Prayers

Prayers

Prayer In Our School

As a Catholic school we use prayers to develop our relationships with God. Active prayer life starts with committing some prayers to memory. As pupils progress through the year groups and Holy Sacraments they are introduced to a wider range of prayer.

The Sign of the Cross

The Sign of the Cross is the most basic Catholic prayer, though we don't often think of it that way. We encourage our children to say it with reverence before and after their other prayers.

The most common problem that children have in learning the Sign of the Cross is using their left hand instead of their right; the second most common is touching their right shoulder before the left. While the latter is the correct way for Eastern Christians, both Catholic and Orthodox, to make the Sign of the Cross, Latin Rite Catholics make the Sign of the Cross by touching their left shoulder first.

Prayer throughout the school day.

Prayer is used throughout the day to praise and give thanks; the morning and evening prayer and Grace before and after meals. Instilling a sense of gratitude in our children can be especially hard in a world where many of us have an overabundance of goods. Grace Before Meals is a good way to remind them (and ourselves!) that everything we have comes ultimately from God.

Our Father and Hail Mary

We should pray the Our Father daily with our children. It's a good prayer to use as a short morning or evening prayer. Children naturally gravitate to the Virgin Mary, and learning the Hail Mary early makes it easier to foster devotion to Saint Mary and to introduce longer Marian prayers, such as the Rosary.

An Act of Faith, Hope and Charity

Acts of Faith, Hope, and Charity are common morning prayers. If you help your children memorize these three prayers, they will always have a short form of morning prayer at their disposal for those days when they don't have time to pray a longer form of morning prayer.

The Act of Contrition/Sorry

The Act of Contrition is an essential prayer for the Sacrament of Confession, but we should also encourage our children to say it every evening before they go to sleep. Children who have made their First Confession should also make a quick examination of conscience before saying the Act of Contrition.

Hail Mary and Glory Be .

The Glory Be prayer is most familiar from the Rosary where it is recited at the end of each decade of the Hail Mary.

Hail Mary is a prayer dedicated to Our Lady, Mary. An important prayer to the Holy Mother with more relevance as we live and learn in the Parish of Our Lady. It also forms part of The Rosary prayer.

Prayer to the Holy Spirit

This prayer is addressed to God as the Holy Spirit. This prayer is important for the Sacrament of Confirmation and during Pentecost.

Eternal Rest

"Eternal Rest" is a prayer for the dead that has been in use since the early days of Christianity. It is recited after the death of a loved one as a way of asking God to bless the departed, guarantee their safe passage to heaven (or paradise), and ensure that they rest in peace. We also use this prayer in the month of November which is the month of Holy Souls.

The Rosary

The Rosary is an important devotion that honours Mary while focusing on the events in the life of Jesus. This and all prayers of the Rosary are meditative prayers. A decade of The Rosary is made up of Our Father, ten Hail Marys and a Glory Be

How to say a decade of The Rosary

Apostle's Creed

This creed is considered to be a faithful summary of the Apostles’ teachings Creed. The creed is used in the Mass.

The Apostle's Creed

The Angelus

A Catholic devotional prayer commemorating the incarnation of Our Lady, Mary. This prayer is used with pupils from year 3 upwards and said before lunch.