The Daily Office

[Fr. Rob]

Final post for a while, I gotta get ready for Eucharist!

How many folks here on the boards pray the Daily Office (Morning and Evening Prayer) according to some form?

Just curious as to if you are clergy or lay, what version of the Office you use, or if you simply find it confusing

Father Rob

 

[Wolseley]

As I mentioned on another thread, I use the 1976 edition of Christian Prayer; I normally do Lauds, Matins, and Compline, but I don't do it all the time. I get streaks where I'll use my breviary for weeks or months at a stretch, then I'll get behind and won't touch it for months.

I also usually do a bedtime devotional, which consists of meditating on several readings from The Imitation of Christ; I am addicted to a'Kempis' medieval mindset---it's fascinating.

And I have a variety of other things that I use off and on.

Oh, and I'm a layman. Once I was a Franciscan postulant, but that was yeeeeeeears ago.

 

[Fr. Rob]

I have used the Anglican Breviary, which is the old PreV2 Roman breviary in King James english. It is quite complex and not very edifying, though the lives and accounts of the Saints and other worthies are excellent.

For those interested in praying the Daily Office, it is my opinion that the Anglican form is simplest. . . it consists of a Confession of Sin (optional if done in private), Psalm 95, a selection of Psalms for the Day or Feast, an Old Testament reading, a Canticle, a New Testament Reading, another Canticle, the Apostle's Creed, and a series of prayers that include the Collect (special prayer) of the day.

Given my profession, I only do one reading and one canticle per office, but I spread my four readings a day out between four offices. Morning, Noon (just before Mid-Day Eucharist), Evening, Night. At times, I add a few others using devotionals for scripture verses and reflections.

The Office is such a wonderful way to pray.

Father Rob

 

[TruelightUK]

None of your options entirely fit me!

As a curious pentecostal-anglican hybrid, I have periods when I use the Daily Office, and periods when I prefer 'free-style devotions' - and other times, if I'm honest, when any discipline of prayer goes out the window!

During Lent this year, I made a conscious effort to follow my a version of the daily office - consisting of Morning Prayer and Compline (following the BCP pattern of 1922) plus my own creation 'Noon Prayer' - consisting basically of excerpts from various intervening monastic offices. Tho' I must confess I found the it extremely hard to make a time for the midday element amid the pressures of my secular employment.

Anthony

 

[Avila]

Um, you didn't put mine - I'm just too lazy to. Honestly, though, I've been trying to do some form of devotion each day. I try to read a saint of the day passage for Tommy. I know he's young, but he is my little sponge right now, and maybe we can start a really good habit!

 

[Fr. Rob]

Originally posted by Avila
Um, you didn't put mine - I'm just too lazy to. Honestly, though, I've been trying to do some form of devotion each day. I try to read a saint of the day passage for Tommy. I know he's young, but he is my little sponge right now, and maybe we can start a really good habit!

That's such a wonderful thing to do for Tommy. Are you using the Catholic Book Publishing Co. Saints of the Day book, or Butler's?

There is an excellent page linked from my website, James Kiefer's Bios of Saints and other Notable Christians. It's down after the various Books of Common Prayer under the title "Other Liturgical Material" or something close to that. It features a bio sketch of the individual, and a prayer. . . and sometimes, links to readings that are appropriate.

Fr. Rob

 

[Avila]

I was using Butler's, but I'll check out your link - sometimes Butler's goes a little too in-depth for a toddler, if you know what I mean.

 

[Wolseley]

We've been using several selections from a children's book called The Bible In Pictures For Little Eyes every night as a bedtime story for Noah. I don't remember where we got it, but I've been editing it heavily as we go along....frankly, I'm not impressed. The OT selections are a tad gory and can give the impression that God is nasty vindictive old man that'll kill you dead in a heartbeat if you step out of line, and the inaccuracies in it are sometimes dismaying, sometimes hilarious.

For one example, the author (Kenneth N. Taylor, who has written some excellent stuff for older children and adults, IMHO, but he sure missed the boat on this one) continually refers to the Jewish synagogue as "the church", and mentions Jesus changing the water at the wedding of Cana into "grape juice". (Good tee-totalling theology, there.)

I think he may just be trying to water the content down so that little children can understand it, but I think it's better to call a synagogue a synagogue, not a church---it'll avoid confusion later. The most hilarious one in the whole thing is on page 130, where Joshua's spies are being helped by "a lady" to climb outside the city wall: "the lady is helping them get away. God will be kind to the lady because she is helping the two men".

I realize that a toddler is too young to understand or care about the distinctions here (and that's as it should be), but referring to Rahab the prostitute as "a lady" just struck me as being hysterically funny.

This book was put out by Moody and is a re-print of a 1956 original, which leads me to believe it was probably a gift from one of our Protestant friends or family. The text, as I said, is not much; I personally think that a lot of the OT is not fit for little children anyway, until they get old enough to understand it---stuff like Absalom impaling himself on the tree or Solomon planning to cut a baby in half with a sword might be traumatic for tiny children, and I think they should be restricted to stories like the Ark or David and Goliath (minus the head-chopping at the end) until they're older.

On the plus side, the pictures in this little book, most of which are modelled after the Dore' engravings, are excellent, and the best part of the book. Noah is still too little to bother with pictures right now (at bedtime he's more interested in what's coming out of the milk jug) but when he's older, it might make a good illustrating tool to help explain the Scriptures to him, if we ignore the text that comes with each picture.

 

[MariaRegina]

How many folks here on the boards pray the Daily Office (Morning and Evening Prayer) according to some form? Just curious as to if you are clergy or lay, what version of the Office you use, or if you simply find it confusing
Father Rob

My dearest joy in Christ, Father Rob:

Christ is in our midst!

I use the Morning and Evening Prayers found on pages 755 to 761 of the Orthodox Study Bible. This is a very simplified form of the Divine Office (from Orthros and Compline), which is handy because it has all the psalms and the NT. During Great Lent, I use the longer form found in the Acathist Hymn.

At times I use a more complete Divine Office from Byzantine Daily Worship. To do the whole office would take a church-full of books, so the laity must keep things simple.

Your Sister in Christ-God,

Elizabeth
Eastern Orthodox (formerly RC)

 

[Aaron-Aggie]

Just started recently
Morning Prayer lead by one of our Priests before Daily Mass

So Morning Prayer would be the Roman form of the Liturgy of the Hours.

Haven’t yet started Evening Prayer.

 

[pax]

I say Morning, Evening and Night Prayer from the Christian Prayer 1 volume Liturgy of the Hours book (normally). I really love it. Eventually I do want to graduate to the four volume eventually, but I think I'll wait until after the new English translations come out....

 

[Jose]

In my case I use a combination of sources.... All Roman Catholic...

I start the day with a Morning Prayer ( Including reading and medidating on the readings for the daily mass)

A prayer at Midday ( I like using Caminos by St Jose Maria Escribá as the source fo my meditations)


At 3 PM is the Caplet of Divine Mercy ( this one ussually in community with my mother)

At Bed Time the Rosary and a Final Meditation ussually based on the Works of St John of the Cross

Viva Cristo Rey!!!!!!!

 

[MariaRegina]

In my case I use a combination of sources.... All Roman Catholic...

I start the day with a Morning Prayer ( Including reading and medidating on the readings for the daily mass)

A prayer at Midday ( I like using Caminos by St Jose Maria Escribá as the source fo my meditations)


At 3 PM is the Caplet of Divine Mercy ( this one ussually in community with my mother)

At Bed Time the Rosary and a Final Meditation ussually based on the Works of St John of the Cross

Viva Cristo Rey!!!!!!!

Dearest Joy in Christ, Jose:

Gloria a Jesucristo! Gloria a El para siempre!

Within Orthodoxy, we would call that a Rule of Prayer.

A Rule of Prayer is our set way of praying every day. It is usually done with the help of our Spiritual Father or Confessor.

A Rule of Prayer can include the Divine Office and reading the scriptures, prostrations, the Jesus Prayer, the Trisagion (Divine Mercy prayers), etc.

Your sister in Christ,

Elizabeth