A reader writes:
My praying the rosary has become an “addictive” habit. I only do it once a day, but now I feel compelled, in a virtually “addictive” way, to do it once a day, because otherwise I feel deprived.
(An intelligently ecumenical gloss: I have some Sufi friends - of the Jerrahi Order, “apostolates” of Rumi who I think might actually be a Saint even though he was a nominal Muslim - who have told me that in THEIR order of Sufism, “to forget to pray is its own punishment, because if you forget to pray then you are depriving yourself of God’s company.”)
Anyway, the rosary has literally become a “habit” to which I feel “addicted”, although not in a compulsive way. I simply feel DEPRIVED if I don’t pray the rosary (when able to do so) every day.
Let me clarify: To contrast this with my physical addiction to tobacco (and I regard tobacco as a gift from God, although a very minor and MATERIAL gift which, in CONTRAST to prayer, OUGHT to be limited)...well in contrast to my addiction to tobacco, my “addiction” to the rosary does NOT make me suffer if I don’t get it, but nonetheless I feel like I’m depriving myself if I don’t do it. In other words, the sense of “deprivation” of the rosary is CATEGORICALLY DIFFERENT from being deprived of tobacco.
To your knowledge, does this experience resemble the experiences of others who have gradually converted to a life of prayer? Especially vis a vis our Mother Mary?
I am so not the person to be asking about this. If there is any problem I don’t have experience or understanding of, it’s the phenomenon of an overwhelming compulsion to pray. Prayer is, with rare exceptions, something the feels like tedious exercise for me. I do it because I know our Lord commands it and because I know it is good for me, in the sense that broccoli and asparagus are good for a five year old. Most of the time prayer is (emotionally speaking) irksome and burdensome; a task to be performed because God says to do it. There are fifty things I’d rather be doing, my mind wanders, and I always have the nagging sensation that I’m not doing it right, that I am praying the wrong way, or for the wrong things, or insincere, or what have you. My consolation comes from Fr. Simon Tugwell, OP, who opens his wonderful book Prayer in Practice by noting that the first thing we know about prayer, according to St. Paul, is that we do not know how to do it.
One thing that relieves this for me is praying along with the Church in the Mass or the Divine Office, because I don’t have to puzzle out whether the prayers of the Church are rightly ordered. I know they are. Dittos for the Rosary. Praying things you aren’t making up off the top of your head—things rooted in the Tradition—can be very liberating. But still, forcing myself to pray, cultivating a habit of prayer that is independent of how I feel, well, that’s steady work. And it’s something that feels miles away from the experience you report.
I can relate to your experience of deprivation if I connect it to the Eucharist. On those occasion I felt I should refrain from receiving, I’ve felt very deprived. But I wouldn’t call my hunger for the Eucharist a compulsion. Compulsion implies lack of freedom and I suspect that nothing which is really from God has that character. “Hunger” or “appetite” is, I suspect, the more accurate word. Hunger speaks of a thing you are properly made to love. “Compulsion” speaks of a thing you are enslaved to. The mystery of Faith is that we are free sons—and bondservants—of God. But our slavery is freedom in Christ, whereas our freedom is slavery in the realm of Satan and the world.
Dunno if any of that is helpful, but I’m glad you are loving the Rosary!
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An interesting look at prayer, Mark. I’m intrigued by your statement, ‘But still, forcing myself to pray, cultivating a habit of prayer that is independent of how I feel, well, that’s steady work.” I believe that transcending ‘how we feel’ and moving on with what we know rationally we must be, or ought to be doing, is an indicator of progression. As you say, it is steady work, but absolutely important.
I take issue with your suggestion that tobacco is a gift from God. I would argue that it is a gift in the same way that Cocaine and Marijuana are gifts; in the same way that a nuclear bomb is a gift. Human beings were never meant to inhale smoke and then blow it from their mouths and noses; we have every indication that this is a very very harmful practice that leads to ill health and death. It is not a gift; you may enjoy using tobacco, but know that in so doing you are using your body in a way in which it was not intended, and you could very well pay the price for this choice.
Peace,
Del
please attach the prayer formet i dont no the prayer please send spiritual prayers my age is 21 please prayer for me and send new miracals sir
thanku
I think prayer can be like exercise: we know we need to do it, and when we do, we feel “righteous” and good about ourselves; when we don’t, we feel guilty, and, I would suppose, feel we’ve missed something.
I struggle to do both, yet when I do them, I have a feeling of accomplishment and can check that off my list for the day.
As far as the rosary goes, my understanding is that the Blessed Mother has asked us for a rosary each day, so, loving her, I make sure I get it in. Again, if I miss, I will make sure I say two the next day.
Del: he was quoting a “reader”
Thank you for differentiating between compulsion and hunger. Very interesting and most helpful!
Something troubles me about your description of prayer. Somehow you seem to have made it into a chore, like cleaning the toilet. As a Secular Carmelite my experience has been the oposite. In reading John of the Cross, we see him describe prayer as a “sheer joy”, and that’s how it seems for me. Prayer shouldn’t be “saying a bunch of prayers” like lifting weights for an athlete. It’s an amazing intimacy with the Lord. The saints describe it as “ecstasy”. As the person writing about their experience with the Rosary, it’s so joyful that it’s an addiction. I’d suggest reading the great mystics like Teresa of Avila, John of the Cross, or Theresa the Little Flower. These were people who know what pray is really supposed to be.
Yes, prayer can be a “joy,” but some days it takes real discipline to make the time. I’ve heard that it is most pleasing to God to pray even when we don’t feel like it. Even Theresa of Avila and others talk about dryness, distractions, etc., etc. Not all of their prayer was ecstasy and joy. So it is persistence in prayer, in my humble opinion, that is necessary.
If we pray only for the consolations, then we are praying for the wrong reasons.
To get back on topic: yes, daily prayer is sometimes work, sometimes joy, etc., but we have to be faithful to it. I find that on those days I don’t pray, or pray minimally, I’m easy prey for the enemy. I don’t have God’s strength, which we ask for daily when we pray.
The rosary is a weapon. We wouldn’t think of going into a dangerous situation unarmed, and going through the day without prayer is going into danger unarmed.
Prayer felt like a chore to me, too, many times, until I started doing regular Eucharistic Adoration. I don’t force myself to do endless hours of it; I take advantage of local adoration weekly and go for small segments of time before work in the morning, or if I have a day off, I spend more time there…and now it’s not uncommon for me to spend 45 minutes to an hour at a time there. That may not sound like much to true “prayer addicts,” but for me? Heck, yeah. I would never have believed I could sit and meditate, contemplate, pray, meander through my daily concerns, just sit and look on Jesus, let Him look at me…for 45 minutes to an hour…and wonder how the time went so fast.
This was a growth process, and it isn’t always “ecstasy.” But I know that stopping for adoration regularly has done things for my ability to pray that nothing else, be it a Rosary, the Liturgy of the Hours, or novenas, has ever done before. I cannot recommend it highly enough. And don’t worry if your mind wanders…just turn all the wanders over to the Blessed Sacrament, and let Him wander through them with you. You’ll definitely be surprised and uplifted by what results.
My take,
Janny
It sounds like our reader might take this up with a spiritual director. The saints—mystical or otherwise—are consistent on this point: progress in the spiritual life requires a wise guide, someone more advanced. We can very easily lead ourselves astray.
Thank you, Alicia! I read and responded to this at 5:30 am, without my morning coffee and clear head! Now it makes sense!
Peace,
Del
If we accept the simplest definition of prayer, then “you’re gonna have to face it, you’re addicted to love.” I think the trouble is that love, by definition, and prayer, by extension, cannot be an addiction. Addiction is something that reduces our ability to use free will, and love must be free or it is not love. Does that mean the individual who finds himself addicted to prayer should get a prayer patch or go cold turkey? Not at all. I think, though, that such a person may find themselves going through a rather rote program of prayer without stopping to place himself in the presence of God. Perhaps the correct guidance is to fill that addiction with love for God rather than a feeling of obligation or sense of compulsion. An addiction, after all, is something less that a true desire for something. If what we are addicted to is a good, then wouldn’t it be better to make sure we have our hearts in it rather than trying to avoid it? Prayer is much more about the heart than it is about the mind or the tongue.
Prayer is often a chore for me, too. After having read “Dark Night of the Soul” (St. John of the Cross), I’ll have to agree with the reader who says that if we get consolation from it, that’s great—a gift from God—but that cannot be our motivation for praying. We need to move beyond our praying-for-consolations so that we pray regardless of whether we feel those consolations or not. My only suggestion (and I’m still struggling with all this myself) is that if a particular type of prayer seems to be particularly “chore-some”, maybe substitute a different form or prayer or a differnt devotion, at least for awhile. I had to do this with the rosary: as someone who has consecrated herself to the Blessed Virgin more than a decade ago, I used to think that I absolutely HAD to pray a rosary each day or else I wasn’t living up to my consecration. Advice from a holy priest helped me to see that I could substitute another form of prayer or devotion, at least for awhile, without detracting anything from my beloved Queen & Mother or her divine Son, the Master of my life.
I would suggest the excellent new book “The Better Part” to help anyone who wants to grow in their prayer life.
Think of prayer in this way: it is a chance for us to touch that which is holy, meaning God Himself. All day long we are confronted by an unholy world. The longer we spend touching the unholy, the more likelihood we will give in to temptation and separate ourselves from God. As we reconnect with God through prayer, we not only experience the full holiness of God, but strengthen ourselves to do battle against the unholy. How often have we begun the prayers of the Rosary with the anxieties of the day on our minds and souls, and then by the time we utter the last “amen” we feel completely at peace?
I pray the rosary every day, well, almost everyday. Some days I miss and then my I find my whole demeanor and thoughts take a downhill turn. I’ve noticed the difference in my whole life and I’ve been praying the rosary steadily for almost 3 yrs now. It only takes 15 min/day. I usually turn on EWTN and pray it with Father Mitch Pacwa at 7:30 a.m. every day. It’s taped from the Holy Land and the pictures of the sacred places where Jesus walked helps in my devotion.
I’ve recently added praying the Stations of the Cross. This has added tremendously to my closeness with God. This takes about 1/2hr and so my total time spent in prayer with God and our Holy MOther is about 45 min/day. That’s not very much time out of 24 hrs! But the peace and closeness to our Saviour from spending time these prayers is what I’ve been looking for all of my life.
My hope is that every Catholic will find this out. It makes life much easier.
Receiving Holy Communion and reciting the Holy Rosary including weekly Eucharist Adoration are such powerful phenomena that a day without any of them becomes an empty and meaningless day
If a day goes by when I don’t pray a Rosary, I feel like I didn’t brush my teeth. I need to practice it more - my attention wanders, but you don’t get better at it by not doing it.
My problem with praying the Rosary is that I get so caught up in meditating on the mysteries that I don’t get around to praying the prayers after awhile, and then I find that an hour has gone by and I’ve only gotten a couple decades prayed….
To the reader who is “addicted” to praying the rosary: This is a gift from the Holy Spirit and possibly - no- likely, your vocation….to pray for others so be glad:) How beautiful!
Amy,
Loosing yourself in the mysteries and not the individual prayers is great! That’s what should happen. Keep doing exactly that. Many of the great saints did that too. If they were reading a book or Scripture and something “jumped out” at them, they’d stop reading and let themselves be taken away in spontaneous prayer, not finishing the chapter in the book at all. If this happens with the Rosary, let it! Union with the Lord is the goal, not finishing a set group of prayers. I think you’ve been given a great gift of contemplation by the Lord.
Interesting discussion.
One question.. is it possible to be addicted to prayer or praying? A friend of mine today told me that her spouse prays for 7 to 8 hours a day, every day!! It is ruining their marriage but he does not seem to care. The description sounded like some sort of compulsion. Apart from going to very church very frequently, he comes home and dials an 800 number in which he joins more prayers.
Of course prayer is a good thing but at what point does it become “compulsive” and where can one turn to for help.
My friend has been married for a year… knew that the husband has this “compulsion” and was thinking that it would end once they got married, as she attributed it to him being lonely. The priest counselled them on this issue before their wedding but of course he was not going to “condemnn” praying..
Seems to me like a different kind of “addiction” as it is very spiritual.. other addictions/compulsions are much more in the realm of physical.
Ideas would be most appreciated.
Thanks.
Tata Wy
I’m 55 and just discovered the bliss of praying the rosary. I am a Girl scout leader and am helping my troop earn the Marian Award, so we have been studying Mary as the first disciple of Christ. My family is going through a very rough time—chronic illness, losing our home to foreclosure—and I turned to my rosary as a “last resort.” Now, I can’t seem to put it down. I get dismayed when I see that I am coming to the end of the decades, so I just start over again. I feel wrapped in God’s love—the fear that had me in its grip—is gone. I only hope I can help “my girls” understand the power of this beautiful form of prayer…
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