What's the difference between one Hail Mary and a 54 Rosary day novena?

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Praying the Rosary conforms your soul to God’s will. It is like what physical exercise does to the body, only the Rosary is like spiritual exercise for the soul. The more and better you exercise, the stronger you will get.
I think we often mistake prayer as being primarily getting God to give us what we want. Prayers i really more about getting ourselves to give God what He wants.
 
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I already answered that when I said what the rosary is. Your question is the equivalent of "why pray?, and the answer is the basic formula I learned over 60 years ago. Prayer is summed up in Praise, Petition, Thanksgiving, and Reparation. And yes, there are other words that can be substituted for those four, but mean the same thing. All prayer comes down to those four categories, including the rosary.
 
0Scarlett_nidiyilii said:
In one sense, God is not sitting “up there” with a magic number of rosaries in mind that if you do them, your problems will go away (ie “Well, I would have given him what he wants for 67 rosaries, but he only said 62, so tough luck”)
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Is that the case though? I imagine he’s probably not as legalistic as in your example, but I would think the spiritual life would mirror the physical life to an extent. There is a difference between pumping off 10 pushups once, and doing 100/day for a year. The second, provided you don’t injure yourself, is going to give better results, all else being equal.
 
Maybe look at how exorcisms are repeated prayers that take more or less time to drive the demons out. Sometimes hours of exorcisms are needed to deliver someone. That shows that the more you pray, the more graces you receive…
Hope that helps !
 
Understood (except it is an odd question).

People may say that one prayer, format, or method is more efficacious than another.

IMHO, unless they have a straight pipeline to God (as in, a revelation), they are “talking through their hat”. The efficaciousness of anyone’s prayer is a matter between them and God.
 
It’s not odd. Either God answers particular prayers or he doesn’t? Does this devotion or that devotion make a difference?

Surely you could pray one Hail Mary and that would suffice? If on the other hand praying a rosary for 54 days straight either changes things because more effort is put in or it changes nothing from one Hail Mary?
 
Prayer does not work that way. Prayer does not change God, prayer changes us. If I have the fortitude to do 486 pushups it will give me more strength than will a single pushup, however, a single pushup done over and over will also give me strength.
 
Socrates92 said:
I would think the spiritual life would mirror the physical life to an extent. There is a difference between pumping off 10 pushups once, and doing 100/day for a year. The second, provided you don’t injure yourself, is going to give better results, all else being equal.
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I often think of it that way myself, but I have met people who really hate equating prayer with exercise, weight lifting, running etc. I’m not sure why they don’t like the comparison.
To me, prayer is like building my spiritual muscles.
 
Pyjamarama said:
Either God answers particular prayers or he doesn’t?
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God “answers” all prayers. Sometimes the answer he gives is not the answer we were hoping to get.

Part of regular and frequent praying is getting more in tune with God so we understand better what he’s trying to tell us and we also accept it better.
 
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“Pray without ceasing” - Saint Paul

Remember also the parable of the Talents. We will appear before the Throne one day with the record of our prayers present. I do not think we want to say “Here is the one ‘Hail, Mary’ I offered Lord. “I” think it was enough…”
 
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po18guy said:
I do not think we want to say “Here is the one ‘Hail, Mary’ I offered Lord. “I” think it was enough…”
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Understandable. So at what point is it enough to require the help we need?
 
Pyjamarama said:
It’s not odd. Either God answers particular prayers or he doesn’t?
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God answers all prayers. Often, people either don’t get the answer, or don’t want to accept it (e.g. “No.”).
Pyjamarama said:
Does this devotion or that devotion make a difference?
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It may make a difference to us; no one, to the best of my knowledge ahs ever “rated” devotions in any meaningful way (as in, “God answers this devotion but not that one”). People have opinions on the matter; but that is not proof - it is an opinion.
Pyjamarama said:
Surely you could pray one Hail Mary and that would suffice? If on the other hand praying a rosary for 54 days straight either changes things because more effort is put in or it changes nothing from one Hail Mary?
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No one - even the most holy person on this earth - is going to “change” God. God is unchangeable. That does not mean that God does not intervene in our lives, but it is an error to presume that we change God.

Prayer benefits us (if for nothing else than a really good dose of humility). Some people may pray for a miracle and receive it almost immediately. Others may pray for a miracle and it takes weeks, months, years. Others pray and that specific request is never answered as requested. We do not know, and likely will not know until after death the ifs, and, buts and whys of answers to our requests.

What we may know is that God was giving us a test; and how we react to that test may be “pass” or “fail”, and the pass or fail may not be dependent on the subject of the request. In other words, the subject of the test may be granted for reasons other than our request and we failed the test; or we may not be granted the request but passed the test.

Saying one Hail Mary may change you. Or it may not. Saying the rosary 54 days straight may change you. Or it may not. And God will answer your prayers; but not necessarily in the way you think.
 
As many as it takes. We know not unitl we plead.

Prayer is the physical and spiritual expression of a relationship with the One we love. Do we desire to spend time with our lover, or do we just say “Hi” once in awhile?
 
That’s why the analogy of relationship is more useful to me.

Not every relationship is between equals. One party might be stronger or more experienced (like a parent).
Also, healthy relationships have a certain give and take, although we want to do things to nurture the bond, and the more correct effort and understanding of the other person you have, the stronger the bond.

But I think we’re coming at this from different POV 🙂
 
It is better to pray 5 decades of the Rosary with great devotion than 15 with none.

If it is a case of a very holy and devout Hail Mary, I could see it being “better” than a whole Rosary. But it’s not either/or.

If we can pray 15 decades, say, with great devotion, why wouldn’t we pray it, as opposed to stopping with just one or five? We love God and we want to be in union with Him, and the rope that binds us with God (ie the Rosary) is a great devotion to do that.
 
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