Kenner women’s group busy storming the heavens

They pray for families. They pray for peace. They pray for those affected by storms and disasters. And they pray for each other.
A group of 17 Catholic women, mostly from the Chateau Estates neighborhood in Kenner, have bonded through their faith since the late 1980s.
Several had attended a Catholic formation program with Bible study and faith sharing and clamored for more, while others were fellow garden club members or friends. All have a fervent devotion to Mary.
“It started out of Renew,” founding member Barbie Maderson said. 
Maderson said a former Kenner resident now living in Metairie – Deanie Stoulig – suggested they pray the rosary during Lent.
By Lent 1992, Maderson was compelled to do more.
“The Lord spoke to me to get everybody in that group to pray the rosary during Lent every Friday.” The next year, the group began using “Mary’s Way of the Cross,” which a few members had been introduced to at Cursillo.
“It was another way of thinking about Lent,” Grace Hagen said.
“Then someone suggested a monthly rosary,” Maderson said, which the Kenner Rosary group has done since.
“It’s like Mary speaking to us,” Maderson said.
Ties that bind
The group now meets monthly on the second Friday of the month to pray a special rosary called “The Rosary with Fra Angelico and Giotto” by Domenico Marcucci. This particular rosary has intentions after reciting half of the Hail Mary. It also has a Biblical citation for each mystery of the rosary.

“It really makes you think about what’s really going on in Jesus’ life,” member Nettie Palermo said. “This helps you meditate on it a little better.”
“With a group, you have a tendency to reflect more on the mysteries this way,”  said member Bonnie Gourgues. “You are not just reading it. As you reflect on each Hail Mary, it makes you think about things you don’t usually think about. That’s why I like it.”
Even though she now has to drive from Uptown New Orleans to Kenner, member and former Kenner resident Patti Buckley wouldn’t miss being with her prayer buddies. Buckley reiterated Renew’s influence on many of the group members to develop a more prayerful and active faith life. She had observed that before Renew few people prayed the rosary as compared to their parents’ generation.
Renewed by ‘Renew’
“Renew made you think where you were in your faith,” she said.
As this group matured, somewhere around Lent 2003, members began alms giving to St. Anthony to help the needy. In 2007, the group began collecting $12 annual dues for its bereavement committee to send sandwiches to members after the death of a loved one. They said they are fortunate not to have dipped into the dues lately.
They also pray the rosary at the wakes of members and their relatives.
“It was wonderful,” Barbara McKinzie said about the rosary recitation during her husband Warren’s funeral. “It was so meaningful that my grandchildren were astonished.”
“We hope to encourage others to form prayer groups and rosary groups.” Maderson said. “The world has become so secular. We need prayer in our lives.”
Buckley, a nurse who administers chemotherapy to cancer patients at Ochsner Medical Center, said she tells people all the time she is praying for them or offering a Mass or  rosary for them.
“They appreciate my rosary group who prays for them,” she said, often hearing from patients how wonderful it is to know there is a group of women praying for them, making their treatment more peaceful. “Those prayers empower them to conquer the journey they are on.”
“It not only helps praying together but the camaraderie in each others’ lives and knowing each other,” Anita Cervini. “We appreciate each other more in our faith, crosses and happiness. We depend on each other.”