A novena is a Catholic devotion of prayer offered for nine consecutive days, often for a specific intention or in honor of a particular saint or mystery of the faith. The pattern is modeled on the nine days the apostles spent in prayer with Mary in the Upper Room between the Ascension and Pentecost.

What is a novena?

The original novena

The Catholic devotion of the novena takes its nine-day pattern from the New Testament. After the Ascension, the apostles, the Blessed Virgin Mary, and the broader circle of disciples returned to the Upper Room in Jerusalem and "with one accord devoted themselves to prayer" (Acts 1:14). They prayed continually for nine days, awaiting the descent of the Holy Spirit, who came upon them on the tenth day, the feast of Pentecost. This is the original novena: nine days of expectant prayer, leading to the descent of the Spirit.

The contemporary form of this prayer is the Holy Spirit Novena, prayed from the Friday after the Ascension through the Saturday before Pentecost.

How a novena works

The structure of a novena varies by tradition, but the common pattern is:

A fixed set of prayers offered each day, often including a specific opening prayer, a meditation or reading on a different theme each day, and a concluding prayer.
A specific intention (a request for which the person is praying), often connected to the patron saint or mystery of the novena.
Nine consecutive days of prayer.

Some novenas are tied to specific dates of the liturgical calendar: the Saint Andrew Christmas Novena prayed from November 30 (Saint Andrew's feast) through Christmas Eve; the Immaculate Conception Novena from November 30 through December 8; the Divine Mercy Novena from Good Friday through the Saturday before Divine Mercy Sunday.

Others are prayed at any time of year for a specific intention, such as the Surrender Novena, the Saint Jude Novena, or the Saint Joseph Novena.

What a novena is not

A novena is not a magical formula. The Catholic tradition has always insisted that prayer is dialogue with God, who responds in his own time and way; a novena cannot oblige God to grant a specific outcome. The Catechism of the Catholic Church teaches that all prayer is heard, but God answers in the way that is best for the soul, which is not always the answer the petitioner expected.¹

The novena is, more deeply, a form of sustained attention to a single intention or mystery for the duration of nine days. The repetition is the point: the same prayers, offered with the same intention, day after day, work upon the heart of the petitioner as much as they direct the petition heavenward.

Plenary indulgences and novenas

Several traditional novenas carry the possibility of a plenary indulgence (a full remission of the temporal punishment due to forgiven sins) when prayed under the usual conditions: confession, Communion, prayer for the intentions of the Pope, and detachment from sin. The Apostolic Penitentiary's Enchiridion Indulgentiarum lists the specific novenas to which this applies.

How to begin a novena

To pray a novena: choose a novena suited to your intention or to the liturgical season; commit to praying the prescribed prayers for nine consecutive days; bring a specific intention to your prayer each day. Most traditional novenas can be prayed in five to ten minutes per day. Many Catholic publishers and websites provide the daily prayers; the novenas hub gives the foundational nine-day texts for the most common Catholic novenas.

Sources

Catechism of the Catholic Church, paragraphs 2734 to 2745, on the response of God to prayer. ↩