The Knitting Theologian

I am halfway through the Irresistible Novena. Yeah, I know: what’s a novena? It’s nine days of prayer. In a row. In the case of the Irresistible Novena, the prayer is the Rosary. Other novenas have other prayers associated with them.

So the Irresistible Novena, which is said to never fail (hence the name), is actually fifty-four days: six nine-day novenas in a row, for those of you following along doing the math. The way the Irresistible Novena works is you spend 27 days (three nine-day novenas) praying a rosary for your intention, and another 27 days praying a rosary in thanksgiving, whether or not your intention has been answered.

Like that little kicker? I can hear my non-Catholic friends right now; heck, I can hear my Catholic friends, and the voices are coalescing into just a few words: are you crazy? How can you give thanks if you don’t even know whether your prayers are answered? I wondered that myself.

The answer to that question is pretty simple: welcome to the Classroom of Faith, my friends. And actually I know that my prayers will be answered. I’m not sure entirely of the form in which they will be answered, but I’ve had enough experience praying to know that God always answers.

And why would I do such a thing? Because I have a couple of intentions I wanted to pray for, and the Irresistible Novena, about which I read a couple of years ago, came to mind immediately in a way that I’ve come to recognize as a nudge from the Holy Spirit. And because I recently resolved to take my fingers out of my ears and stop singing la-la-la when I sense those nudges, I went ahead and started the novena.

And so, halfway through, here I am, and I do have things for which I am grateful:

• An increased sense of God’s presence, not only during prayer but throughout the day.
• An increased recognition of the presence of God in others.
• An increased sensitivity to the graces present in the Eucharist. (I could write a whole other post on this last one, but I’ll just say here that there are many graces present in the Eucharist, and I’m sure I’m only scratching the surface of them. Trust me, they are there, and it’s the biggest reason I go to daily Mass so often. Gets me through the day like nothing else.)

I knew when I started that there was no way I could do this alone, no matter how stubborn I am. I have had to say to Jesus as well as to Mary and Joseph and practically the whole communion of saints, often, “Help! I can’t do this anymore.” They have come through, with help and support, every single time. It feels like being showered with “every spiritual blessing in the heavens.” (Ephesians 1:3) For all that, how could I not be grateful?

Yes, I know it’s already 2010 and I ought to have done this post a couple of days ago. I say better late than never. Technically I’m more than a month behind, anyway, since the church year begins with the season of Advent. I was even on retreat at the beginning of December, which offered a great opportunity, but other things happened on that retreat and somehow I never got to a review of spiritual commitments.

I have daily, weekly, monthly, and yearly spiritual commitments. Here’s what they are and how I did.

Daily

1. Liturgy of the Hours: review the readings from Office of Readings and say Morning Prayer. Not 100%, but probably darn close. I doubt I missed more than 10 days.
2. Lectionary: review the readings for Mass, and take some time to reflect on the Gospel. Again, not 100%. I’m very good about reviewing the readings, less so about reflecting on the Gospel, because I don’t always read slowly enough to allow God to get my attention.
3. Mental prayer: 20 minutes. Not 100% but very very close. Mental prayer has become so necessary for me I can feel the difference when I don’t do it.
4. Rosary: maybe about 60%. I do pretty well saying the Rosary during the week but less so on the weekends because I haven’t found a good time for it.
5. Nightly Examination of Conscience: maybe 10% if I’m being generous. I just haven’t been doing it, and I know the reasons I don’t are just excuses.

Weekly

1. Liturgy of the Hours: say Evening Prayer at least once a week. I’d say about 50%. It’s easy to do when I meet with the prayer group, less easy to do when I’m on my own. I added this commitment in Lent and have kept it going. As the year went on I was up to about 3 times a week pretty regularly.
2. Daily Mass: I’d say about 40% here. I cannot attend Daily Mass every single day because of work commitments, but I tried to make a point of going when I could. It got easier after my dog died.
3. Holy Hour: ooh. Not very well here at all. I had trouble finding a time I could work into my schedule. I maybe made about a dozen Holy Hours, but recent experiences have shown me the tremendous healing power possible.

Monthly

1. Confession: maybe 75% here, because this particular sacrament is becoming  more and more important.

Yearly

1. Retreat: check. And it was a good one.
2. Review of spiritual commitments: well, I’m doing it now.

Next time I’ll post on the fruits of my reflection on this list of commitments and what I plan to add/change/delete for 2010.