Rosary Addiction

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A few months ago, a friend suggested we pray a daily rosary.  Actually, she suggested a fifteen decade daily rosary.  We were both tired, frustrated and stressed to the limits.  We had exhausted all the typical remedies for this state of being.  Veterans of this Catholic home education large-family lifestyle, we tweaked our diets, our exercise plans, our chore systems, our sleeping (well, we tried), our school plans.  We both changed parishes (we live two time zones apart but somehow we both were in the wrong church). All the tried and true remedies for burnout and frustration were failing us.  As our families grew and our children got bigger, the stakes went up.  We recognized that nothing on earth was "working" to gain for us that much needed peace.  Our souls were restless indeed.

All of this we shared with each other.  We hashed out all the usual solutions, we swapped meal plans and chore plans and lesson plans.  Independently, we took it to prayer.  That's when she came back with the absolute certainty that she was supposed to pray a fifteen decade rosary every day.  And she was pretty certain I was supposed to do the same.  Only glitch was that she had this revelation while I was reading Rosarium Virginis Mariae.  I was increasingly sure that I was supposed to shower my soul with the light of those five Luminous decades as well.  Fifteen for her, twenty for me.

I bought a CD so that I could turn driving time, walking time, bed time into rosary time.  Really, the Holy Spirit did the pointing and clicking this time.  I bought Praying the Rosary with St. Therese of Lisieux.

Praying the Rosary with St. Therese of Lisieux Cd

This beautiful CD has it all.  Lovely Gregorian chant in the background.  Soothing voices of prayer.  And every Hail Mary is preceded by a quote from the Little Flower.  Those quotes have worked their way into my soul, they are becoming me... or I am becoming them. Either way, through the powerful intercession of the Blessed Mother, that elusive peace is happening. 

My daughter, always looking over my shoulder as I blog, objects to the "Just for Mom" category.  She reminds me that she hears the CD all the time, too.  And she is increasingly devoted to both the Blessed Mother and the Little Flower.  Those quotes are touching her.

My friend and I exchange emails, coveting each other's decades.  All is not peace and green pastures.  Life is still happening.  And it is really, really hard sometimes. There are days when I beg her to offer all fifteen of hers to me and days when I reciprocate. We rarely pray the whole thing at the same time; instead we snatch decades throughout the day.  And maybe that is better, kind of like booster shots for the soul. We've shared some pretty amazing success stories. And we're both pretty sold on the power of ALL those decades.

More da Vinci

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It's going to be a rainy weekend.  Tournaments are already cancelled.  So, I see some reading in our future.

Continuing our Leonardo da Vinci study, Mary Beth is reading Leonardo da Vinci. More complex than last week’s biography, this beautifully illustrated book details the life of one of the most amazing people who ever lived. Diane Stanley is an incredibly gifted author-artist and her illustrations truly make this book a feast. Patrick is fascinated by The Second Mrs. Giaconda; he’s looking for his own clues to the Mona Lisa mystery. And Christian, who has some experience of his own with writing entirely backwards, is enjoying poking through The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci. The writing in the book has been transcribed from da Vinci’s notebooks (where he wrote reams of notes entirely backwards).

It is interesting to me to see how different our da Vinci study is this time around. Last time we studied da Vinci (five years ago), it was very much a picture study. Michael is so intensely interested in art that the scientist and inventor held little appeal for him. Christian, on the other hand, sees da Vinci in a whole new light. There is little doubt that this is multi-faceted genius, indeed.