The Art of Praying as a Family

• The Delicate Juggling Art of Praying as a Family
• The Delicate Juggling Art of Praying as a Family

Part 1

Part I: My own introduction to this topic of “Praying as a family” and 3 recommendations – for the “beginners” among us.

Part II: The translation of a wonderful French site dedicated to this very subject: Prier en famille – for the more “advanced” among us.

PART I: INTRODUCTION TO THE TOPIC OF “PRAYING AS A FAMILY”

In this time of Advent, it feels appropriate to review the various ways in which we can prepare ourselves for the coming of Jesus Christ. What is it exactly that we can do and how can we do it? This is quite a special time of the year and there’s got to be more to it than frantic shopping and endless food-feasts with family and friends and co-workers, right? We all need to go on a diet anyhow and this constant marching music of “Buy this! Buy that! Buy NOW!” is rather deafening. It is exactly in this month of December that the difference between the spirit of the season in the secular and consumer world and the Spirit of this Advent liturgical season in the Church are definitively taking different paths… and I think that the two of them are growing more and more apart as the years go by. Lucky for us, we have the Mass and the readings of Scripture and the homilies (and our conscience!) to constantly call us to another level, to redirect us to the proper level of relationships vs. the level of things, because it is all about love, the love of God and the love of neighbor, and there is more to love than a wrapped box with pretty paper and lovely ribbons. Of course, a material gift can be the way we express our love but it’s definitively not the first way and it looks to me like nowadays, in 2006, in our wonderful and wealthy and free democracies of the West, the voice of the Church is the only one to constantly challenge us to go beyond ourselves and beyond what we see and hear and feel. Thank God for that challenge!

So when I thought of what is it that we can do to better prepare ourselves in this Advent Season, I thought of prayer right away. Praying is free, it’s available in many sizes, it’s do-able at our own pace and it’s self-sustainable, it will bring us many graces and it will yield better returns for you and for those around you than any other investment. We are all called to pray as individuals, in the privacy of our hearts, where we go to the “upper room and close the door and pray to our Father”. And we are all called to pray as a group, as members of the Catholic Church, as we do each Sunday at Mass. But there is another dimension, which is within the family, within the Domestic Church. It is very important to develop a life of prayer within the family because that is one of the best way we can equip our children to face the world. And there is no better way to show them how to do it than to do it with them.

So for the “beginners” among us in FAMILY PRAYING, I recommend these 3 options to start:

1 – Read the life of the Saints to your children:

This can be done each night, before going to bed. Or have an older sibling read and be there with them, listening. Reading to our children is one of the best educational activities we can do. Choosing specifically to read about one Saint is to kill two birds with one stone! The lives of the Saints are inspirational. They are our role models. There are many modern Saints. One day, someone gave me a prayer card for a recent Saint: Gianna Berretta Molla. On it was a picture of Gianna with her 2 young children, in an Italian ski resort, in the 60’s! I was astonished that this woman is a Saint and here she was, helping one of her kid put on ski boots… It got me dreaming. Gianna is a wonderful pro-life and pro-family hero, a mother, a doctor, a skier – and a modern Saint. Saints are like giant signs along the road of life pointing us in the right direction. They themselves had to overcome many obstacles and their lives read like an adventure. Their goal was always to build the Church and to do God’s work in the world. Make sure you finish the “reading moment” with your child with a short prayer to this particular Saint, asking for their blessing on your family.

2 – Say a daily blessing, a short prayer, as a group:

Decide on a short prayer which you will say daily, at the very same time, when the family is all together: either a morning blessing just before going out the door or a blessing before dinner. The morning blessing is a wonderful thing to do before heading out the door if you all leave at the same time. Asking for God’s protection on the family at the very beginning of this day, before everyone leaves the safety and warmth of the family nest, is a very good habit to instill in all of us. The blessing before dinner is also a very good habit, thanking the Lord for the food on the table and for the members of the family present, and also adding a thought for the ones that are not here or the ones who do not have enough to eat. But whether it is a morning blessing or grace before dinner, or both, find a prayer that you like, decide when you will do it, talk about it before-hand with everyone in the family and start doing it regularly. Start a “prayer box” or a “prayer binder” where you will keep the family’s favorite prayers and where you can turn to for inspiration. Have the children add their own prayer to this treasure trove.

3 – Read Scripture together, as a family project:

This is easier done with older children. But you could decide to read Mark’s Gospel for instance, which is a very short one and a very “action oriented” one. It has only 16 chapters. If you decide to read it 2 or 3 times a week for a start, you’ll be finished before Easter. For such a reading, it is good to start with a moment of calm or silence. Make sure the TV is off and everyone is unplugged and all the cells and Blackberries have been put away. Gather in a place where you can have some quiet time and which is comfortable too. Assign the reader ahead of time. Decide on the format: 1 minute of silent recollection, then the reading (usually around 5 minutes), then another 5 minutes of question and meditations on what we can take away from this reading and then finish with Our Father said aloud, as a team. The whole thing can be about 20 minutes but it will do wonders in strengthening the whole family as a unit, in practicing a moment of concentration, silence and listening, and in instilling hope and peace within each heart.

this article discovered here

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Posted: 02|9|08 at 8:17 pm. Filed under: Catechesis + Devotion, Unity.
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