; then an encrypted copy is kept on our server so your other devices can fetch it, locked with your key so that we cannot read it. Without sync or an export, clearing your browser’s data clears your intentions and record too.

Sources

The meditations are our own words, written for 1765 Regina.

Further reading in the Library: How to Pray the Rosary, Step by Step · Seven Sorrows of Mary: Meaning and Chaplet · The Queenship of Mary: Why She Is Queen