Catholics-please explain the Rosary?

Sorry, I missed your question.

Catholic Christianity includes a rich tradition of both informal (in our own words) and formal prayer just like our Jewish forefathers.

The Church teaches "the memorization of basic prayers offers an essential support to the life of prayer, but it is important to help learners savor their meaning." In other words, the Church emphasizes that formal prayer should not be mindless lip moving but instead a formal expression of clearly understood and heartfelt sentiments.

The verse in question reads, in the King James Version, "But when ye pray, use not vain repetitions, as the heathen do: for they think that they shall be heard for their much speaking."

Jesus is not talking of the repetitious prayer of the Jews in which Jesus would have participated in and who He would not call heathen.

The important Greek word here for "vain repetitions" is battalogeo, or babbling. The heathens had a magical perception of prayer and thought the more they babbled to their gods, the more that that god would respond. I Kings 18:26 is an example of this:

"And they took the bullock which was given them, and they dressed it, and called on the name of Baal from morning even until noon, saying, O Baal, hear us. But there was no voice, nor any that answered."

Then, two verses after the warning in Matthew against "vain repetitions," Jesus gave us the "Lord's" prayer, which most Protestant Christians pray with no qualms about praying "in vain."

The same command in Luke 11:2 reads: "And he said unto them, When ye pray, say, Our Father..." -- "when you pray, say..."

In addition, Christ prayed in repetitions:

+ Matthew 26:44: "And he left them, and went away again, and prayed the third time, saying the same words."

+ Mark 14:39 reads: "And again he went away, and prayed, and spake the same words."

The angels pray repetitiously:

+ Revelation 4:8: "...and they rest not day and night, saying, Holy, holy, holy, Lord God Almighty, which was, and is, and is to come."

God commanded Moses to tell the Israelites:

"Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God is one LORD: And thou shalt love the LORD thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might. And these words, which I command thee this day, shall be in thine heart: And thou shalt teach them diligently unto thy children, and shalt talk of them when thou sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, and when thou liest down, and when thou risest up." (Deuteronomy 6:4-7)

The Psalms are a collection of prayers and litanies, which were prayed formally in the Jewish synagogues and early Christian churches, are still prayed in synagogues and Catholic churches today -- and were even prayed by Christ from the Cross.

The liturgy of the synagogue was (and is) filled with repetition and formalized prayer. Christ said "use not vain repetitions, as the heathens do.” Were the Jews heathens? Jesus also prayed in the synagogue in this way.

They prayed (and still pray) the sh'ma twice a day and, in their liturgy, the Shemoneh Esrei, the Kaddish, the morning blessings, the Aleinu, etc. Check out a Jewish siddur (missal) sometime; does it look more typically Protestant or Catholic?

Hymns are prayers. Is it "vain" to sing "Amazing Grace" more than once?

Catholics do not babble but pray from the heart in formal and informal prayer.

For more information, see the Catechism of the Catholic Church, part four: http://www.usccb.org/catechism/text/pt4sect1.shtml

With love in Christ.

The Rosary is a series of prayers and meditations focused on events in the lives of Jesus and Mary. There are four groups of prayers, also known as Mysteries:

1) the Joyous Mysteries: the conception, birth, and early events in the life of Jesus

2) the Luminous Mysteries: His ministry

3) the Sorrowful Mysteries: Christ's Passion and death

4) the Glorious Mysteries: His Resurrection and Ascension and the final events in the life of Mary

Someone once said that the Rosary is like having a miniature Bible, and you can see why. And the key word in "vain repetitions" is the word "vain." If you rattle off a bunch of memorized prayers without any thought to the Mysteries, then yes, it would be in vain.

But I can tell you from my own personal experience that praying the Rosary and applying each Mystery to my own life has brought me closer to Christ than I ever was before. The Sorrowful Mysteries have special meaning for me: each time that I pray them, it brings home just how much my sins cost my Savior.

If you want more information, I can look up the URL for several websites that will help you understand more about the Rosary. Just edit your post if you want that information.

And since you did ask Catholics about the Rosary, may I suggest that you ignore non-Catholics who have their own axe to grind? The information that they give you is seldom accurate and certainly not from the perspective of Catholics who have studied their Faith and know why we believe as we do.

God bless you!

When we say the Rosary, it is necessary for us to meditate on the Biblical mysteries for each decade that we say, all the while praying out loud the Hail Mary (It isn't so important to concentrate on the words of the Hail Mary while saying the Rosary - It is more important to meditate on the mysteries).

The silent meditations are the soul of the rosary, and the out-loud Hail Marys are the body of the Rosary.

When we say the Rosary , we are using our lips, our minds, and our bodies to give glory to God by invoking the prayers of His mother.

Not only do we meditate on the events of Jesus and Mary in the Bible, but we also put ourselves into the meditation. In other words, we do the mysteries and apply it to us personally.

And................we are chasing satan away by saying the Rosary.

The rosary is a devotion in honor of the Virgin Mary. It consists of a set number of specific prayers. First are the introductory prayers: one Apostles’ Creed (Credo), one Our Father (the Pater Noster or the Lord’s Prayer), three Hail Mary’s (Ave’s), one Glory Be (Gloria Patri).

You must understand that they are meditations. When Catholics recite the twelve prayers that form a decade of the rosary, they meditate on the mystery associated with that decade. If they merely recite the prayers, whether vocally or silently, they’re missing the essence of the rosary. It isn’t just a recitation of prayers, but a meditation on the grace of God.

Look at Psalms 136, which is a litany (a prayer with a recurring refrain) meant to be sung in the Jewish Temple.

Its not vain repitition, its prayer and reminding us of God. Structured and focused.

Let me get this straight, you call the the prayer Our Blessed Lord gave us Himself, vain repetition??? The words of Jesus, when recited are done so in vain? The Hail Mary is taken basically directly from Scripture, so if it is vain reciting it more than once in your life, then it is in vain that you read the same Bible passage more than once.

The vain repetition (not a very good translation really) referred to in the Bible is repeating words with no meaning, does the Bible have meaning?

He usually replies, perhaps he was busy, but the answers here are more than suffice.

Matt. 6:7 - Jesus teaches, "do not heap up empty phrases" in prayer. Protestants use this verse to criticize various Catholic forms of prayer which repeat phrases, such as litanies and the Rosary. But Jesus' focus in this instruction is on the "vain," and not on the "repetition."

Matt. 26:44 - for example, Jesus prayed a third time in the garden of Gethsemane, saying the exact same words again. It is not the repetition that is the issue. It's the vanity. God looks into our heart, not solely at our words.

Luke 18:13 - the tax collector kept beating his breast and praying "God be merciful to me, a sinner." This repetitive prayer was pleasing to God because it was offered with a sincere and repentant heart.

Acts 10:2,4 - Cornelius prayed constantly to the Lord and his prayers ascended as a memorial before God.

Rom. 1:9 - Paul says that he always mentions the Romans in his prayers without ceasing.

Rom. 12:12 - Paul commands us to be constant in prayer. God looks at what is in our heart, not necessarily how we choose our words.

1 Thess. 5:17 - Paul commands us to pray constantly. Good repetition is different than vain repetition.

Rev. 4:8 - the angels pray day and night without cessation the same words "Holy, Holy, Holy is the Lord God Almighty." This is repetitious prayer that is pleasing to God.

Psalm 136 - in this Psalm, the phrase "For His steadfast love endures forever" is more repetitious than any Catholic prayer, and it is God's divine Word.

Dan. 3:35-66 - the phrase "Bless the Lord" is similarly offered repeatedly, and mirrors Catholic litanies.

No; vain repetition in the Bible is not saying the same prayer over. It is making a sound or saying words you do not know the meaning of.

Think of it as the sound of OOOHHHHMMMM while meditating...you are simply making noise to make noise. That would be vain repetition; not only do you not know what you are saying, you don't know why.

As an Orthodox Christian, I can say the "Our Father" in Russian and know what I am saying despite not knowing the full literal translation (it does translate differently into Russian than it does English). Is that a vain prayer? No, because I know what I am saying and why.

We don't consider it vain repetition. Unless all is vanity and all repetition is vanity. The prayer was made popular when people were illiterate and death was a next door neighbor. By focussing on the "Hail Marys" and "Our Fathers" and "Glory be's" you missed the announcement before each Our Father of a Biblical scene or some activity of Mary (associate with her life with Jesus) that was to be meditated upon while chanting the repetive prayers.

At a funeral the mysteries meditate on are usually the sorrowful mysterys, those dealing with the crucifixion and death of Jesus.

The are:

The Agony (of Jesus) in the Garden (after his last supper)

The Scourging (of Jesus) at the pillar

The Crowning (of Jesus) with thorns (by mocking Roman soldiers)

The Carrying of the Cross

The Crucifixion

What no Ressurection? No, that is in another set of mysteries. So we are reminding ourselves that Christ, too, died and as he was raised from the dead we will be too.

As you are aware we belive that if you die with mortal sin, you are damned, but if you die with sin or have not suffered the consequences of your (forgiven) sins, then you must suffer in Purgatory until you are purgated of all sinfullness and enter heaven.

Thus we believe that prayer for the dead helps them, because our petiontions to God to realease a soul from purgatory are listened to by God. We also believe that our prayers and our suffering can be applied to the souls in purgatory so that they can be released.

While this can be (and is by some) constured to mean that we believe that sacraficial death of Jesus is inadequate to gain us heaven, we would deny that accusation. We believe in the reconciliation of humans and God by the atonement of Jesus and we believe that God is just and we must suffer for our sins, here on earth, or before we enter heaven. There are sins that condemn us to hell, but not all sins, by mercy of God, do.

Who is edified? The people praying and the deceased. Is this contrary to what many Baptist teach? Yes. Does this deny the truth of scripture?No, not the way we understand it.

I'm Protestant and I don't approve of people praying to Mother Mary or the saints, but I have seen the love of Catholics for God's people expressed in this way. I think expressing love, devotion, faith,

worship, holiness needs more work in the Christian churches altogether, but focused on God and Jesus Christ. Praying with love shouldn't be questioned as long as it's toward God.

Thank you for asking! So many people assume that we worship Mary and statues but we really don't. It's nice to see somebody actually ASK a Catholic what it is (relief:).

Anyway, when we say a rosary, we are asking Mary to pray for us. We believe she's in heaven and, as the bible says, "the prayer of the righteous are powerful." And as we ask her to pray for us, we think about the 'mysteries" of Jesus. They are about his life, miracles, death and resurrection. We don't say all the Hail Mary's as vain repetition. The bible talks of repetitious prayer because the heathens thought of prayer as being some magical thing that would cause their god to hear them more. But we know that HE knows what we're going to say beforehand anyway. Repetitious prayer is in the bible as NOT being vain;

. Matthew 26:44: "And he left them, and went away again, and prayed the third time, saying the same words". Mark 14:39 reads: "And again he went away, and prayed, and spake the same words."

Revelation 4:8: "...and they rest not day and night, saying, Holy, holy, holy, Lord God Almighty, which was, and is, and is to come."

"Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God is one LORD: And thou shalt love the LORD thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might. And these words, which I command thee this day, shall be in thine heart: And thou shalt teach them diligently unto thy children, and shalt talk of them when thou sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, and when thou liest down, and when thou risest up." (Deuteronomy 6:4-7)