Night-time Prayers

When the family is all in bed, we say prayers. The usual format is this:

1. Sign of the Cross

2. General Prayer ("Dear Jesus, I love you, please help me each day to be kind, to be gentle, and quick to obey"--directed more towards kiddies, but useful for adults as well : )

3. Individual petitions ("Bless mommy, daddy, etc. and we pray for the X family whose house just burned down . . . ")

4. Hail Mary

5. Sign of the Cross


The whole thing might take two minutes. Up until recently, Cavan couldn't really add petitions, and we intentionally kept things brief to maintain his attention and because we're usually exhausted.

Now with a verbal Cavan and the presence of 11-year old Molly, things have expanded somewhat. Same format as above, but now a typical prayer session goes like this:

1. Sign of the Cross

2. General Prayer

3. Intercessions

Heath: "Lord, we give you thanks for a beautiful day, and for all the good things that you give to us. We ask that you bless Molly tomorrow at swim camp, and we pray for an end to abortion in our country."

Shannon: "We pray for our friends and family who are preparing to have babies, and for those moms who are struggling with the adjustment to motherhood."

Oh yeah, but in between Shan and I, we give Molly and Cavan a turn:

Shannon: "Cav, would you like to pray for anyone?"

Cavan: "Mine friends. Awezandu (Alexander), eye ("and") Domihit (Dominic), eye Jooh (Jude), Mashoo (Matthew) eye Sawuh (Sarah), eye . . . (long pause) . . . mine friends; Awezandu, eye Domihik . . . Mommy, eye Daddy, eye Mowwy, eye Baby, eye . . . (long pause) . . . Jooh, Samooul (Samuel) eye . . . Paw-paw, Dahmaw Debby (Grandma Debby), eye Bah (Paul), Dot (Scott) . . . (long pause) . . . uhhhhh . . . who ehs ("who else")?

This continues on for a while, until Molly starts and Cavan says, "No wait, I do it", stating that he's not quite finished. He then repeats the same names (interspersed with long pauses, of courses) and then finally says, "Um, do ahead."

Then it's time for our pre-teen to go:

Molly: "Um, for everyone I know, and for everyone that knows them, and for their families, and the families of their families, um, and for my friends, and their friends, and for their families, and for everyone that their families know, and so on and so on. (And all kinds of variations on this tactic) And for Grandpa Neil, Grandma Colleen, Uncle Jimmy, Aunt Meagan, Aunt Marie, Blackie (her dog), Dusty (her cat), and for my friends, Randy, Carly, etc. . . . and I pray that I can go home on the 24th for Dusty's birthday and get to stay for a whole week. OK, Shannon your turn."

(Please note that I've given you the abbreviated version of the above.)

So we've basically tripled our usual time since our two prayer-warriors joined the mix. Six minutes doesn't seem like much, but with Cavan's long pauses and Molly's endless litanies of people she knows and the cats that they own, it can be hard to maintain a prayerful disposition. Nonetheless, we feel it's very important to pray together as a family, and start to model good prayer habits for the children. And it's really helping our growth in the virtue of patience!