I probably shouldn’t admit this publicly, but praying the rosary has never resonated with me. I know it should, and I keep trying, but as soon as I start repeating the prayers, my mind wanders off to whatever worry is uppermost in my mind. When I call it back, it wonders what’s for dinner, or where the plot twist of the novel I’m reading is headed, or whether I’ll be able to go bird watching anytime soon. It doesn’t matter how often I call my thoughts back to the words my mouth is saying, it always strays again.
With that in mind, I didn’t have much hope for the “Rosary in a Year” podcast, which began Jan. 1. Produced by Ascension Catholic Media, the podcast is hosted by Fr. Mark-Mary Ames, CFR, who is the director of communications and the director of priestly studies for his religious order, the Franciscan Friars of the Renewal. He also is author of Habits for Holiness: Small Steps for Making Big Spiritual Progress and The Father: 30 Meditations to Draw You Into the Heart of God.
My low expectations for the podcast were immediately smashed. It’s only been a couple of weeks, and we haven’t even started praying the entire rosary yet, but I’m already more attentive to the prayers we do say.
One of the things I like about it is that the first several episodes address prayer in general, and the attitude with which we should approach the Our Father and the Hail Mary. For example, Fr. Mark-Mary says, “Prayer is always … a group project – at the very least between me and God, with God in his grace doing the heavy lifting. So when we pray, we begin by looking at him, by acknowledging him and recognizing his presence.”
Most of the time when we pray, we try to connect with God, we just start talking, which becomes a monologue, he said, and that’s certainly true with me, so I was happy that several of the episodes are dedicated to ways to connect with the Father and the Son. These were followed by exegesis on the prayers of the rosary.
I soon ran into a problem with the podcasts, though: I was listening to them during my commute, and found that I wanted to devote my complete attention to what I was hearing, rather than to my driving. I’ve solved that problem, and have so far listened each day to the podcast. One nice thing is that they’re short; the longest episodes is 15 minutes but most of them are under 10, although there are a couple of longer bonus features.
According to the program for the “Rosary in a Year,” the first phase is called Forming the Relationship, and the next is Biblical Roots of the Rosary. Next up we’ll have Meditating on the Mysteries, which will be lectio divina and visio divina – both of which will require giving my entire attention to the prayer.
Following these phases, the podcast will start applying the lessons, and then will begin praying the rosary a decade at a time until we’ll be praying the full rosary. With the grounding that’s already been given, I’m hoping that I’ll be able to finally succeed with this prayer.
The other podcast I’ve been listening to is the “Desert Fathers in a Year,” which is presented by Bishop Erik Varden, OCSO, a Trappist monk who is Bishop of Trondheim in Norway. This podcast, which also launched on Jan. 1, is in collaboration with Exodus 90 and EWTN. Unlike the “Rosary in a Year,” which has a new episode each day, “Desert Fathers” has a weekly episode. There’s also a roundtable discussion of the episode by several men connected with Exodus 90.
Bishop Varden says the Desert Fathers have good advice “born of experience” on questions such as “How can I responsibly fight the demons within?” and “How can I be happy and a source of happiness to others?” These are questions to which I’ve been seeking answers, so I’m very much looking forward to hearing more in the coming weeks.
Marie Mischel is editor of the Intermountain Catholic. Reach her at Marie@icatholic.org.
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