The “novena” deal is that there are 9 days from the Ascension to the Descent of the Holy Spirit on the Apostibuls. Acts says they spent the time in prayer.
So some geniuses decided that it would be cool to pray for stuff for nine days running. “Novem” is Latin for nine. I don’t know the rest of the derivation.
But then some athletes pray for 54 days (9 x 6) and others for fewer, but the name ‘novena’ stuck to a commitment to pray for a number of days.
Now, “Nox” means “night” in Latin. So we could call it a Nox-ena to encourage those who forgot to pray in the daytime to pray the Litany before they go to bed?
Day TEN of our nine day prayer!
(I told a friend that my plan was to become both emperor AND Pope. And my Papal motto would be, “But wait! There’s MORE!”
I happen to think this is a great line to use in preaching the Gospel. It’s always more and better than we could imagine!
His answer was, “NOW how much would you pray?”)
And I propose that we have graduated from a “some-ena” to a Nox-ena.
But then, I’m a sick man.
Thanks for the explanation of novena. I had never heard the term before...sounds reasonable to me. One of the many faults in my prayer life is that I expect not just gratification, but instant gratification. I want a genie, not God. Prayer should bring me to His will, not Him to mine.