It is simply this:

"Jesus Lord and Christ, Son and Word of the living God, have mercy on me, a sinner."

The Jesus prayer is an ancient, Eastern Orthodox prayer, whereby God is invoked by uttering the name of Jesus, and the one who prays approaches humble reconciliation with God by acknowledging one's sinful nature. In Eastern Orthodoxy, this is a common repetitive prayer, often spoken on knotted prayer ropes throughout the day, and follows St. Paul's admonition to "pray without ceasing." [Thess 1, 5:17]

Father Cleary has structured these meditations to be prayed with the traditionally configured 5 decade Catholic rosary. For those who object to the crucifix (cross with corpus) and the Marian rosary center, it is quite easy to obtain a 5 decade rosary made with a simple cross and Jesus center. For Catholics, the Jesus Prayer rosary may be considered a chaplet alternative, much along the lines of the Divine Mercy and other chaplets, where the five decade, Dominican configuration of beads are used.

Each decade is followed by a Glory Be and a wonderful concluding prayer, which Father Cleary has taken from liturgical sources or, in some cases, beautifully written himself with sitings heavily referenced in notes at the end of the book. The concluding prayers create a crescendo of spiritual feeling; they're an exclamation point at the end of the decade--a reinforcement that gives structure to the decade and impetus on to the next meditation. They're extremely well done. Father Cleary also includes prayers on the centrepiece and final prayers for the end of the rosary, as well as alternate prayers for those who wish to include the Marian experience.

This compact, portable book certainly packs a punch on many different levels--it's a bridge of prayer across Christian faiths, which celebrates what is in common rather than what divides. It draws us in meditation to Christ and keeps us there with the brilliant device of the repetition of the meditation itself on each small bead. It provides a warm embrace with the concluding prayers of each decade. It's a rosary quickly recited, yet not robotically recited. And the appendix notes themselves are a wealth of sources for further reading and education. The Jesus Prayer Rosary is available on Amazon.com (see this and more sources below) for a very affordable price, and would make a terrific gift, not only for yourself, a family member or friend, but for your church's reading library.

Q.: What was your inspiration for writing The Jesus Prayer Rosary?

Answer:

A number of factors motivated me to compose the JPR really. It is now very difficult, after six years, to remember them all, or to put the ones I do recall into the right order. But here it goes:

(1)   Having tried all sorts of methods of devotional prayer, and having ended up rather despondent and exasperated (none of them were particularly helpful)  I thought to myself “Well, go back to the old ways, the way you were taught to pray when you were a youngster, in the “old Church”, before Vatican II and the heady, cerebral, dismissive approach to things that came in its wake (that had nothing whatsoever to do with the Council’s intentions of course).  Why not try the Rosary, of all things?”  I had always carried one with me, but never actually used it properly. It was something to hold on to – still is, thank God. Well, I did try it, and I found the whole experience of praying with beads wonderfully calming and therapeutic. With its tactility and sense of rhythm, I could definitely understand why people were so attached to it. Its history was deeply rooted in the psyche of people who couldn’t read, who weren’t engaged in heady stuff, and who just wanted to draw close to their Lord. I took to it so much that my friends and parishioners were taken aback and wondered what had happened to this over-academic, somewhat skeptical and analytical priest. I was displaying the annoyingly intrusive enthusiasm of a convert.

(2)    At the same time, I felt a need to do something about how I was using the beads. I was no longer a little boy in Birmingham. I had to pray in a way that was also appropriate to my experience of life, who I am as a particular person, including someone whose forte had been New Testament exegesis. An awful lot of the Rosary literature that I read didn’t seem to have anything to do with the approach to the gospel tradition in Dei Verbum for instance. They weren’t terribly interested in the theology of the particular evangelist, for instance; how he looked at things, presented Christ. Yet, the real Jesus is to come across to us, not in spite of the evangelists’ pondering, but through it and with their particular view of things.

I also found the repetition of the Ave Maria to be somewhat distracting. I was, after all, supposed to be reflecting on Jesus as presented in a particular passage, or the Christian life, as presented by the other New Testament writers. Thankfully, the wonderful treatment of the Rosary of the Blessed Virgin Mary (RMVM) by John Paul II had just been published. It indicated a way in which the RBVM should be prayed, as meditation on Scripture and focused on Christ. It is striking to hear it prayed, celebrated even, in the way that he wanted in the Lady Chapel of Westminster Cathedral, where, for instance, they sing the Gloria Patri as the highpoint of the meditation, and not simply as a concluding adjunct. They definitely do not have what I call the mindless “machine gun” way of praying the Hail Mary that has so often put people off.

It was also in that apostolic letter that I rediscovered the “Jesus Clause” and how it is meant to emphasize the christocentricity of the Ave Maria by enlarging on the name of Jesus, which is, after all, the heart of the Hail Mary. At the same time, I re-read the 1973 USA Bishops Marian Pastoral called Behold Your Mother: Woman of Faith (BYM). Unfortunately, no one has seen fit to reproduce it on the net. But the following passage I found particularly interesting in the circumstances: ‘Besides the precise rosary pattern long known to Catholics, we can freely experiment. New sets of mysteries are possible’ (#97). And that is precisely what I set about doing. So, for instance, in the JPR, there is a whole set of meditations on Matthew’s Infancy Narrative, endeavouring to bring out his theology of Jesus as New Moses set against the background of the Exodus story and the forthcoming story of the passion. There are devotional meditations at the end of the book in honour of the Sacred Heart, the Name of Jesus, Saint Benedict. When it comes to a particular theme, sometimes there is more than one version of an episode in the gospel tradition, letting each evangelist tell it the way he does, with a Jesus Clause and a Concluding Prayer to match.

(3)   My ecumenical interest also started to kick in. I had learnt that Christians of other traditions are also getting interested in Bead Prayer. I write about that in the Introduction to the book, and there are a good few references in the endnotes. It occurred to me that an indubitably and  manifestly more Christocentric form of Rosary could be tried; one with which Christians of other (less Marian) denominations could feel comfortable. That led me to reformulate the truth of the mysteries of the Assumption and Coronation of the Blessed Virgin in the meditations on the Life of Grace and the New Jerusalem. The Marian dogmas may not be acceptable to non-Catholics, but my two non-Marian reformulations (of what is after all the same idea) most certainly are. Christocentricity and ecumenical sensitivity also played a huge part in my choosing the Jesus Prayer as the recurrent theme. Again, I have dealt with the Jesus Prayer, its background, biblical meaning, its praise in the Catechism of the Catholic Church and its popularity in ecumenical circles in the Introduction to the book (see also the reference notes). Along with what is written in the book on pages xi-xii, it can be said that this prayer, with its use of the great Christological titles, concentrates the mind on the centrality of the person of the New Testament Jesus. An enormous amount of time was taken up in deciding on the content of the Jesus Clause attached to the Jesus Prayer. Its role is crucial. It is to ‘hold the thought’ in a very concise way, that is, to act as a reminder of the theme of the meditation suggested by the Scripture reading. So, for example, while meditating on the death of Jesus:

    Jesus, Lord and Christ,

    Son of the Living God:

    you passed from this world to the Father,

    have mercy (on us).

Q.: I noticed that there was no calendar attached to the Meditation. Do you have a recommendation as to how the Meditations should be chosen for a particular day of the week?

Answer:

Not really. It all depends on the celebration or the purpose for praying the Jesus Rosary. However, ordinarily, I use the customary arrangement: Sunday, Meditations on Life in Christ; Monday, Meditations on the Infancy Narrative (of either Matthew or Luke); Tuesday, Meditations on the Passion: Wednesday, Life in Christ: Thursday, Meditations on the Ministry of Jesus; Friday, Meditations on the Passion; Saturday, Meditations on the Infancy Narrative of Luke, using the Hail Mary with its Jesus Clause as presented in the book (Appendix 1).

Q.: The concluding prayers after each decade are really wonderful.  Did you arrive at the idea of including them because of your individual experience with the standard rosary, or were concluding prayers common historically?

Answer:

Yes, they did arise out of my experience with what you call the standard rosary. In this part of the world, the “Fatima Prayer” is used. The major problem is that it does not serve the purpose of a Concluding Prayer, which is to sum up the particular Meditation and to ask for its fruits. That is the way Pope John Paul II understood it in RBVM #35. ‘In current practice, the Trinitarian doxology is followed by a brief  concluding prayer which varies according to local custom. Without in any way diminishing the value of such invocations, it is worthwhile to note that the contemplation of the mysteries could better express their full spiritual fruitfulness if an effort were made to conclude each mystery with a prayer for the fruits specific to that particular mystery. In this way the Rosary would better express its connection with the Christian life.’ Most of the Concluding Prayers are taken from Liturgical books (Anglican or Roman Catholic). In a few places, I have had to compose some myself, as in the case of Matthew’s Infancy narrative; some others I have translated from the Latin of the Roman Liturgy.

Q.: In the helpful notes which you provide to tell us from where you derived your prayers, I noticed repeated references to various "Collects."  What is a Collect?

Answer:

A “Collect” is what is today called an Opening Prayer in the Roman Catholic Liturgy. The Anglican Liturgy continues to use the word Collect. It comes from the Latin word Collecta which means ‘the prayer that gathers up’. In the ancient liturgy, after the Celebrant had said ‘Let us pray’, there were a few moments of silence in which people made their own prayers. The Celebrant then said the Collect. It was meant to gather them all up together in one audible petition. Obviously, in the JPR they have to be called Concluding Prayers.

Q.: Would you tell us a little about your Catholic order, the Divine Word Missionaries (SVD)?

 
Answer:

That is a BIG ASK. Too big for 1am. The following websites will definitely be of help:

http://www.stmary-on-the-quay.com/

http://www.theword.ie/cms/publish/article_690.shtml

http://www.svdvocations.org/Missionaries/Who-We-Are.aspx

http://www.divineword.org/

And now I am going to bed!