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World at Prayer blog
Reflections of Family and Faith
"The family that prays together stays together." - Venerable Patrick Peyton
The-Rosary-In-Our-Hands | family prayer
I’m so thrilled to be writing to you on this feast of Saint John Paul II. From the time I was born and up through college, Pope John Paul II was the only pope I knew. Looking back, he was the reason I started to have a love for the Rosary. Pope John Paul II’s last World Youth Day was in Toronto in 2002. As a thank-you to our parish for all the fundraising to go, I was inspired one day to write the Joyful Mysteries of the Rosary into short scripts. I created a production where the young adults and youth at my parish performed each Mystery, and the audience would pray the decade’s prayers in between each one. It was a “Living Rosary,” and it was beautiful. All this came about because of attending World Youth Day. After World Youth Day, in October of the same year, Pope John Paul II released the Luminous Mysteries with the start of the Year of the Rosary. I fell in love with these new mysteries and inspiration struck! This time, my brother wrote music to go along with the scripts I wrote for the Luminous Mysteries. I cast a small group of young adults and high school students from across the diocese to take part in what I called a “prayformance.” It was an incredible experience as my cast, the audience, and I became completely immersed in the Rosary. I was the director and producer, and also played the woman who washes the feet of Jesus in the Third Luminous Mystery, “The Conversion of Sinners and the Proclamation of the Kingdom.”
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Holy lives of inspiration | Why pray? | family prayer
Once upon a time, two families came to a Rabbi, wanting him to settle a dispute over boundaries over their land. He listened to the members of one family as they recounted how they had received this land as their inheritance from their ancestors and how it had been in their family for generations. They had maps and papers to prove it. Then, the Rabbi listened to the other family. Its members described how they had lived on the same land for years, working and harvesting it. They claimed that they knew the land intimately and that it was their land. They didn't have papers to prove it, but they had calluses and sore backs and the harvest and the produce of the land. The Rabbi looked at them both and backed away from between them. They turned on him and said, "Decide, Rabbi, who owns this land."
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The-Rosary-In-Our-Hands | family prayer
We are a family of six with no family living in the same state as us, which means we are a road-tripping family! Every year, we take at least two road trips, and sometimes more, depending on holiday schedules. Visiting extended family is a priority, and driving is the only way to keep it affordable. Each day we spend in the car traversing this beautiful country is not complete until we’ve prayed a Rosary. Life is hectic, and we don’t regularly pray a Rosary together as a family. But during road trips, we never miss. Once we’ve finished lunch, it’s Rosary time. Sometimes we leave after breakfast and sometimes we arrive before dinner, but we’re almost always eating lunch on the go. Having a designated time to pray rather than just hoping that we get to it has made it easy to remember and actually pray it. Since we’ve been so consistent with our Rosary schedule, at least half the time it’s my kids reminding me that it’s time for the Rosary!
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The-Rosary-In-Our-Hands | family prayer
I have always struggled with the Rosary, but it wasn't until I received some healing that my struggle turned into a desire. I was often reminded of the words that Jesus spoke to the Apostle John while on the cross: “Behold, your mother.” These words profoundly affected me as I longed for Mary to be my mother. I began focusing more on the Rosary, and as I closed my eyes to pray, I imagined that with each Hail Mary, I was handing Mary a beautiful rose that she would gracefully receive. By the end of the Rosary, Mary would be standing before me with her arms full of roses and a flower crown I had placed on her head.
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The-Rosary-In-Our-Hands | family prayer
Today, October 18, is a special day for my family. Two and a half decades ago, my oldest son was born. He came into the world on a night when our city was engulfed in a historic flood, the likes of which hadn’t been seen for over 100 years, and that seemed to set the standard for how his life would roll. He arrived at a time of high drama and adventure, and he never looked back. He’s the reason I developed a devotion to the Rosary. Trusting the Blessed Mother to Protect My Fearless Child When he was four years old, we moved to an old farm out in the country that had a huge, dilapidated red barn on the property. That barn was like a magnet for my son. He would talk about climbing the “ladder to nowhere,” a rickety old ladder barely hanging onto the side of the barn that used to lead up to the second-story loft, long since rotted away. His goal was to jump from the ladder onto a fraying rope hanging from the rafters and swing out over “the bottomless pit” — a hole in the flooring below that opened over old farm equipment, unused since the 1960s. It was the perfect enticement for a fearless young boy, full of adventure ... and a disaster waiting to happen.
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The-Rosary-In-Our-Hands | family prayer
Recognizing the place of the Blessed Mother in my life and the importance of the Rosary was a gradual process for me. I was blessed to be raised in a Catholic home, the youngest of seven siblings, and was fortified by the love of my mom and dad (60+ years) as well as an aunt who lived with us while growing up. The Catholic faith and the Mass were always important to my family. I was in rich soil. Mary Had a Special Role in Hearing Our Requests While I do not remember praying the Rosary on a regular basis during those early years, I do recall that we would go to Mary and pray the Rosary together when people in the family needed significant intercession. We trusted that Mary had a special role in hearing our requests and praying for us, presenting our petitions to her Son. One memory of praying together as a family was in early college. My sister-in-law was hemorrhaging after giving birth to my nephew, and we prayed the Rosary as a family, receiving a call shortly afterward that she would be okay (a doctor who was pioneering a way to help women in these situations just happened to be in town for a presentation and was called to help).
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