Novena


A novena is an ancient tradition of devotional praying in Christianity, consisting of private or public prayers repeated for nine successive days or weeks. The nine days between the Feast of the Ascension and Pentecost, when the disciples gathered in the Upper Room and devoted themselves to prayer, is often considered to be the first novena.
In some Christian communities, such as in Africa, Latin America and the Philippines, novena traditions are popular and include devotional rituals such as liturgies, congregational prayers, the decoration of statues, hymns and music, processions, as well as communal feasting.
Novenas are most often prayed by members of the Catholic Church, but also by Lutherans, Anglicans, and Eastern Orthodox Christians; they have been used in ecumenical Christian settings as well. The prayers are often derived from devotional prayer books, or consist of the recitation of the rosary, or of short prayers through the day. Novena prayers are customarily printed in small booklets, and are often dedicated to a specific angel, saint, Marian title of the Blessed Virgin Mary, or one of the persons of the Holy Trinity.

History

The word Novena is rooted in the Latin word for nine. The practice of the novena is based in early Christianity, where Masses were held for nine days with devotional prayers for the deceased. The practice may trace its origins to an early Greek and Roman custom performed by families, consisting of nine days of mourning after the death of a loved one, followed by a feast, which originally prompted Catholic writers such as St. Augustine, Pseudo-Alcuin and John Beleth to warn Christians not to emulate the custom.
Over time, members of the Roman Catholic faith began to associate novena with Christian themes such as the nine months Jesus spent in the womb, the giving-up of His spirit at the ninth hour during the crucifixion, and the nine days that passed between the Ascension of Jesus and the descent of the Holy Spirit on the first Christians at Pentecost. In the New Testament, this biblical event is often quoted from Acts of the Apostles, 1:12–2:5. The Church Fathers also assigned special meaning to the number nine, seeing it as symbolic of imperfect man turning to God in prayer, due to its proximity with the number ten, symbolic of perfection and God.

Papal recognition

The practice of novena grew by the Middle Ages to include pious prayers for nine days before a feast in honor of a saint identified on a liturgical calendar. By the 11th century, the novena practice had become a means in Christianity of praying to petition spiritual or personal favor through a saint, such as the Virgin Mary. After the Protestant Reformation and Counter-Reformation, the Catholic Church formally permitted novenas, in particular through the papal approvals of a large number of novenas by Pope Pius IX.
In the Roman Catholic Church, there are three recognized categories of novenas, though this distinction is not exclusive:
  • Mourning, or before a burial;
  • In preparation for a Church feast; the revised Enchiridion Indulgentiarum assigns indulgenced novenas to particular feasts: "A partial indulgence is granted to the faithful, who devoutly take part in the pious exercises of a public novena before the feast of Christmas or Pentecost or the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary."
  • Intercessory.
By standard liturgical norms, novenas may be performed in church, at home, or anywhere where solemn prayers are appropriate, though some indulgenced novenas require church attendance. Sometimes, a special candle or incense is lit at the beginning of the novena which burns during the nine days of prayer.
The first chapter of the General Principles of Sacrosanctum Concilium, #13, of the Second Vatican Council sought to give guidance on the place of novenas in Christian piety:
Within the Roman Catholic tradition, novena prayers typically include a praise of Jesus Christ, the Virgin Mary or another saint, and a personal petition.
Novenas have been a widespread practice in Catholic history. Novena prayers are also practised by Lutheran, Orthodox and Anglican Christians, who hold close or similar beliefs regarding its pious practice. In addition, novenas have also been used in an ecumenical Christian context, such as those promulgated by Premier Christian Radio, in order to pray for Church renewal.

Practices

A novena is a ritualistic devotional worship where one or more Christian devotees make petitions, implore favors, or obtain graces by honoring Jesus Christ, Virgin Mary or the saints of the faith who are believed to empower divine intervention. According to Professor Fenella Cannell, a Novena is "a supplicatory act of worship".
A novena may be made at any time. The devotion of the Nine First Fridays in honor of the Sacred Heart is a novena. Some parishes conduct a perpetual novena where the prayers particular to a specific novena are recited weekly.
Other novenas are traditionally held in preparation for a particular feast day.
  • The novena to the Holy Spirit is held between Ascension Thursday and Pentecost in commemoration of when the disciples gathered in the upper room and devoted themselves to prayer; it is considered the first novena. There are a number of ways to pray the Pentecost Novena. One might pray the Evening Prayer from the Liturgy of the Hours each day, the "Come, Holy Spirit" or other prayers.
  • The Novena to the Holy Trinity generally includes the Gloria Patri, although the other prayers may be used.
  • There are a variety of Christmas novenas. The St. Andrew's Christmas novena is made from the feast of St. Andrew through Christmas Eve with the novena prayer said fifteen times daily. Las Posadas is a novena celebrated chiefly in some Latin American countries, such as Mexico, Guatemala, Cuba, and by Hispanics in the United States. Colombians also celebrate a novena in the nine days leading to Christmas, known as the novena of aguinaldos. It is typically celebrated each year between December 16 and December 24.
  • The novena in honor of the Infant Jesus of Prague is often said at Christmastide. The Feast of the Holy Name of Jesus is the principal feast of the miraculous Infant. In the Czech Republic the statue is ceremoniously paraded through the streets of Prague annually on May 27, with prayers and songs.
  • A novena to St. Joseph is commonly made on the nine first Wednesdays before his feast day or on the nine days before the feast.
  • Franciscan friaries customarily hold a novena of nine Tuesdays in honor of Anthony of Padua before his feast day of June 13.
  • The novena to St. Jude and the novena to St. Peregrine, the patron saint of cancer patients, each begin nine days before their feast days, but can be prayed in a particular time of need as well.

    Regional customs

Africa

Novena practices were introduced into communities by Christian missionaries in their colonial era and postmodern era evangelization efforts in Africa, as well as new world plantation colonies where African slaves were settled such as in Brazil. These initiatives brought a sense of socioreligious community.
Some practices are unique to Africa. Various denominations of Christianity in Africa have introduced regional novena practices that include devotional prayers, singing, and clap, wave, or shout offerings. The novena devotionalism in Ghana includes on each of the nine nights, after the loud prayers, the blood-covering of Jesus, where the devotees stain themselves considering it to be symbolism for the blood of Christ.
Among the coastal West African Christian communities, novena is a means of petitioning God through worship and fasting, along with traditional rituals. Syncretic new age religious practices in Nigeria have adopted the nine days of novena prayer ritualism. In Zimbabwe, according to Lawrence Daka – a professor and a Zimbabwean Jesuit:

Europe and North America

Devotional and paraliturgical novenas have been common in Europe as well as with European settlers in North America. These have included public worship such as Mass and private praying with religious items such as a rosary and images particularly related to the Virgin Mary. According to James M. O'Toole, a professor specializing in American Catholic history, the period between World War I and mid-1950s were the "heyday of American Catholic devotionalism".
This period witnessed novena devotionalism along with popularity of sodalities, confraternities, devotion to saints, meatless Fridays, holy cards, rosary, cross and eucharistic practices. O'Toole says that these provided a sense of communal identification, particularly in a time of mass migration. The novena had strong roots in ethnic neighborhoods, and devotional worship had sociopolitical links, offering a sense of communal security through religious symbols in a period of uncertainty and fear. As economic prosperity and a sense of national solidarity grew in and after the 1960s, the novena ritualism waned and the participation in church worship services fell.
In Eastern and Central Europe, novena practices continue. During the communist era, the devout orthodox Christians in the former Yugoslavia organized the Great Novena under the statue of Virgin Mary, to resist the state enforced atheism, to maintain the freedom to practice religion, and to re-assert the Christian legacy of the region, particularly in Croatia.
In Catholic Ireland, states Professor Gladys Ganiel, devotional practices such as novenas have been popular. The cultural acceptance of devotional worship has been historically high, and those Irish who themselves do not perform novenas, nevertheless respect those who do. Some of their Catholic ritual practices were repressed by the British state during the 18th and 19th centuries, but repression and criticism only increased the resolve of the Irish to persist in their ways of practicing their faith.
A 1921 survey in the Bulletin of the University of Notre Dame states that novena prayers were popular, and particularly common among students during examinations, or illness, or after the death of a fellow student. The Novena-Seance remain popular in many regions of the United States, such as among the Roman Catholics of Louisiana, where novenas are dedicated to St. Jude and the Virgin Mary. These novenas are prayers believed to create a contact between the saint and the devotee, and thereby invoke divine intervention in whatever problem or anxiety is important to the devotee.