Friday, February 24, 2012

The Angelus

One of my New Years Resolutions was to teach more prayers to Luke (and Taryn when she's older).  We've been praying the Angelus at noon every day.  Noon is the traditional time to say the prayer.

The Angel of the Lord declared to Mary:
And she conceived of the Holy Spirit. 
Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee; blessed art thou among women and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus. Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of
our death. Amen. 
Behold the handmaid of the Lord: Be it done unto me according to Thy word. 
Hail Mary . . . 
And the Word was made Flesh: And dwelt among us. 
Hail Mary . . . 

Pray for us, O Holy Mother of God, that we may be made worthy of the promises of Christ.

Let us pray: 
Pour forth, we beseech Thee, O Lord, Thy grace into our hearts; that we, to whom the incarnation of Christ, Thy Son, was made known by the message of an angel, may by His Passion and Cross be brought to the glory of His Resurrection, through the same Christ Our Lord.
Amen.  


So at noon my iphone bell charm alarm goes off every day as a reminder to pray this prayer.  Usually my husband is home for lunch so we do it as a family.  We make Luke stop what he's doing but he almost never says (even though he already knows the Hail Mary part) any part of it.  He mostly just pauses what he is doing and stares into the wall... or so I thought.  Well during Lent I've set up a few more alarms as reminders to pray for particular things and so the bell chime goes off more than once a day now.  Last night it went off and my husband and I were talking and we heard Luke start the prayer by himself "The angel of the Lord declared unto Mary, and she conceived of the Holy Spirit'.  Then he said his Hail Mary.  I was just so shocked he knew the prayer.. like he was secretly listening the whole time.  I mean I know kids do this, but it always surprises me when Luke does it like 'oh you mean you were paying attention'.  Guess I should start doing more prayers.  He'll be a Catholic genius before he knows it. :)

2 comments:

Crunchy Con Mommy said...

I need to do this with my son. except I need to learn all the prayers first! Since I am a convert to Catholicism, the only one I really know by heart is the Lord's Prayer. I don't even have the Hail Mary memorized (as a convert, the anti-Mary-prayer thing is so ingrained in me, it's hard to overcome even though I understand now and don't think it's bad-it's somehow still doesn't feel right actually doing it)

Cassie said...

I totally didn't know you were a convert!! Cool!
I love Mary, mostly because I feel like I can relate to her as a mother now. :) And I think she prays for me on those really stressful days!