How to pray and meditate while saying the rosary?
Upvote:2
The Handbook of Prayers contains a number of meditations written by St. Jose Maria Escriva which put you and him in the place where Jesus and Mary are in that particular mystery. It is a lot like the Stations of the Cross in that regard, where in the short meditation, to be read before each decade, St. Jose Maria explains the feelings and thoughts a person might have when experiencing the things that Scripture and Tradition say happened during the events in the mysteries.
If you want to go even deeper, there is a meditation published on CatholicTradition.org which goes bead by bead which is adapted from Ven. Mary of Agreda's work "City of God" (a work detailing visions she received).
However, neither of these have the Luminous Mysteries.
As for the Saint's who have given their input into the matter of the Rosary, there's no better work than St. Louis De Montfort's The Secret of the Rosary which you can also find on CatholicTradition.org (or at TAN books). It's got writings from Bl. Alan De La Roche who revived what St. Dominic was handed from Our Lady herself. He also received visions and messages from The Virgin Mary on how and why to meditate on the mysteries of the Rosary:
She also taught it to Blessed Alan de la Roche and said to him in a vision: "When people say one hundred and fifty Angelic Salutations this prayer is very helpful to them and is a very pleasing tribute to me. But they will do better still and will please me even more if they say these salutations while meditating on the life, death and passion of Jesus Christ----for this meditation is the soul of this prayer."
But you're right, it is difficult to discern when you're meditating on the words and when you're meditating on the mysteries. Because St. Louis also wrote this, concerning the Our Father:
People who say Our Lord's Prayer carefully, weighing every word and meditating upon it, may indeed call themselves blessed for they find therein everything that they need or can wish for.
Nevertheless, it would seem that mediating on the Lord Prayer inbetween the mysteries is more important and that Bl. Alan also says that you can't possibly fathom the meaning of "Hail Mary" so it's a mystery within a mystery. The best advice I can glean from The Secret of the Rosary is that the meditation on the Hail Mary beads is mystery-related and the meditation between is on the meaning of the words of the Lord Prayer and other prayers.
Having attempted to put some of the word of St. Louis De Montfort into practice in praying the Rosary lately has greatly improved my understanding of what it means to pray the mysteries. There are several sections in the Secret of the Rosary which break down the parts of the Hail Mary and the Our Father. I believe the key to your question is in there. It's not the individual words themselves, but the parts of the prayer in reference to the mystery. The Hail Mary consists of two parts, the praise part and the petition part. So in reference to the mysteries of the Rosary, one can praise Our Lady with the frame of reference being the backdrop of the mystery you are mediating on, then ask her intercession with that same backdrop.
In any event, here is one more resource that could come in handy, St. Louis apparently taught many ways of praying the Rosary, so you might be be able to have your cake and eat it too, just not at the same time.
Upvote:2
How to pray and meditate while saying the rosary?
It is such an easy question to answer, but to really find a Catholic source that actually answers it seems next to impossible.
There are lots of books out there about the rosary. But most deal with the glories of the Most Holy Rosary, it’s history, it’s promises accorded to those who pray it daily, etc. As for Catholic sources about actually how to pray and meditate on the rosary, these sources for some reason are not openly available. Whether that is due to the fact that Catholics are not interested in it or that many of us just like to say the rosary as is, I do not know.
Some years ago my former seminary rector, Fr. Augustine Kalberer, OSB, PhD of Westminster Abbey celebrated mass in my home parish on the Feast of the Most Holy Rosary. The topic of his homily was how to meditate on the Most Holy Rosary.
In his homily he basically shared the idea that there were three general ways to meditate while praying the Rosary.
The first one is somewhat alluded to in Peter Turner’s answer. It consists on pondering the actual meaning of the words one is pronouncing as one prays the rosary. This is generally good for novices that are just getting into the habit of praying the Rosary everyday.
The second manner/of praying the Rosary is to meditate in one certain biblical passages associated with the particular mystery one is reciting. This is called a scriptural rosary.
As one recites a Hail Mary one meditates on the word of God revealed in Sacred Scripture.
As a title of example here are the scriptural references for the first decade of the Joyful Mysteries, the Annunciation:
Through the disobedience of Adam sin enters the world. Rom. 5:12
The Father sends His Son to save the world. Jn. 3:17
The Angel Gabriel is sent to a virgin named Mary. Lk. 1:26,27
The Angel tells Mary: “You are to have a Son and will name Him Jesus.” Lk. 1:31
He is the Son of God. Lk. 1:32
Mary consents: “Let it be done to me.” Lk. 1:38
God the Son becomes Man, in obedience to His Father. Lk. 1:35
By His obedience many shall be saved. Rom. 5:19
Mary becomes Mother of God. Lk. 1:35
Nothing is impossible with God. Lk. 1:37
The third way to meditate the Mysteries is definitely the the most profound and in-depth manner to do. The soul that is accustomed to pray and meditation delves into the rosary mysteries by placing himself into the mystery contemplated and getting totally absorbed into the sacred realities being pondered. Some (very few) find this way of meditation as being a sort of second nature!
Some Jesuits like to put this in the sense that we try to place ourself at the very scene that we are contemplating and in a sense become a participant in the mystery we are meditating.
I like to think of this as making myself a fly on the wall and watching the the Mysteries of the rosary unfold before me.
Sorry for the lack of genuine Catholic references, but if I find anything of value I will edit it in.
As a side note, one can obtain CDs of praying the rosary with the pope. They are great for praying the rosary in a car when it is good to have your hands free for driving and not worrying about counting.
Some other Catholic sources that may prove helpful are as follows:
- The Glories of Mary
- Methods for Saying the Rosary by St. Louis Marie de Montfort
- The Secret of the Rosary
- God Alone This book provides five specific methods for praying the rosary with more devotion. These methods do not change the Our Father or Hail Mary prayers within the rosary, but interweave additional petitions, prayers and visualizations as the rosary is being prayed.
More post
- 📝 How does God speak today?
- 📝 According to Catholicism, in what cases is Purgatory necessary?
- 📝 Why a soul needs to be in a state of grace when receiving the Eucharist?
- 📝 Early church fathers on Mary as mediatrix
- 📝 What is a Pacifist interpretation of the Cleansing of the Temple?
- 📝 Where did Martin Luther say
- 📝 Is the Promise of Regeneration Enunciated in the Old Testament?
- 📝 Does Roman Catholic doctrine teach that Christ no longer has a body that possesses flesh?
- 📝 Which year did Jesus die? What is the most commonly held view
- 📝 Is there is any external source about Demas, Paul's fellow worker?
- 📝 What are the major arguments Protestants make for the Catholic Church being apostate?
- 📝 Is Lutheran confession necessary for salvation?
- 📝 How can something be less reverent but impart the same graces?
- 📝 What is the Biblical basis for the belief that there are humans in heaven now?
- 📝 How do Biblical Unitarians understand verses that appear to identify God (the Father) and the Holy Spirit as different beings/entities?
- 📝 What does it mean when Jesus cannot be separated from the Father and the Holy Ghost?
- 📝 According to Roman Catholicism, what does "proceeds' mean in the Nicene Creed?
- 📝 Are the words in the Lord's Prayer "Hallowed BE Thy Name" or "Hallowed BY Thy Name"?
- 📝 What is the Septuagint?
- 📝 According to Catholicism at the Upper Room, did the Apostles follow the tradition of laying of hands and pouring of oil like the prophet Samuel?
- 📝 "Felix culpa" - is it correct?
- 📝 In Western communion services, when was the origin of the practice of consistently offering only the bread to the laity?
- 📝 How did Isidore of Seville become the patron saint of the Internet and computer programmers?
- 📝 What is the theology of the Semi-Arians?
- 📝 Does Jesus Christ explicitly deny transmigration or explicitly state there's only one birth?
- 📝 What is the power that Christians possess?
- 📝 Fallen Angels worshiped in ancient civilizations?
- 📝 Laurentian Litany - How pray it?
- 📝 Was the first Christian community a model for Religious Orders?
- 📝 Does the Personalistic Norm apply to Divine Persons?
Source: stackoverflow.com
Search Posts
Related post
- 📝 How to pray and meditate while saying the rosary?
- 📝 How do Protestants explain the benefits of Marian devotion and praying the Rosary experienced by Catholics?
- 📝 What did Martin Luther really mean by saying "Reason is the Devil’s greatest who*e" and how do Protestants view this?
- 📝 What is the basis for saying Christians and Muslims worship the same God?
- 📝 How do young earth creationists reconcile the age of the universe with the speed of light, and visible distant objects?
- 📝 How can the sun be created after day and night?
- 📝 How could Jesus be born during the reign of Herod, and when Quirinius was governor of Syria, if those periods were not contemporary?
- 📝 How can I tell the difference between the Moral law and other laws in the old testament?
- 📝 How does Matthew 25:31-46 ("The Sheep and the Goats") reconcile with salvation by faith?
- 📝 How did the Crusades affect the Pope's power and authority?
- 📝 How could Stephen be stoned without a trial and conviction in front of the Roman Governor?
- 📝 When and how did the names Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John get attached to the gospels?
- 📝 How are the Calvinist, Arminian and Lutheran conceptions of Total Depravity different?
- 📝 How common were blasphemy accusations and trials among the Jews during the time of Jesus?
- 📝 How did Cain and Abel know to offer sacrifices before the Law of Moses?
- 📝 If the Holy Spirit is God, and God can not be in the presence of sin, then how can the Holy Spirit dwell in me a sinner?
- 📝 How did John the Baptist have the "spirit and power of Elijah"?
- 📝 How did the Seven Deadly Sins originate and how is it used?
- 📝 How do the proponents of the idea that salvation once received cannot be lost explain Hebrews 6:4-6 and 10:26-29?
- 📝 What is the Lutheran doctrine of consubstantiation and how does it differ from transubstantiation and a more general protestant sacramental view?
- 📝 How has apostolic succession been "unbroken" in the wake of depositions, antipopes, immorality, and simony?
- 📝 How do apologists defend against Bart Ehrman's arguments that Church scribes corrected and changed the Bible to fit their theology?
- 📝 How did Isidore of Seville become the patron saint of the Internet and computer programmers?
- 📝 How do the Catholic and Orthodox views of original sin differ?
- 📝 What is the background of the words "notitia," "fiducia," and "assensus" and how do they relate to the biblical notion of "faith"?
- 📝 In the NPP, if Paul's "works of the law" are only circumcision and diet, how is Galatians 3:10 interpreted?
- 📝 When and how did Martin Luther arrive at the justification by faith?
- 📝 How can Christians reconcile the request to prohibit same-sex marriage and the lawfulness of h*m*sexuality itself?
- 📝 How many 'Books' never made it to the Bible (Old and New Testament)?
- 📝 How is the belief that Christians are both adopted and begotten sons of God reconciled?