From the bulletin for Solemnity of Our Lord Jesus Christ King of the Universe (Nov 24, 2024)
Parish School of Prayer, Pt 12: The Liturgy of the Hours
Structure helps. Parameters guide. Unbounded horizons, in contrast, make us wonder where we ought to go. This is true for essays, homilies, and bulletin articles. The hardest to produce are those whose content or at least topic is not already dictated by the prompt, the readings, or the occasion. I suspect many have experienced the same in prayer? It’s a beautiful thought to say “No agenda this time, I will just place myself in the presence of the Lord and let prayer flow from out my aching heart. Tongue as nimble as the pen of a scribe, and all that!”
Well, sometimes the tongue is not so nimble, nor the heart so disposed to prayer. Or, our prayer is like a vine creeping across the yard, going every which way, getting nowhere, never getting off the ground. But give that prayer a structure, provide that yard with a trellis, and beautiful things result.
By means of the sacred liturgy, the Church provides her children with a structure for prayer. This is preeminently true of the Mass, as well as the sacraments, prayers which flow not so much from our hearts but from Christ’s. But while perhaps we can’t always engage the sacraments, we can access the official prayer of the Church anywhere and time through the Liturgy of the Hours (LOTH).
Since last year, a grassroots movement at the parish has been adorning the parish life of prayer with this fruitful vine. For about a month now, that vine has been intertwined with the life of our adoration chapel, as those who pray over the six o’clock evening hour or Saturday before 8am Mass have surely noticed.
There are many things that could be said about the LOTH. I simply want to encourage you all to give it a try. The “hours” (they typically take between five and fifteen minutes to recite) are composed primarily of scripture–chiefly the Psalms–and form that trellis of prayer that lifts our minds and hearts off the ground in a way we never could on our own. Unburdened from the heavy lifting, we are free to pour our souls into the petitions and praises that speak more truly than those we could craft ourselves, flowing as they do from the Word of God.
The benefits don’t stop there. The LOTH leads one to “hit all the notes” of prayer (praise, petition, adoration, thanksgiving, complaining, trust, etc.); when alone, one can dilate the pace to allow for meditation and contemplation. Though the structure remains the same, each day the psalms, scriptures, and prayers are different, to keep the routine from becoming rote and the script from becoming stale. Best, it's the prayer of the Body said in union with Christ the Head and therefore has special efficacy and power.
You can come check out Vespers (Evening Prayer)prayed in our adoration chapel Tues-Thur at 6:30pm or Lauds (Morning Prayer) at 7:30am on Saturdays. There are a few breviaries available in the chapel bookshelf, or you smartphone users can also download the free iBreviary app and have full access to all of the hours every day. Imagine adorning your prayer routine with the Office of Readings, which contains a whole spiritual reading plan in the form of short but powerful selections from the Bible and the Fathers of the Church for every day of the year. Or imagine capping each day with Night Prayer recited with your spouse, household, or guardian angel. (On that note, not only does the LOTH facilitate prayer in common–since we can’t very well pray spontaneously simultaneously without serious inspiration–it also allows us to unite in prayer with Christians all over the globe who are participating in the Hours).
I will cede the last paragraph on the subject to Pope John Paul II: “Through this prayer of Christ to which we give voice, our day is sanctified, our activities transformed, our actions made holy. We pray the same Psalms that Jesus prayed and come into personal contact with him–the person to whom all Scripture points, the goal to which all history is directed… As a community of prayer and praise, with the Liturgy of the Hours among the highest priorities of our day–each day–we can be sure that nothing will separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” (Address at St Patrick's Cathedral, October 3, 1979). Amen!
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