Finding Clarity Through the Rosary

Kate Taliaferro explains what she a commitment to praying the Rosary daily has taught her about her own priorities.

October is the month of the Rosary. The Rosary is a beautiful prayer which I have practiced on and off during my life. I had a long stint after college when I prayed the Rosary daily. As the kids came and life got busy, it fell away. Somewhere in the middle of babies and toddlers and homeschooling I found it again, briefly, only to let it slip back into the back of my spiritual mind. This October, the Holy Spirit seemed to be solely focused on getting the Rosary back into my life.

I decided to make a commitment to pray the Rosary every day for October. I have been following along with the Hallow app’s Rosary challenge, which has been a beautiful way to dig deeper into the individual mysteries. While I already had the order of mysteries memorized, I have not spent too much time reflecting on the corresponding fruits of each mystery. This has added a new element and color to each mystery that I am enjoying resting in.

One of the first things I’m noticing from my time spent in with the Rosary is a need to reevaluate how I am spending my time overall. It may not seem like much, but 20 to 30 minutes to pray a Rosary is still time away from something else. We have 6 children, we homeschool, and my husband is in the military. Those 30 minutes have to come from somewhere, even if I am folding laundry while I pray.

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In addition to my vocation as wife and mother, I am also a blogger and since Lent of this year, a YouTuber. That’s a lot of plates to keep spinning, and throughout the summer I felt like I was doing a pretty good job. However, in a recent Bible study at my parish, we talked about how spending time in service for God is not the same as spending time in prayer with God. Through my time spent with the Rosary, I am feeling the Holy Spirit begin to guide me away from the rigorous content production schedule I had been working to maintain for myself. I don’t have time to do it all, and on more than one occasion these past weeks I have found myself needing to choose: pray my promised Rosary or create content.

The times I chose to create content, the Rosary got left to the minutes before sleep and was never finished. The times I chose the Rosary, the content sometimes found time elsewhere, but at the expense of my family and my inner peace. All the things cannot fit in the day. And if all the things cannot fit, then I am trying to do more than God is asking of me.

In being faithful to my Rosary, God is opening my eyes to where my focus needs to be as the year begins to close. Time in prayer and time with my family have to come first. Everything else, no matter how good or beautiful they are, come second. The Rosary is helping me to daily discern how to order my life in a way that is pleasing to God.

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All the things cannot fit in the day. And if all the things cannot fit, then I am trying to do more than God is asking of me. #CatholicMom

If you do not yet have a dedicated time set aside for prayer, I encourage you to give it a try. Perhaps this could be something to consider for the upcoming Advent season. We are blessed with so many different prayers and devotionals. Even if the Rosary isn’t the prayer form you choose, I promise the time you spend daily with God in prayer will bear good fruit in your life.

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