Benediction & Rosary

Good Friday, 04/10/2020 w/Rosary, Stations & Vespers

This ministry, meets in the church biweekly outside of both Penitential Seasons of Lent & Advent and weekly during Lent & Advent. This ministry is held Wednesdays except on Fridays during Lent which includes the Stations of the Cross. Adoration of the Eucharist during exposition when we meet to pray the Rosary which is followed by Benediction and on many occasions Vespers. Occasionally, people will have special intentions, which are prayed for during the Rosary. Anyone is allowed to join this group for prayer and we invite you to join us for this special time of prayer.

To learn how to pray the Rosary, simply click for English or Spanish.

The Rosary is a very special way to pray, and also very powerful. So many prayers have been answered from praying the Rosary as well as many miracles performed as a result of the Rosary. The Rosary is a form of devotion, when you say the Rosary, you are with Jesus and Mary, it nourishes our souls. When you are with Jesus and Mary, you are in heaven with Our Lord and all the saints. Below, you’ll find a brief description of both Benediction and the Rosary. We invite you to spend a few minutes reading this valuable information. There is so many resources also available on the internet regarding the Rosary and what it truly means. Please take some time to learn more about this special devotion and what it can do for your prayer life.

If you have any specific questions or if you would like more information on Benediction or the Rosary, what Vespers is or the Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament, please contact Father Joseph at r everendjosephm@outlook.com

Benediction of the Blessed Sacrament

Benediction of the Blessed Sacrament is the service in which Jesus Christ is adored in the consecrated Host exposed on the altar, and in which the priest blesses the faithful with the Sacred Host.

Benediction of the Blessed Sacrament begins with the Exposition of the Blessed Sacrament (i.e., consecrated Host) in a monstrance set upon the altar. The liturgy includes singing the ancient Latin hymns written by St Thomas Aquinas, O Salutaris Hostia and Tantum Ergo, followed by the benedictionproper. The celebrant holds the monstrance wearing a humeral veil covering his shoulders, arms and hands, and then blesses the faithful with the Blessed Sacrament by tracing the sign of the cross with the monstrance held steadily upright before him. The liturgy concludes with the Divine Praises and Psalm 117 (LXX 116) “Laudate Dominum” with the antiphon, “Let us forever adore the Most Holy Sacrament.”

A monstrance (pictured here at left) is a vessel used in the Roman Catholic, Old Catholic and Anglican churches to display the consecrated Eucharistic host, during Eucharistic adoration or Benediction of the Blessed Sacrament. The monstrance is usually gold or silver and has an opening through which the Consecrated Host can be viewed. Benediction is often employed as a conclusion to other services, e.g. Vespers, Compline, the Stations of the Cross, etc., but it is also still more generally treated as a rite complete in itself. Created in the medieval period for the public display of relics, the monstrance today is usually restricted for vessels used for hosts. The word monstrance comes from the Latin word monstrare, meaning “to show”, and is cognate with the English word demonstrate, meaning “to show clearly”. In Latin, the monstrance is known as an ostensorium (from ostendere, “to show”).

The Holy Rosary

Rosary The rosary has been called the preparation for contemplation and the prayer of saints. While the hands and lips are occupied with the prayers, the mind meditates on the mysteries of the Incarnation and Redemption represented by the decades. Meditation is the form of prayer by which the one who prays uses the mind and imagination to consider a truth and uses the will to love it and form resolutions to live it. In this way the heart, mind, and soul of the Christian is formed according to the Gospel examples of the Savior and His First Disciple, His Mother. In God’s own time, when this purification of the heart, mind, and soul has advanced sufficiently the Lord may give the grace of contemplative prayer, that special divine insight into the truth which human effort cannot achieve on its own.

Why pray the Rosary today? Certainly, to grow in holiness and in one’s prayer life. The following are a few others reasons why the rosary should be prayed often, even daily:

“Among all the devotions approved by the Church none has been so favored by so many miracles as the devotion of the Most Holy Rosary” (Pope Pius IX).
“Say the Rosary every day to obtain peace for the world” (Our Lady of Fátima).
“There is no surer means of calling down God’s blessings upon the family . . . than the daily recitation of the Rosary” (Pope Pius XII).
“We do not hesitate to affirm again publicly that we put great confidence in the Holy Rosary for the healing of evils of our times” (Pope Pius XII).
“No one can live continually in sin and continue to say the Rosary: either they will give up sin or they will give up the Rosary” (Bishop Hugh Doyle).
“The Rosary is a magnificent and universal prayer for the needs of the Church, the nations and the entire world” (Pope John XXIII).
“The Rosary is the compendium of the entire Gospel” (Pope Paul VI quoting Pope Pius XII).
“Meditation on the mysteries of the Rosary . . . can be an excellent preparation for the celebration of those same mysteries in the liturgical actions [i.e. the Mass] and can also become a continuing echo thereof” (Pope Paul VI).
“My impression is that the Rosary is of the greatest value not only according to the words of Our Lady at Fátima, but according to the effects of the Rosary one sees throughout history. My impression is that Our Lady wanted to give ordinary people, who might not know how to pray, this simple method of getting closer to God” (Sister Lucia, one of the seers of Fátima).
“How beautiful is the family that recites the Rosary every evening” (Pope John Paul II).
Pope John Paul II has called the Rosary his “favorite prayer,” after the Mass and the Liturgy of the Hours.
St. Louis de Montfort warns us against both the ignorant and scholars who regard the Rosary as something of little importance…”the Rosary is a priceless treasure inspired by God.”

Source: EWTN

The word Rosary means “Crown of Roses”. Our Lady has revealed to several people that each time they say a Hail Mary they are giving her a beautiful rose and that each complete Rosary makes her a crown of roses. The rose is the queen of flowers, and so the Rosary is the rose of all devotions and it is therefore the most important one. The Holy Rosary is considered a perfect prayer because within it lies the awesome story of our salvation. With the Rosary in fact we meditate the mysteries of joy, of sorrow and the glory of Jesus and Mary. It’s a simple prayer, humble so much like Mary. It’s a prayer we can all say together with Her, the Mother of God. With the Hail Mary we invite Her to pray for us. Our Lady always grants our request. She joins Her prayer to ours. Therefore it becomes ever more useful, because what Mary asks She always receives, Jesus can never say no to whatever His Mother asks for. In every apparition, the heavenly Mother has invited us to say the Rosary as a powerful weapon against evil, to bring us to true peace. With your prayer made together with Your heavenly Mother, you can obtain the great gift of bringing about a change of hearts and conversion. Each day, through prayer you can drive away from yourselves and from your homeland many dangers and many evils.

It can seem a repetitive prayer but instead it is like two sweethearts who many times say one another the words: “I love you”…

Source: The Holy Rosary