rosary prayers

Jesus asks that His disciples to “pray unceasingly.” (Luke 21:36) This is a hard command and requires great discipline in both the mind and body. Essentially to pray unceasingly is to “be perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect,” (Matt 5:48) for it is constantly keeping at the forefront of one’s mind and heart the twofold commandment: “love God and your neighbor.” (Luke 10:27) Prayer is putting these commandments into action.

To aid in a personal and perpetual active relationship with God, the Church has Mass offered daily; this is the highest form of prayer. Additionally, the Church has laid out holy hours to bring her members into prayer all throughout the day and night. These moments are called the “holy hours” or “Divine Office". These hourly prayers are divided into four categories: morning (lauds, terce), daytime (sext, none), evening (vespers, compline) and night prayers (matins).

“From ancient times the Church has had the custom of celebrating each day the liturgy of the hours. In this way the Church fulfills the Lord’s precept to pray without ceasing, at once offering its praise to God the Father and interceding for the salvation of the world.” – Office of the Sacred Congregation for Divine Worship. more...

“Our souls are restless until they find their rest in Thee.” - St. Augustine

Life isn’t easy. Each one of us has difficulties that we must work through in order to reach a place of peace and joy— which ultimately, is happiness. On our own, we can wander around in the desert, say for 40 years, as did the ancient Israelites, or we can follow the maps as received via the Church.

The Rosary being one of these maps will give us graces to persevere, the ability to find solutions to the challenges we face, and will help us reach our goals much sooner. By praying the Rosary, we are making an act of faith that no matter what happens, we will trust in God, do our best, live out our calling, and thus, serve God and others, fulfilling the twofold commandment of love: love God and your neighbor. more...

Rosary booklets are not necessary for praying the Rosary, but they are a helpful aid as they provide explanatory and even meditation points on the Rosary and Rosary Mysteries.  They have a twofold purpose: they are educational, and they help keep the focus on what is being prayed. more...

The Our Father Prayer, also known as the Lord’s Prayer, is the prayer said at the beginning of the Rosary directly after The Apostles’ Creed, and is right before the three Hail Marys.  It is also the prayer that begins each decade.

Catholics, and even non-catholic Christians, claim that the Our Father is the most beloved of prayers in the Catholic Church’s treasury; it was taught to the Apostles by the Second Person of the Trinity, Jesus Christ. (Matt 6:9-13)  Since the Our Father is the response to the Apostles’: “teach us to pray, ” we can be assured that it is powerful and is the most perfect of prayers. There is so much depth to this prayer that The Catechism of the Catholic Church devotes one of its four parts to examining it.  Many argue that it is the summary of the gospels. St. Augustine and St. Thomas Aquinas praise it: more...