I-YOUniverse

Here are some pics. My beloved bought the camera to say TY for my help with a church staff retreat she recently conducted.

On the left is the first real rosary we built together. I like the large Hail Mary beads. They suit my fingers very well. The wire circles we used for the Our Father beads also remind me of the empty center which is the goal, emptiness that God may choose to fill or not. We’ve got a problem with the filament we’re using, however; it doesn’t hold the knot well.

In the center is my first practice strand for the knotted Rosary. Counting the joiner knot, it has 36 knots; three times around yields 108, the usual number of knots or beads for Buddhist prayer. But my friend Jon had the best idea: why not let each knot remind me of a specific sacred or happy moment of life.

On the right are two sets of beads. The small light wood outside is a rosary made for me by Benessa of latinworks. The inside, made by a friend and given to Sandy, is an Anglican rosary (four “weeks” of seven beads, four Our Fathers in the form of a cross, and an Invitatory bead, totaling 33).

Today I’ll pray for the people of the Gulf; those hit hardest by the financial turmoil (not the fat cats); for my friend Jean-Emile Ngue, who recently lost his mentor; and for Sandy, who is completing her second cataract surgery this afternoon. Believe me, those are the most beautiful eyes on the planet. Thanks be to God for God’s loving care and steady hand through the storms.

A bead is a bead, a knot is a knot—what counts is the heart.

Tags: prayer, Rosary, Rosary making

This entry was posted on Thursday, September 18th, 2008 at 10:02 pm and is filed under prayer, religion. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.