Rogation Days

 

There is a special Procession and Mass for the Rogation Days.  Before Mass begins the Litany of Saints is chanted during an outdoor procession around the church grounds and prayers of supplication offered to appease the wrath of God and avert the scourges of His justice.  The three days preceding Ascension Thursday are these special Rogation Days (Lesser Litanies).  The word "litany" means "supplication" and "rogare" means "to ask". 

Dom Gueranger talks about the Rogation Days in The Liturgical Year, Vol 8 on pp. 350-353.  In it he says: "After all, we are sinners, with much to regret and much to fear; we have to avert those scourges which are due to the crimes of mankind; we have, by humbling ourselves and invoking the intercession of the Mother of God and the Saints, to obtain the health of our bodies and the preservation of the fruits of the earth; we have to offer atonement to divine justice for our own and the world's pride, sinful indulgences and insubordination  Let us enter into ourselves, and humbly confess that our own share in exciting God's indignation is great; and our poor prayers, united with those of our holy Mother the Church, will obtain mercy for the guilty, and for ourselves who are of the number."