Praying the novena

By Aby Sam Thomas

It was almost 1 a.m. on a recent Friday morning when Claudia del Castillo decided that it was time to close up shop and get some sleep.

Del Castillo, a graduate student at Columbia University, had been juggling a number of different study-related tasks over the past few hours: reading her textbooks, searching for information on the Internet, organizing her contact lists. Her usually perky eyes were tired, and she ran her hands over her black hair, worrying that it had seemingly lost some of its bounce.

In the midst of all her work, she had also managed to have a chat on the phone with her mother in Colombia, while trying to decide between watching “Wall-E” and “What’s Your Number?” on her iTunes movie account. In the end, she decided to watch neither—she was tired and she needed some shut-eye.

But there was something she needed to do before she got to sleep.

A quick, warm shower later, she was in her pajamas, sitting cross-legged over the covers on her bed. She reached out to the small desk by her bed and picked up the small, square book given to her as a gift by a friend from the Dominican Republic. The book was titled “Novena Biblica Al Divino Nino Jesus,” the Biblical Novena for the Divine Infant Jesus.

The cover of the book had a picture of a cherubic Infant Jesus in a pink robe, his tiny feet visible just beneath the hem of the robe. There’s a glow around the Infant’s image, with a golden halo in the shape of a crossbehind the Infant’s head. The Infant is smiling, with his arms outstretched, as if to give a reassuring embrace.

Del Castillo held the book with both her hands, closed her eyes and said, in Spanish, “En el nombre del Padre, del Hijo y del Espíritu Santo. Amén.” In the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, Amen.

With that solemn utterance, del Castillo picked a page in the book and started to read out the prayer forthe fifth day of her novena, starting with the persignarse, the Sign of the Cross.

The novena, an act of devotion in the Roman Catholic Church, is a prayer that is repeated every day, for nine days, in the hope of receiving God’s grace. These prayers are often dedicated to a specific entity like a saint, an angel, the Blessed Virgin Mary or one of her representations or one of the personages of the Holy Trinity.

“People pray [the novena] when they are in need of solace, to ask for favors,” said del Castillo. She smiled as she confessed her own reasons for doing the prayer.

“I just want this week to be better,” she said, having had a slew of heavy, work-laden days at school. “I just need some vision, some courage to guide me. And this prayer helps. You can pray novenas anywhere. You can pray them in church, at home, anywhere.”

Del Castillo learned these rituals as a young girl growing up in a devout Catholic family. She is no longer devout and considers herself a “secular” Catholic. But her nighttime routine demonstrates that for del Castillo and many formerly religious people, religious rituals remain so deeply ingrained that they never go out of style.

The freedom to be able to pray “anywhere,” also works well for del Castillo, who, though reluctant to go to church for Mass, finds the confines of her small room good enough for prayer.

Her eyes closed, she chanted: “Por la señal de la Santa Cruz, de nuestros enemigos, líbranos Señor Dios nuestro.” By the sign of the Holy Cross, free us from our enemies, Oh God.

As she spoke the words, she made the sign of the cross three times—once over her forehead, an invocation to the Holy Spirit to show one’s belief in the Gospel; secondly over her lips as a mark of respect to the Gospel and to prevent hypocrisy and blasphemy from one’s mouth; and finally, over her chest, to show one’s desire to keep the Gospel in one’s heart, an act of blessing the self.

There was a structured rhythm in the way del Castillo said her novena. She began her prayer by reading the Nicene Creed, and then followed it with a short prayer which is common for all nine days of the novena. A prayer directed to the Holy Virgin was next, which started with specific prayers invoking the Holy Father and the Blessed Virgin, and ended with a quiet rendition of the Gloria hymn.

Pulling up the page in the book referring to the fifth day of the novena, del Castillo then recited the fifth day prayer in a slow, solemn fashion. After a short series of couplets to the Virgin Mary called the gozos, del Castillo said the final prayer to the Infant Jesus, in whose name the prayer book was dedicated.

Once the prayer was over, she closed her eyes and chanted:

“Jesús, José y María, bendecid nuestros hogares.

Jesús, José y María, libradnos de todo mal.

Jesús, José y María, salvad nuestras almas. Amén, Aleluya.

En el nombre del Padre, del Hijo y del Espíritu Santo. Amén.”

Jesus, Joseph and Mary, bless our homes.

Jesus, Joseph and Mary, free us from all evil.

Jesus, Joseph and Mary, save our souls. Amen, Hallelujah.

In the name of the Father, the Son and the Spirit. Amen.

Del Castillo opened her eyes, a flicker of a smile now on her face. She felt calmer, she felt a sort of peace with herself and her surroundings. She placed the book back on her desk and switched off the lights.

It was finally time to sleep.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, March 7th, 2012 at 4:11 am. It is filed under Aby Sam Thomas, News, View From NYC. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.