Anglican Prayer Beads

Since early times, people of many different religious traditions have kept track of their prayers to God by using pebbles, beads or a string of knots. In the mid 1980s the Rev. Lynn Bauman blended the Roman Catholic Rosary and the Orthodox Jesus Prayer Rope to create Anglican Prayer beads.

Anglican prayer beads are made up of four sets of 7 beads called “weeks”. The number 7 signifies wholeness and completion. It also represents the 7 days of creation, the 7 seasons of the church year, the 7 sacraments and the 7 days of the temporal week.

Separating the weeks is a single bead called a “cruciform”. These four beads form a cross.

Anglican Prayer beads use a cross instead of the crucifix used in the Roman Catholic Rosary. Separating the cross and the weeks is an “invitatory bead”. This brings the total number of beads to 33 which represent the number of years in Jesus’ earthly life.

Many prayers in the prayer book are easily adapted to the prayer beads but the beads also lend themselves to our own prayers. The King of Peace Episcopal Church provides sample prayers and detailed instructions.

I find praying with the beads helps me to be mindful and quiet and better able to focus my prayers as I work toward a deeper relationship with God.

Leah Rayburn