The Franciscan Crown: Make it, pray it!
One of my goals after learning how to make knotted twine Rosaries was to knot up a Franciscan Crown, but being terrible at math and measurements and such, I wasn't sure how much twine I needed for it.Make It!
Not to worry, though -- thanks to collaborating with other Rosary-makers, we determined that it'd take about 23-1/2 feet of twine (if you're new to Rosary-making, you may wanna up it to 24). So, I was able to knot up a few of these for some of my Franciscan brothers and sisters, and one for myself, too!
Here's how they turned out (click for a larger picture):
I'd have preferred to use brown, but, alas, didn't have enough on hand. So, I used Tranquility, and finished it off with a San Damiano crucifix.
Pray It!
A bit o' background: The Franciscan Crown dates to the 1400s and was promoted by a young novice friar to honor the 7 joys of Mary. It consists of 7 decades of Hail Marys, each preceded by an Our Father and followed by a Glory Be. I've seen slightly different instructions out there on praying it, but the way I'm familiar with, and was taught as a novice (candidate), is:
- To Start: Begin with the sign of the cross, which is then followed by 7 decades, each consisting of 1 Our Father, 10 Hail Marys and 1 Glory Be. (There is no Creed or opening prayers.)
- To End: At the end of the 7 decades, conclude with 2 additional Hail Marys (in honor of the tradition of the 72 years of Mary's life), followed by 1 Our Father, 1 Hail Mary, and 1 Gloria for the intentions of our Holy Father.
- The Annunciation
- The Visitation
- The Nativity
- The Visit of the Magi
- Finding Jesus in the Temple
- The Resurrection
- The Assumption and Coronation of Mary
And to finish things off, here are a couple of helpful resources on the Franciscan Crown for further reading, iffin' you're interested:
Labels: franciscan, prayer
posted by Lisa, ofs | Permalink 
11 Comments:
good for you! My experience is that it's an excellent devotion, and unlike our other great Franciscan devotional invention, the stations of the cross, is still more or less limited to our Franciscan family. Enjoy!
Our SFO Fraternity meets to pray the Franciscan Crown when our parish has a day of Adoration.
What a beautiful Rosary you made for this beautiful prayer tradition. Making the Rosary seems like it would be a prayer in itself.
Thanks, Friar Minor! :-) I do love this special devotion from our Family.
An' Barb, that's way spiffy that y'all pray the Crown at your parish's Adoration! I wish my fraternity did that. Hmmm, mebbe I'll mention that at our next Gathering! :-)
Thank you so much for mentioning the Crown Rosary on Rosary Army, and then linking back here to these instructions!
I sense this could potentially become a huge benefit for my own growth in faith and devotion.
*hugs*
love always
awesome... thanks. I'm not a dumb Francsican anymore!
I received a Franciscan 7 decade rosary. Do I have to have it blessed? We are in a small midwest town and there are no Fathers here.
Thanks
CJA
Hi, Anonymous! No, you are not required to have the Crown (nor any other type of Rosary or chaplet) blessed in order to pray with it. :-)
+Pax et Bonum+
Lol have just been discussing this since Third Order meeting last Friday. A Tertiary from Canada whom I contacted about this informed me there is a specific blessing for Seraphic Rosary/Franciscan Crown in the Manual of Nicholas IV.
Manual can be downloaded at; http://thetraditionalthirdorderofstfrancis.blogspot.com/
Love the idea of making a Franciscan Rosary! I just went to my first meeting with the local SFO, and I feel called to be there.
When you finish the Rosary, instead of the usual Our Father knot with a crucifix, do you use a Hail Mary knot?
@Doug: Yep, that's a Hail Mary knot at the end, instead of the Our Father that's on the standard Rosary. :-)
I graduated from a registered nursing programme at Grant MacEwan Community College in 1983. One of our treasured classmates will be celebrating her 50th year in the Franciscan Sisters of the Atonement in Edmonton, Alberta. She just told me about the Franciscan Crown rosary with the 7 decades they say throughout the day. I plan to make some of these now that I just found your blog site (I "Googled" Franciscan Crown Rosary+how to make). Voila!
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