ALL NIGHT VIGIL MEDITATIONS ON THE ROSARY

We have suggested a simple vigil program, which we especially recommend, based on the mysteries of the Rosary.

Obviously this program will be most successful if the ten minute Rosary meditations (which follow below) are well presented. They offer an excellent basis for the vigil especially when the priests would be busy with Confessions.

To add interest three or four persons can coordinate and take different parts of the same meditation. Also special intentions can be added. For example:

If we were meditating on the first Joyful mystery with the intention of reparation for sins of abortion and other sins against the dignity of parenthood, someone could cite some statistics or current news events showing the evil and extent of sins of abortion.

It adds a great deal to a vigil if the intentions are current, such as prayers for persons killed that day, or week, in some disaster, prayers for drug addicts tied into some news event, prayers for youth threatened by pornography or violence; prayers to have a pornographic shop removed from a neighborhood and on and on.

Indeed, if there were only four lay persons to conduct the vigil, each one of the four could take turns coordinating similarly on all the mysteries. But if there happened to be one really good reader or speaker, then he or she could do them all. Those conducting the vigil should be open to the Holy Spirit, to the inspiration of the moment. Then the vigil will be truly alive.

Prepared Meditations

We recommend the prepared meditations below, inviting different persons to read different parts.

We begin with the Sorrowful Mysteries because they offer a fitting preparation for the opening Mass (usually in honor of the Sacred Heart) and for the entire experience of the all night vigil.

The Joyful Mysteries, said in the first hours of the first Saturday, recall not only the essential mystery of Incarnation, but also the recent visitations of Our Lady with her program to renew all things in Christ, to bring about the triumph of the Sacred hearts for a true order of peace in the world.

Finally the Glorious Mysteries climax the vigil and offer a fitting preparation for the closing Benediction and the Mass of the Immaculate Heart.

These meditations can also be used for Holy Hours and to fulfill the first Saturday obligation to meditate on the mysteries of the Rosary (as was noted in the first chapter). In no vigil is possible in a church within traveling distance, why not invite neighbors and have a vigil at home....directing one's love to the nearest tabernacle where Jesus today is often locked away, truly a Prisoner of Love.

To Introduce the Rosary

It is warmly recommended that brief prayers to the Father be said to introduce each mystery beginning immediately after the Creed (before the Our Father for each mystery).

O Eternal Father, we praise and thank You for sending Your Only Son into the world to redeem us, and for sending Him through Mary that we might have both a Redeemer and a Mother. By these mysteries we beg You to increase in us faith, hope and love!

The following prayers can be used to "announce" each mystery:

Joyful Mysteries

1) Dear Father, thank You for sending Your angel to ask Our Lady to become the Mother of Your Son and, at that same moment, our own Mother. Help us to understand this great mystery of Your Love.

2) Dear Father, urged by the words of Your angel that nothing is impossible to You, Our Lady hastened to Her cousin Elizabeth. Grant, Father, that we, too, may live in the realization that to You nothing is impossible; that we, like St. John the Baptist, may be sanctified at the sound of Our Lady's greeting.

3) Dear Father, Your Provident Power moved the head of the great Roman Empire to issue an edict to fulfill Your Will that Jesus be born in Bethlehem as foretold and You sent a miraculous star to lead kings from afar. Lead us, O loving Father, and all the nations of the world, to Him, Who came to us in a manger to reveal to us that You are Love.

4) Dear Father, as Your daughter Mary and Her spouse St. Joseph presented Your Incarnate Word in the temple, You sent Your Holy Spirit upon Simeon and Anna to recognize Him, and to see into Mary's Immaculate Heart. Grant us the light of that same Holy Spirit.

5) Dear Father, You willed that Your daughter Mary and Her spouse St. Joseph should endure the trial of separation from Jesus, and the joy having Him return to Nazareth to abide with them. Grant that we may endure the trial and have Jesus abide with us.

Sorrowful Mysteries

1) Dear Father, in His agony in the garden Jesus cried out: "Not My Will but Thine be done!" O good Father, that I may ever accomplish Your Holy Will! Thy kingdom come! Thy Will be done!

2) Father, we are appalled to see Your Divine Son bound and scourged, as He is "bound" in our tabernacle as a Prisoner of Love, scourged by our indifference and even by sacrilege. Grant, through the intercession of Our Lady, that we may console our Prisoner of Love!

3) Father, they mocked the kingship of Your Divine Son with a crown of thorns. We affirm His kingship! May He reign in our lives! Thy Kingdom come!

4) Father, we believe that Calvary is present at every Mass. To assist well at our next Mass we wish to follow in the footsteps of the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of Mary on the road to Calvary where, by His death, Jesus showed us that You are Love.

5) The night before He died He said: "When you see Me, you see the Father." Dying He said: "Into Your Hands I commit My Spirit." O good Father, in the passion of Jesus may we recognize the greatness of Your love and mercy. By the intercession of the sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of Mary may many souls be saved by this prayer and that You be honored and loved in all the world!

Glorious Mysteries

1) Dear Father, the first recorded words of Our dear Lord after His resurrection were: "Do not touch Me, I have not yet ascended to My Father!" He reminded us, as He had the night before He died that He was sent by You to show us Your Love. Confirm us in the hope of our own resurrection to be with You forever.

2) Ascending to You, dear Father, He said that You would send the Holy Spirit to make all things known to us, and He left His Mother behind to gather with the church in prayer, as we do now. Send Your Holy Spirit upon us and upon the Church!

3) Father, You kept the promise Jesus made as he ascended to You. You sent the Holy Spirit with light and strength. Grant, beloved Father, through the intercession of Our Lady, His spouse, that we may receive His gifts.

4) With what joy, Father, You received Your daughter Mary assumed into Heaven! We are told that, in this joy, all Purgatory was emptied. By Her intercession, grant relief to the Holy Souls and final contrition to all the dying! And grant that we may obtain, by Her motherly intercession, to be with You and the saints forever in Heaven.

5) Eternal Father, we rejoice to live in this age of mercy when You have entrusted the peace of the world to Mary, our loving Mother! We hail Her as our Queen. See us clothed in Her livery and use us in Her service for the triumph of Your Kingdom in our nation and in all the nations of the world!