During the visit to the Church of Our Lady of Victorious where the statue is housed, we only had limited time to get souvenirs so I bought this one decade rosary in a rush.
When we got home and we were organizing our purchases, my mom noticed that the rosary had 12 beads + 3 beads, not 10 beads + 3 beads! I thought it was almost impossible for the church to have sold rosaries that were erroneously made. So I tried googling for “12-bead rosary”, “rosary with 12 beads” and other iterations but never got any results related to the Infant Jesus. So for almost 2 years, I never figured out what it was for! Haha…
Finally, during Holy Week, my mom mentioned about using the “Chaplet of Our Lady of Sorrows”. It’s a rosary with 7 sets of 7 beads each. Chaplet! <Lightbulb moment> So these prayer beads are called chaplets, not rosaries.
To me, anything that has beads strung together with a religious medal is called a rosary! Haha… Apparently, a rosary is strictly the 5 decade rosary as we know it, and a chaplet is a form of Catholic prayer which also uses prayer beads but not necessarily related to the Virgin Mary. A chaplet can focus on Jesus or saints.
So I googled “Chaplet of the Infant Jesus of Prague” and finally found the relevant results.
Here's how to use the Chaplet of the Infant Jesus of Prague:
When holding the medal, say the ff prayer:
"Divine Infant Jesus,
I adore Thy Cross
and I accept all the cross
Thou wilt be pleased to send me.
Adorable Trinity,
I offer Thee
for the glory of Thy Holy Name of God,
all the adorations of the Sacred Heart
of the Holy Infant Jesus."
Before each of the beads, pray -
"And the Word was made flesh and dwelt amongst us."
On each bead of the 3 beads after the medal, say Our Lord's Prayer. These are said in honor of the Holy Family.
On each bead of the 12 beads, say a Hail Mary. These are in memory of the 12 years of the Sacred Infancy of Jesus.
At the end of the Chaplet, pray:
"Holy Infant Jesus, bless and protect us."
So the next time you see prayer beads which have 3 beads, 4 beads, 8 beads, 12 beads, 6 decades, or a rosary which has different bead colors, don’t worry, that’s not something an absent-minded rosary-maker erroneously did. It’s called a chaplet. :)
For a list of popular chaplets, you can visit wikipedia's page on Chaplet (prayers).
