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As Family of the Father, we've now released “The Mysteries of Light”, and are currently producing a music video of "We Are Your Rainbow" (see The Fourth Mystery of Light below).
It’s taken us 5 years from the time that the Mysteries of Light were first introduced by Pope John Paul II for us to finish them. As we grew up with the Joyful, Sorrowful, and Glorious Mysteries, we knew them well. But we needed to learn these new 5 mysteries before we could insightfully write The Mysteries of Light songs and meditations.
We spoke with members of the clergy both within and outside the Catholic tradition. We studied the Scripture, and, in the end, we discovered five components of a very beautiful, complete prayer – not just for Catholics this time, for all Bible-believing Christians. The completeness of this prayer is contained in the 5 referenced points of Scripture: reconciliation, petition, praise, empathy, and gratitude.
“The Baptism of Jesus” – The First Mystery of Light (Matt. 3:17)
Amazing Grace – a prayer of reconciliation
As prayer is conversation, healthy conversation begins with reconciliation. How can you and I have a meaningful conversation without first reconciling if I’ve hurt you? In whichever direction I may try to take our conversation, we’ll want to clear the air first about the hurt that I’ve caused you. Why should our conversations with God be any different? As we need to reconcile early in our conversations with each other, we need to reconcile with God early in prayer. We need to bring our true selves with both our strengths and weaknesses into our prayer.
“The Miracle at Cana” – The Second Mystery of Light (John 2:1-11)
Turn Our Water Into Wine – a prayer of petition
Persistence in prayer is as important as persistence in life. Jesus told us that. And an overwhelming message from the miracle at Cana was taught to us by Mary, who refused to settle for “It’s not yet my time.” She didn’t give up when Jesus said that. She went right over to the servants and told them to report to Jesus. She stayed with her prayer of petition and got what she was after, in the same that way we need to persist in our prayers.
“Jesus Proclaims The Kingdom of Heaven” – The Third Mystery of Light (Mark 1:15)
You Are My Heaven – a prayer of praise
Jesus said that heaven is like a treasure in a field that is so valuable someone will sell everything they own to buy it. God cannot be my God without being above all else to me. Saint Theresa wrote that her heaven began to grow within her here on Earth. We just need to look for it. We wrote “Come, Be My Treasure” as a song of praise to the One who creates our heaven within.
“The Transfiguration” – The Fourth Mystery of Light (Luke 9:29)
We Are Your Rainbow – a prayer of dependence & interdependence
Prayer is never just an exercise between me and God. It always leads to my brothers and sisters, even when I spend the majority of time asking for stuff just for me. While I may at times wish everyone around me were just like me, so they could be perfect, too; God doesn’t look at it that way. The Transfiguration demonstrated that we do not always see the complete reality. We need to see people as we are – as God sees us – as Our Father's wondrous rainbow. No one is impressed by a monochromatic rainbow. Our differences help make each of us more beautiful.
“The Institution of The Eucharist” – The Fifth Mystery of Light (John 13:1)
Washed By The Blood of The Lamb – a prayer of thanksgiving
The way in which someone says “Thanks” can tell us a lot. A whispered “Thank You” can be worrisome. “Are they just being polite?” Or is their loud, boisterous “Thank You” telling us that the gift truly hit the jackpot. Where songs of thanksgiving can cover the distance from a soft love song to a thunderous song of power, we felt that this song of thanksgiving should have all the gusto reserved for only our most important gift – a God who has sacrificed so much because of His love of us.
And if, at the end of these five prayers, we’ve had a very deep, powerful conversation with our God, what can be better than that?
The Rosary Tapes® is now a collection of the 20 events of the Rosary, (Joyful, Luminous, Glorious and Sorrowful), on 4 CDs. This collection includes meditations and prayers for the entire rosary along with Grammy-nominated music from Family of the Father, a contemporary Christian musical group from Michigan. Its author is Bill Gildenstern, and its composer is John Giaier.
It was the summer of 1992, and Bill was driving from his home in Saginaw to a business appointment in Detroit, praying the rosary. The beads got stuck in the track of the car seat that day, and he began to think, 'There must be a better way.' He'd just returned from a week at a Franciscan retreat center in Wisconsin.
Later, he remembers sitting at his desk. Before him was his desk, behind him, audio equipment; and he began to pray, "Lord, all my life I've always tried to do pretty much what I've wanted to do. Now, I want to do what You want me to do. Please tell me what You want me to do, Lord." As quickly as he made the prayer, all he seemed to hear was 'Turn around.' Bill turned around and stared at the audio studio, not knowing what to do with it. He recalls just asking God, "What do I do now?"
Then he got an idea. He'd create a tape of the rosary. Each decade would include meditations united with a song, reflecting the theme of that particular mystery. Bill had written award-winning lyrics in the commercial arena for years, and he felt the need to work with a top-notch composer to assure the quality of the tapes. And the name, John Giaier, came to mind. John had composed "Have You Driven a Ford Lately" and the two of them had written a number of musical images over the years for clients around the US.
With his wife, Kelly, Bill created a tape of the third Joyful Mystery - The Nativity - and used "Silent Night" to wrap the mystery. He wrote the meditations, tapped out the melody on the keyboard, and asked Kelly to sing the song, help him read the meditations, and recite the prayers. He knew that he would need a tangible example to sell the idea to John.
The next afternoon, Bill drove the tape to John & Debbie's home. He told John he had something he wanted to do. John wasn't all that receptive at first. So Bill suggested they ask his wife, Debbie, to listen to the tape that Kelly and Bill had made. Shortly after the 3rd Joyful Mystery began, Debbie asked them to leave the room, then began to cry while listening to the tape.
John remembers that, while he was somewhat surprised by Debbie's reaction to it, it took him a little time to warm-up to the idea. Shortly after Bill had played the tape for them, John was driving through the Sonoran desert. He found himself wishing that he'd had a tape like that to pray with; and the more he thought about it, the more convinced he was that t should undertake the project together. So, together Bill and John wrote the songs based on meditations that Kelly and Bill had written.
We released the Grammy-nominated Joyful Mysteries in October of1992. Shortly after, newspapers and radio and television stations around Michigan began writing stories about them. After Christmas, we began work on the Sorrowful & Glorious Mysteries Rosary Tapes. Upon their release, in July of 1993, The Detroit Free Press ran David Crumm's front page story, the wire services picked-up the story and fed it to media around the world. We began hearing from people from across the country and around the world. We're honored to have received a very nice thank you note from Pope John Paul II.
We've saved the many boxes of letters that've arrived over the years. To read many of those letters is to begin to understand the power of prayer, and the peace that God gives to those who simply spend time with Him. As the years went by, we began sensing a growing desire for more than audiocassettes. The CD era had arrived - everywhere. People were getting insistent that we release The Rosary Tapes on CDs. Of course, our response was "If you want them, pray that God finds a way for us to have them made." Somebody prayed, because on May 31, 2001, we released them - and more. We also re-mixed the Glorious Mysteries tape (CD) and then re-mastered all three.
We also opened a very large Rosary Tapes website so that most of the people in the world could download The Joyful Mysteries at about the same time. We've been told that over a million had been downloaded. David Crumm from The Detroit Free Press wrote our story, which was picked up by the wire services and sent around the world. When we called him later to thank him for the story, he told us about an interesting call he'd received from an office full of stockbrokers in New York's World Trade Center who had downloaded it and were all jubilantly praying with it in the office. Three months later, 9/11 brought them back to mind.
Unfortunately, enough band width for worldwide simultaneous downloading was extremely expensive. After a few months and hundreds of thousands of downloads, we had to turn off the switch for awhile. Later, we turned it back on with a lot less bandwidth, but still free downloading. So, if your download seems unusually slow, we apologize. You may wish to try again a little later.
Then, in 2002, the Mysteries of Light were introduced - in our eyes the perfect prayer. Much credit goes to John Paul II, who assembled those Gospel messages in a specific order into a very intense, beautiful prayer.
We'd like to take this opportunity to thank the many people who've contacted us over the past five years asking for our Mysteries of Light CD. Our response to them was always, "This project is in God's hands, and, if you'd like the CD released, please ask Him to help."
We believe in answered prayer.
