4/12/2023 0 Comments Divine office prayer![]() The Psalms, canticles, and other passages from scripture form the bulk of the Daily Office in many ways, it is the Bible at prayer. But in the Liturgy of the Hours we have access to wisdom that stretches back to before the time of Jesus. The Divine Office provides us with a language for prayer. Sometimes it’s hard to find the words for prayer. ![]() If you don’t yet pray it, or need encouragement to begin or (like me) to strengthen your commitment to regular prayer, then I hope the following reasons will be a help for you. If you pray the Divine Office, perhaps this will be inspiration to carry on. So I thought I would share them with you. Just off the top of my head, I came up with four reasons, and as I reflected on it, I thought of three more. He asked me why I find the Divine Office worth praying. Recently I met with one of the monks who guides our Lay Cistercian community, and we talked about the liturgy. I wish I could say that I am now a model practitioner of daily prayer, but the truth is, I still struggle with it. In the book, I go on to talk about how forming a friendship with a devout Muslim, who prays five times every day, inspired me to take the Divine Office more seriously. I muddled along, praying from time to time and justified to myself all the days that I didn’t manage to pray. When I first became a Lay Cistercian, I struggled with the liturgy… My life was too busy, too unstructured, too freeform, and too spontaneous for me to be bothered by something like daily prayers. In chapter 7, I make the following confession: If you’ve read Befriending Silence, then you know that I have a tempestuous relationship with daily prayer. Morning prayer includes the “Benedictus” (the prayer recited by John the Baptist’s father, Zechariah) evening prayer includes the “Magnificat” (which Mary recited when she visited her cousin Elizabeth) and night prayer includes the “Nunc Dimittis” (Simeon’s prayer at the presentation of Jesus at the Temple).Praying the Divine Office is central to monastic life, but even those of us who aren’t monks may find that this type of prayer is an essential part of our spiritual practice.īut it’s a huge commitment and many people might find it daunting to pray even part of the Divine Office on a regular basis. Three prayers in the Liturgy of the Hours are taken from the infancy narratives in the Gospels of Matthew and Luke. Celebrating morning prayer and evening prayer has become a common parish practice. While usually considered the obligatory prayer of clergy and those in monastic orders, the revised Liturgy of the Hours is meant to be prayed by all people. ![]() These prayer times are about three hours apart: Lauds (3am), Prime (6am), Terce (9am), Sext (noon), None (3pm), Vespers (evening), Compline (before going to bed), and Matins (Midnight).Īfter Vatican II, the Divine Office was updated and simplified, and became know as the Liturgy of the Hours. Traditionally, there are seven hours of prayer in the day and a night prayer. ![]() By the seventh century, this daily prayer became know as the Divine Office. The custom of reciting prayers at certain hours goes back to a Jewish practice that was continued and developed by Christians in the Church’s early centuries. The Church has a full year’s cycle of daily prayer – the Liturgy of the Hours.
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