Which of these is the best way to pray the Rosary?

[VivaPadrePio]

Dear Sirs, thank you in advance for your help.

I have started to pray a 54 days Novena Rosary some time ago (today is day 17).

Until the day before yesterday, I have prayed as follows:

1. separate meditation on the mysteries
2. all the prayers of the decades with utter concentration, word for word. By the littlest distraction (that is: when I did not form in my mind an exact picture of the exact phrase I was saying) I came back, and recited the phrase again (say: “The Lord is with Thee”) and again until I could be fully concentrated by what I was saying.

It was exhausting because it becomes extremely difficult to maintain concentration, but it was beautiful to know, at the end of the Rosary, that my “garland of roses” looked good, and that nothing of any prayer had gone, so to speak, “lost”.

Upon reading of specialised Rosary internet sites and of the Catholic Encyclopedia, it would seem that I was not being entirely orthodox, and that I am supposed to pray the decades whilst continuing in the meditation of the theme of the mystery.

I prayed my Rosary this way yesterday, and whilst it was faster, I failed to have the customary good feeling about it, as one remains with the impression of a massive “superficiality” or “shallowness” in the recitation of the decades, during which my concentration obviously makes back and forth between the meditation and the Hail Mary.

My questions are:

1. What do you suggest me to do? Go on with the first method or switch to the second? I don’t mind investing an hour a day on that, if I am sure it is a bona fide Rosary. I want to stop it immediately, if it is not.
2. If I must switch to the second method (praying the decades whist concentrating on the mystery), may I count the days of the “old” ways of praying, or must my 54 days novena rosary start again from the beginning?

Thank you for your time and kind answer.
VivaPadrePio

 

[Fr.Vincent_Serpa]

Hi,

The rosary is not meant to be the ordeal you are making of it. When you pray the rosary privately, you can meditate on only one mystery for the five decades if you want to. If you want to meditate before you begin the prayers, that’s okey too. What is important is that you PRAY! It’s all about God!

Fr. Vincent Serpa, O.P.