"And His fear increased in me more and more, and the faith grew in me, and the spirit was roused, so that, in a single day, I have said as many as a hundred prayers, and in the night nearly the same, so that whilst in the woods and on the mountain, even before the dawn, I was roused to prayer and felt no hurt from it, whether there was snow or ice or rain; nor was there any slothfulness in me, such as I see now, because the spirit was then fervent within me." The above is a quote from St. Patrick's Confessio (today is his feast!), relating his early life as a slave among the barbarian peoples of ancient Ireland. If anyone's counting, our Novena is a commitment of about 4 prayers daily, but Patrick sometimes said 100! While 100 prayers may not be possible in everyone's state in life, St. Patrick's example is appropriate for this first day of our Novena; it reminds us of the necessity of perseverance in prayer, a theme we also find in our Novena Prayer. Our Lady is the Mother of Perpetual Help, but can we persevere in prayer?