A Story of Hope
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| A small Children's Rosary in Hartford CT USA |
On the Memorial of the Holy Rosary a new Children’s Rosary group met for the first time at Trinity Academy in Shenandoah, Pennsylvania USA. This was the first time a Children’s Rosary group was held at a school. The response was a bit unexpected.
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| A Children's Rosary in Timor Leste a country in Asia |
News came the following day that the first Children’s Rosary had been attended by 52 children and 4 teachers. Upon further questioning the magnitude of the success became almost incomprehensible. The children had not been instructed to attend the Children’s Rosary instead they had been given a choice to meet together in prayer of the Rosary or go to recess after lunch. Fifty-two children mostly ages 6-10 but some as old as 11-13 had voluntarily given up play time to run around and instead chose to come together and kneel in prayer of the Holy Rosary. How does this happen. The story seems too good to be true. But indeed it is true and suggests a truth many are not aware of: children are very open to prayer especially with other children. Another truth which Maria Montessori has shown with her model of childhood education: children like to be given the choice to participate in activities and when given the choice they are very committed to what they are doing.
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| A Children's Rosary in Kenya |
The Children’s Rosary began in a parish as a prayer group movement for children. On the Memorial of the Holy Rosary 2013 Our Blessed Mother gave us a gift. She opened the door of the Children’s Rosary prayer groups to our Parochial Schools and provided a window into how one could function quite seamlessly into the school day. The new Children’s Rosary at Trinity Academy has chosen to hold their Children’s Rosary weekly at 12:20 PM. The principal and teachers are very supportive of this addition to the week. On the first day of the meeting the principal talked to the children about the Rosary and the new prayer group at morning assembly. The children had a second invitation in their home rooms. At the end of lunch a third invitation was given to children to meet in the prayer room for the Children’s Rosary. As it was raining that day the children were not able to go across the street to the Church to hold their prayer group.
While many of our Children’s Rosary prayer groups meet monthly it is a wonderful blessing to have weekly groups as well. The school setting actually lends itself wonderfully to more frequently meetings. On October 25th a second Children’s Rosary will begin in a school in Louisiana and we eagerly await the feedback from this group. While no pictures were taken at Trinity Academy images from our many other Children’s Rosary prayer groups give us a wonderful example of how open children are to prayer they only need an invitation.
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