If saying the rosary is your only faith activity, does it still work?

Sister Maxine   

We have one more question here. And it comes in from Christie in Los Angeles and Christie writes: “My older sister Angela and I were raised Catholic, but we only did Catholic things until we were 18. That's when we got jobs and left home and didn't have to go to church because our parents made us. Angela’s almost 30 now, and she has had some really hard times. She told me that two years ago she started saying the rosary on her way to work. And she still does at least one rosary and sometimes two per day. I'm really surprised by this because she doesn't go to church or anything else. Just the rosary. But does the rosary work if it's the only faith activity you do?  

Thank you for the question, Christie, and it sounds like you and your sister have been in quite a bit of conversation, maybe especially as you recognize those hard times in her life and she shares that with you. The rosary is a wonderful devotion, one I know that, Shannon, you like a lot as well.   

Sister Shannon   

I do. It's a prayer that brings us to a place of quiet and comfort. I think that’s because t’s the repetition of a prayer over and over again, it almost acts like a mantra in our hearts. It's a prayer that consoles. It's a prayer that slows us down. It’s a prayer asking Mary to help us in our lives. That really gives comfort and that's an important part of it.

Sister Maxine   

And for people who may not be familiar with what a rosary looks like and what the prayers are, there's a lot of resources on the Internet that describe the sequence of prayers on a rosary. I'll include a couple links in the podcast for people who might be interested in that.

Sister Shannon   

It's a sacramental that really is something you can grasp and hold on to, and it directs your prayer. So as you move through the beads, you say the prayer we call the Hail Mary. On each one of those beads, you count it out, as it were, as you move along the beads, and it keeps you centered on your relationship with God and  there's goodness in that.

Sister Maxine   

I know a lot of people, including one of my family members—she can pray a rosary on her way to work and one on her way back. I don't know if that's what Angela is doing. But for someone who, like Angela, has had some hard times, I think the rosary could be especially meaningful because of the connection with Mary.

Sister Shannon   

I think that's really where the whole connection resides. Mary is one of us, she is like us, a human. We know her as mother, as the mother of the Savior, and she's approachable. In that sense, we have great devotion to the way that she lived her life. We recognize the choices that she made were very difficult. When she was a young woman and God asked her to be the mother of Jesus, then we saw how she lived her life. She walked with him. She witnessed his crucifixion and death. She did not lose hope. And if she can do, it so we. She has the comfort of a mother, which is why I think the prayer works so well. We’re asking Mary to pray for us to God to help us.

Sister Maxine   

It’s with the confidence that she herself, as you had mentioned Sister Shannon, was through those tough times. A lot of times, I think when we're in difficult moments, we feel isolated and we feel very alone and frightened. It helps to just have somebody with us. We have people in our families, of course, but sometimes it takes someone like Mary to step into our life. We open the door to her and welcome her into our life, knowing that we aren't alone in the struggles that come with our humanity.

Sister Shannon   

The ending of the prayer, the Hail Mary, is “Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners now and at the hour of our death.” We really seek her prayer for us. We believe that the connection between Mary and Jesus is so incredible that she intercedes on our behalf. I think about all the times I wanted to ask my dad something and I wanted my mom to do it because there's something about going to your mom [light laughter]. I think it's also really important for our listeners to recognize--because sometimes there's some confusion about this--that we as Catholics don't honor Mary as if Mary was God, but we invoke her as an intercessor on our behalf, in much the same way that I might say, as I'm leaving today, “Keep me in your prayer, Sister Maxine.” We say the same thing to Mary: “Pray for us. Keep us in your prayers. Don't let us stumble. Help us to enter into a deeper relationship with your son.”

Sister Maxine   

And in that way, we're looking at Mary as mother and sister and friend and companion. You were mentioning earlier, Sister Shannon, the book that you're reading right now.

Sister Shannon   

Yes, it's written by Elizabeth Johnson, and it's called Truly Our Sister. It examines the life of Mary and her role in the Church, and how significant she is for us as Catholics. I think many traditions, for example Muslims, honor her in much of the same way that we do. And that notion of her being truly our sister is a powerful one, because she is, as the Hail Mary prayer says, “blessed among women.” She's one that we can look to as a model for how we might live our lives, seeing the choices that she made: her saying yes to God at such an early age, and then her follow through, with all of the challenges and the difficulties that were involved in being the mother of Jesus.

Sister Maxine   

So, to Christie's ending question….

Sister Shannon   

Yes….

Sister Maxine   

Let's go there! So, if it's the only faith activity you do, does the rosary, really work? Is it effective? Is it doing what it's supposed to do?

Sister Shannon   

I think that's really the heart of the question that Christie is asking us--what's the value of this for her sister. She comments that her sister still doesn't go to church, per se – the institutional forms of gathering as a community for worship. Well then, what's the value of this rosary? And I think she's curious herself if she should start to do this, and if will it work for her.

Sister Maxine   

I thought maybe it was just me reading into that, but I feel the same way! For Christie, does she see the value there—does she see something in her sisters that’s different, and so maybe she wants to try. So, Christie, that might be something to think about! 

Sister Shannon   

Yes, it’s interesting that you asked the question “Does the does the rosary work.” I'm not sure what “work” means in that instance--what your expectations are. As you said earlier, Max, a lot of our questions on the podcast today are about what are our expectation. But I do think that what prayer does, whether it's the rosary or some other form of prayer, is that it brings comfort. First, it enables us to begin to develop a relationship with God, and that's an important thing. And it plants within us the seed or the desire to one day, perhaps, rejoin the community of faith to find people that are like-minded. Is the rosary a springboard to bring your sister or yourself back to going to Church every Sunday? I don't know. But could it bring you the kind of comfort that makes you realize there's more here in the Catholic faith and that maybe it's time to take it up again as an adult and to think about what that means.

Sister Maxine   

“As an adult” is the key phrase there. Christie mentions that she and Angela did the Catholic thing only until they were 18. And what we realize in our lives is that we cannot live a fully adult faith life with an adolescent faith. We have to allow our faith to grow along with the whole rest of our lives. And the fact that whatever happened there, before the age of 18, was a powerful enough thing that the rosary came back into Angela's life.  

Sister Shannon   

The things I've witnessed many times over the years--I've seen it in my own family--a child is raised up in the Catholic faith, and they go to church and they maybe even go to a Catholic school or they go to catechism and they have faith, and then at 18, when they abandon all external controls, faith is one of the things that they throw out with the bathwater. But when it comes to them having their own children, oftentimes that's what brings them back. They recognize the value of community. They want their child to be a part of something bigger than themselves, and they will begin to turn back toward their faith, for the children.

Sister Maxine  

A bit earlier, when you were talking about some of the things we associate with prayer, there’s an often- overlooked part of that. When we pray, even with a rosary, which is a form of recited prayer, even with prayers that we pray more spontaneously, they are ways of articulating the things, or trying to, that are in our heart. Whether it’s a prayer of petition, or a prayer of thanksgiving—we’re articulating something important for our own selves to hear.

Sister Shannon 

I’m with you very much there! I don't think that God cares what prayer form we take. It's about that connection, that communication, that acknowledgement that God is a part of our lives and a part of everything that happens and is walking with us. I wonder if that alone isn't the comfort that Angie gets from praying that rosary as she's driving. God’s calming her heart in her spirit before she goes to work, and she's recognizing that God is with her and walking with her and in the car with her and going to be with her throughout the day and whatever is going to come next.

Sister Maxine   

To continue with that, for two years Angela’s been praying the rosary on her way to work. When Christie asks, how do you know if it's working, well, it’s doing something for Angela because otherwise she would not persist in that.

Sister Shannon   

Yes, we would abandon it. We would find other things to do--turn on the radio or listen to a book or whatever. But there's something about that connection with God that Angela has that starts her day.