Rosary Help

[pentecostbaby]

May’s coming up, and I’d really like to get to know Mary better. So many of you on this forum have such great relationships with her - I see people call her “Mama”. I’m very envious. Maybe because I have a cordial but distant relationship with my own mom (I would never talk to her about anything emotionally serious), it’s hard for me to get to know Mary well.
I love to pray the Divine Mercy Chaplet, and I’m getting over the whole mediative prayer scariness. I know what I’m supposed to meditate on during the Rosary - but how?
For example, I was praying the Glorious mysteries yesterday. I got to the Acension, and I meditated on it … but felt like I couldn’t really think about more than the Scriptural event, if that makes sense. So what should I think about while I pray the Rosary? I don’t want to do a Scriptural Rosary; I know I would get caught up in the reading part of it.
When I’m praying the Divine Mercy chaplet, I think about being with Jesus through His Passion and telling him I love Him - but that doesn’t seem right for the Rosary.

 

[cecilia97]

May’s coming up, and I’d really like to get to know Mary better. So many of you on this forum have such great relationships with her - I see people call her “Mama”. I’m very envious. Maybe because I have a cordial but distant relationship with my own mom (I would never talk to her about anything emotionally serious), it’s hard for me to get to know Mary well.
I love to pray the Divine Mercy Chaplet, and I’m getting over the whole mediative prayer scariness. I know what I’m supposed to meditate on during the Rosary - but how?
For example, I was praying the Glorious mysteries yesterday. I got to the Acension, and I meditated on it … but felt like I couldn’t really think about more than the Scriptural event, if that makes sense. So what should I think about while I pray the Rosary? I don’t want to do a Scriptural Rosary; I know I would get caught up in the reading part of it.
When I’m praying the Divine Mercy chaplet, I think about being with Jesus through His Passion and telling him I love Him - but that doesn’t seem right for the Rosary.

Someone explained it to me as the prayers being the soundtrack and the meditations being the movie in your head. That’s what I do, I imagine scenes and pictures while I pray.

The Ascension is tough to picture, I agree. But I try to think about “how were the people involved feeling when this happened?”. I think about Mary seing her son rise to His Father in glory and how she must have felt that all her sacrifices were being rewarded. I think about how the Father wanted Jesus back in Heaven with Him. I think about the confused apostles watching him leave and being sad, and amazed.

Sometimes I try to picture the mysteries from different “actors” points-of-view. A lot of times I end up meditating on the shopping list, but I keep triying, and there are lots of ways to do it once you get comfortable.

I’m very visual so I imagine clothing, smells, sounds to enhance the meditation. For some reason, I always picture Jesus’ dusty feet while He is carrying the cross. I like to imagine the smell of the evening air in Gethsemane.

I think Mary understands if you have never had warm fuzzies toward her. She really will point you straight to Christ, who is her whole reason for being.

 

[allhers]

Try reading something like this:
APOSTOLIC LETTER
ROSARIUM VIRGINIS MARIAE
OF THE SUPREME PONTIFF
JOHN PAUL II
TO THE BISHOPS, CLERGY
AND FAITHFUL
ON THE MOST HOLY ROSARY
CHAPTER I
CONTEMPLATING CHRIST WITH MARY
…
A face radiant as the sun:
9. “And he was transfigured before them, and his face shone like the sun” (Mt 17:2). The Gospel scene of Christ’s transfiguration, in which the three Apostles Peter, James and John appear entranced by the beauty of the Redeemer, can be seen as an icon of Christian contemplation. To look upon the face of Christ, to recognize its mystery amid the daily events and the sufferings of his human life, and then to grasp the divine splendour definitively revealed in the Risen Lord, seated in glory at the right hand of the Father: this is the task of every follower of Christ and therefore the task of each one of us. In contemplating Christ’s face we become open to receiving the mystery of Trinitarian life, experiencing ever anew the love of the Father and delighting in the joy of the Holy Spirit. Saint Paul’s words can then be applied to us: “Beholding the glory of the Lord, we are being changed into his likeness, from one degree of glory to another; for this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit” (2Cor 3:18).

Mary, model of contemplation:
10. The contemplation of Christ has an incomparable model in Mary. In a unique way the face of the Son belongs to Mary. It was in her womb that Christ was formed, receiving from her a human resemblance which points to an even greater spiritual closeness. No one has ever devoted himself to the contemplation of the face of Christ as faithfully as Mary. The eyes of her heart already turned to him at the Annunciation, when she conceived him by the power of the Holy Spirit. In the months that followed she began to sense his presence and to picture his features. When at last she gave birth to him in Bethlehem, her eyes were able to gaze tenderly on the face of her Son, as she “wrapped him in swaddling cloths, and laid him in a manger” (Lk2:7).

Thereafter Mary’s gaze, ever filled with adoration and wonder, would never leave him. At times it would be a questioning look, as in the episode of the finding in the Temple: “Son, why have you treated us so?” (Lk 2:48); it would always be a penetrating gaze, one capable of deeply understanding Jesus, even to the point of perceiving his hidden feelings and anticipating his decisions, as at Cana (cf. Jn 2:5). At other times it would be a look of sorrow, especially beneath the Cross, where her vision would still be that of a mother giving birth, for Mary not only shared the passion and death of her Son, she also received the new son given to her in the beloved disciple (cf. Jn 19:26-27). On the morning of Easter hers would be a gaze radiant with the joy of the Resurrection, and finally, on the day of Pentecost, a gaze afire with the outpouring of the Spirit (cf. Acts 1:14).
catholic.com/library/apostolic_letter_rosarium_virginis_mariae.asp

 

[BarbaraTherese]

Hi there Allhers…What a wonderful beginning you have made in meditative prayer…and wonderful and a great blessing indeed that you are seeking a close relationship with Mary, the beloved mother of Jesus, our God and saviour, our friend and brother.

There are many ways of meditating on The Rosary for example…sometimes my mind is so distracted that I think of the words I am saying in each actual prayer…Hail Mary, Our Father and Glory be etc. Sometimes I may just picture in my imagination some artwork I have seen of Our Lady either connected to a particular mystery of The Rosary or not, or something similar. Sometimes I may need to be content, so distracted am I, at continual efforts to draw my mind back to some form of meditating over and over again throughout the Rosary. Sometimes I feel a closeness to The Lord, Our Lady and the whole of Heaven simply hearing myself (listening) praying the prayers of The Rosary,
The Lord, nor Our Lady, do not *demand *success of us, rather they rejoice in our efforts trying to be successful. And if I should perchance have any success, all thanks and praise to God and His Gifts to the least of His own.
Many ways of meditating on the Rosary and I am sure others will be more helpful…God ever richly bless you…Blessings - Barb

 

[water]

I’ve found the book “The Secrets of the Rosary” by Saint Louis Mary de Montfort was the best one for me. By the way, yesterday, Monday, was his feast day.

Recently, I had spent about 4-6 months praying for the devotion, and something happened that I helped me see the need of Virgin Mary in my life. Through this need, I have started to come closer to Her and trust Her that She would take me to Jesus.

 

[puzzleannie]

May’s coming up, and I’d really like to get to know Mary better. So many of you on this forum have such great relationships with her - I see people call her “Mama”. I’m very envious. Maybe because I have a cordial but distant relationship with my own mom (I would never talk to her about anything emotionally serious), it’s hard for me to get to know Mary well.
I love to pray the Divine Mercy Chaplet, and I’m getting over the whole mediative prayer scariness. I know what I’m supposed to meditate on during the Rosary - but how?
For example, I was praying the Glorious mysteries yesterday. I got to the Acension, and I meditated on it … but felt like I couldn’t really think about more than the Scriptural event, if that makes sense. So what should I think about while I pray the Rosary? I don’t want to do a Scriptural Rosary; I know I would get caught up in the reading part of it.
When I’m praying the Divine Mercy chaplet, I think about being with Jesus through His Passion and telling him I love Him - but that doesn’t seem right for the Rosary.

pray as you can
every formal prayer and devotion (outside Mass and the sacraments) is nor for everyone, nor not for every time of one’s life.

I think you are very perceptive about the fact that one’s relationship with one’s own parents affects the relationship with Mary as Mother, or with God as Father. Jeff Cavins gives a good testimony about this, for instance. Maybe a place to begin is asking her to help you forgive your own mother, and to heal what needs healing in that relationship.

Thinking about the gospel event when contemplating the mysteries is what is supposed to happen, not that there is a “supposed to”. For instance, every time you think about the Ascension it may be a different aspect of the story that “grabs you” whether you are reading the gospel as part of Mass on that day, or saying the rosary. There really is not a “supposed to” with the rosary, or the chaplet for that matter. The repetitive prayer sets the mood and serves to put the hands and posture to work to remove physical distractions, and to help quiet the mind to remove those distractions, to leave room for meditating as you are doing on the Passion, Gods love and mercy etc., and on the gospel mysteries.

Mental prayer can’t be forced into a pre-cut mold. allow the Holy Spirit to guide that part and if He wills it, lead you into contemplation.

 

[three-sixteen]

Speaking of St. Louis, Whose feast day it still is for me on the west coast, he has some advice that i have found most helpful. He says the Hail Mary should be said in phrases and with short pauses. This is how he recommends saying it. By the way, St. Louis is the Rosary expert, and the Apostle of Mary. All three of his books are sensational and have changed my life: True Devotion to Mary, The Secret of Mary, and the The Secret of the Rosary.

Hail Mary full of grace (pause)
the Lord is with Thee (pause)
Blessed art Thou among women (pause)
and blessed is the fruit of Thy womb Jesus (pause)
Holy Mary Mother of God (pause)
pray for us sinners now (pause)
and at the hour of our death. (pause)

Try saying the Hail Mary (which is a Tree of Life) this way and see if you dont enjoy it. To me its more powerful than saying all those words in one long sentence with no pauses. In fact, doing this has changed my prayer life. Ideally of course, one could go to Daily Mass, spend time in adoration, and pray the Rosary daily. Hope this helps and GOD BLESS you!

p.s. as St. Louis says, “Of Mary there is never enough!”