Somewhere around mile eight, I hit the Presentation again.
I run with a finger rosary. It's the only way I've found to pray consistently through a half marathon - my mind wanders, my legs burn, but my thumb keeps moving bead to bead. Over 13.1 miles, I cycle through the Joyful Mysteries multiple times. And each time I reach the fourth mystery - Mary and Joseph presenting Jesus at the temple - I'm a little more spent than the last.
That's when I think about the names.
I don't run alone. Not really. I carry people with me - their faces, their needs, their fears. A friend in the parish facing continued declining health with such grace. A homebound parishioner I visit who continues to suffer. A young person lost and searching. Parents watching a child make choices that terrify them. A friend and his wife carrying a difficult and uncertain pregnancy.
Before every race, I gather intentions the way you might gather supplies. I write them down. I hold them. And then I carry them - literally, physically, step by step across every mile.
This is what I'm offering. Not just my time or my effort, but my body. Romans 12:1 made literal: "Present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God."
The miles are the offering. The sweat is the incense. The names are the intention.
We call them the Joyful Mysteries, but spend some time inside them and you'll find sorrow woven through every one.
The Annunciation - Mary's yes is pure and whole, but she doesn't yet know what it will cost her. Her yes at the foot of the cross will be the same yes, only then she'll know.
The Visitation - Elizabeth's son will be beheaded. Mary's will be crucified. The joy of that meeting carries futures neither mother can see.
The Nativity - Born in poverty, laid in a feeding trough, already hunted by a king. Within weeks they'll be refugees.
The Presentation - Simeon takes the child in his arms and blesses God. Then he turns to Mary: "A sword will pierce your own soul too."
The Finding in the Temple - Three days of anguish, not knowing where he was. A preview of another three days to come.
The Joyful Mysteries aren't joy instead of sorrow. They're joy that knows sorrow is coming and says yes anyway.
This is why carrying sorrows through the Joyful Mysteries isn't ironic. It's the point.
When I pray the Presentation at mile eight, holding the names of people who are suffering, I'm not forcing something heavy into something light. The Presentation already holds it. Simeon's arms held salvation and announced the sword in the same breath.
Joy and sorrow aren't opposites in the Christian life. They're woven together like threads in a single fabric. You can't pull them apart without unraveling the whole thing.
Mary presented her son knowing he was destined for glory. She didn't yet know he was also destined for nails. But even then, in that temple moment, the shadow was cast. Offering always costs something. Presentation leads to piercing.
Picture a triptych in the Renaissance style. Left panel: Abraham binding Isaac on the altar. Center panel: a golden altar with a lamb. Right panel: Mary presenting Jesus at the temple.
Sacrifice and surrender across salvation history. The same thread, the same logic, the same costly yes.
Abraham lifted the knife. Mary lifted her son. Both offerings. Both surrenders. Both caught up into something larger than they could see.
And somehow - this is the part I can barely articulate - our small offerings get caught up too.
Paul writes in Colossians about "filling up what is lacking in Christ's afflictions." Not that Christ's sacrifice was insufficient. Never that. But that we're invited to participate. Our little dyings join his great dying. Our presentations join Mary's presentation. Our surrenders echo across that same salvation history.
The last few miles are always the hardest.
My legs are heavy. My mind wants to quit. The finger rosary keeps moving - bead to bead, mystery to mystery - and the names come back. The friend facing her diagnosis with grace. The homebound parishioner. The lost young person. The terrified parents. The friend and his wife carrying a difficult and uncertain pregnancy.
I'm not earning anything for them. I know that. This isn't transaction. But I believe - because the Church teaches and because something deep in me knows - that offering matters. That carrying matters. That presenting our bodies as living sacrifices actually does something in the economy of grace.
We call them mysteries for a reason. Not puzzles to be solved, but truths too deep to exhaust. Every time I return to the Presentation - on the course, in the Liturgy of the Hours, in the rhythm of Monday's rosary - there's more to discover. The mystery doesn't get smaller with familiarity. It gets larger.
Simeon held Jesus and saw salvation. Anna the prophetess spoke about the child to all who were waiting for redemption. The offering in the temple wasn't just ritual. It was encounter. It accomplished something.
Maybe my miles accomplish something too. Not because of me, but because of the One to whom they're offered.
Today is the Feast of the Presentation - February 2nd. It's also called Candlemas - the blessing of candles, the light coming into the temple. And because it falls on a Monday this year, it's also the day we pray the Joyful Mysteries together as a Church.
As I pray the Liturgy of the Hours today, I'll be thinking about mile eight. About the finger rosary. About the names I've carried and the names I'll carry again.
The Joyful Mysteries have room for all of it - the sorrow and the hope, the weight and the light, the piercing and the glory.
Present your bodies. Offer the miles. Carry the names.
And trust that somehow, in ways we can't see, it matters.
If this resonated with you, I'd be honored if you shared it with someone who might need to hear it.
Michael Halbrook is a Catholic deacon, husband, and father of four. He writes at DeaconMichael.net and sends a weekly email called Wednesday @ Lunch - reflections on faith, family, work, and life. Subscribe here.
