By Barb Arland-Fye
Editor
My husband Steve is praying the rosary daily as part of his Lenten journey this year and I have been praying with him. Colin, our son with autism, joined us last Saturday night but it has been several years since he prayed the rosary, once a family tradition. He needed a refresher.
We have numerous rosaries in our home but the closest one at hand was made of very small beads. I asked Colin if he wanted to use my rosary or the smaller one and he chose the latter. He lowered his head to focus on my prayer instructions. When I pointed to the first bead of the first decade during our refresher, I said, “The first Hail Mary.” Then I pointed to the other beads and spaces that signified the “Our Father” and the “Glory Be.”
We seemed good to go, so Steve began the rosary. When we reached the first decade, Colin replied, as if to prompt himself, “Number one Hail Mary.” I couldn’t help smiling. However, his fingers held tightly to the closely spaced beads. As we finished the “Glory Be” and the “Fatima Prayer” of the second decade, Colin’s anxiety became clear as he tried to figure out which bead and space belonged to the correct prayer. “I think the beads are too small,” I said. Steve and Colin exchanged rosaries and we resumed praying, Colin keeping pace with his dad’s larger-beaded rosary.
After praying the rosary, we began Evening Prayer of the Liturgy of the Hours, the universal prayer of the Church, which Steve and I have grown to love over the years. Colin has prayed Evening Prayer with us, but this double dose of prayers might have been too much for one evening. He manages his sense of well-being according to a consistent routine that cannot vary without advance warning — how much advance warning is hard to gauge!
His Catholic faith provides Colin with a sense of grounding and well-being, with a caveat. As Ecclesiastes reminds us, “There is an appointed time for everything, and a time for every affair under the heavens” (Eccl.3:1). The Wisdom writer surely anticipated the Colins of the world when writing that verse! Could the writer also have known that Colin loves reading Scripture?
The structure of the text, the consistent numbering of chapters and verses and the stories contained within each book of the Bible enthrall our son. His eyes lit up when I handed him two, gently used Bibles from a friend in my Emmaus group. He added the Bibles to his collection of at least 10. So, it’s not surprising when his friends in Our Lady of Victory Parish-Davenport’s DREAM TEAM Bible Study for adults with special needs turn to Colin for answers on Scripture-related questions.
March is Developmental Disabilities Awareness Month, “A time to raise awareness about the inclusion of persons with developmental disabilities in the Church and all areas of community life,” according to the National Catholic Partnership on Disabilities (NCPD). “Developmental disabilities are impairments in physical, learning, language or behavior areas, including autism spectrum disorders, cerebral palsy, Down syndrome, and learning disabilities” (ncpd.org).
NCPD recognizes that it can be challenging to adapt faith formation to meet the needs of persons with disabilities and is offering a parish leadership meeting on this topic April 9 from 1-2:30 p.m. Check out the website for more information.
While Colin has his strengths and weaknesses in faith formation, we take the challenges one rosary at a time, beginning with “Number 1 Hail Mary.”
(Contact Barb Arland-Fye at arland-fye@davenportdiocese.org)
