As part of its 150th Anniversary Celebration at Christ Church in Cedar Key, will offer a free workshop to the broader North Florida community. The topic is especially relevant in today’s world.

When you stop to pray, what keeps your mind from wandering? Remaining focused on daily prayers has challenged people of many faiths for centuries and the solution is not much younger - tactile reminders. Since the earliest times, Christians have used knotted ropes or pebbles or strings of beads to keep their minds fixed on their thanksgivings and supplications.

Now a woman who has intensively studied healing and recovery has determined that prayer beads are also an integral part of healing from pain and trauma. Kristen Vincent, a graduate of Duke Divinity School, has an ongoing ministry in the use of protestant prayer beads to assist with spiritual growth and healing. She has also written three books on this subject because she has found that true healing requires not only physical and emotional healing, but also spiritual healing. It is, Vincent said, the spiritual aspect of healing that can be aided with prayer beads.

The survivor of a childhood sexual assault, Vincent said she was able to experience profound spiritual healing, in large part by using prayer beads as a tool. “This (praying with beads) was a tactile reminder that kept me focused and reminded me that I was not alone - that God was with me,” Vincent said. She has worked with a wide variety of people dealing with the effects of traumatic events or circumstances in their lives, including those working to overcome PTSD. 

Vincent has accepted an invitation from Christ Episcopal Church in Cedar Key to offer a workshop entitled Healing from Pain and Trauma: Finding Spiritual Peace and Emotional Recovery. The purpose of the local event is to “introduce a Christian path of healing that focuses on prayer, stillness, and finding the strength to speak you truth,” said Fr. Jim Wright, Vicar of Christ Church. Each participant will receive a set of homemade prayer beads to use in the workshop and take home. In addition to Christ Church, the workshop is sponsored by Cedar Key United Methodist Church and First United Methodist Church of Chiefland.

Vincent has written several books about the practice: Beads of Healing: Prayer, Trauma, and Spiritual Wholeness (Upper Room Books, 2017); A Bead and Prayer: A Beginner's Guide to Protestant Prayer Beads (Upper Room Books, 2013); and Another Bead, Another Prayer: Devotions for Use with Protestant Prayer Beads (Upper Room Books, 2015). Vincent’s books can be previewed and purchased on Amazon. For more information about Vincent, visit her website at www.prayerworksstudio.com 

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