i love the daily office. i suppose that i've fallen for that typical protestant glorification of monastic life that just does not match its lived reality. but i've read thomas merton's seven story mountain. i felt with him the draw of silence, of a serious contemplation that yet so fully engages the world. he found that at the abbey of gethsemani, kentucky.
but i'm a married lutheran pastor with two children, and i love it. i work in an office at an ecumenical divinity school and i love it. so, where does my monastic impluse go? into keeping the liturgy of the hours in daily life. the hours are rooted in the call of the palms: " I call out to God who rescues me; morning, noon, and night I plead my case." (55:17). the liturgy of the hours is, as sister joan chittister, osb, argues, an especially important form of prayer because its timed intervals call us to prayer when we're ready and especially when we're not.
But praying the hours can become, as martin luther and many others have warned, a clanging symbol and not true prayer. so, i try to be attentive to when something captures my imagination and there i dwell in prayer, sometimes not even finishing the prayers. i just dwell.
and since i like to sing, this flight of prayer often happens when i run across language (usually psalms) that are a song i like. it happened this noon as i prayed the midday office. i came across a line from psalm 31:3 'lead me, guide me' and then psalm 25:1 'to you, o lord, i lift up my soul'. how do you pray? what is helpful to keep prayer integrated in daily life? post a comment or email me.
sing, pray, my soul. morning, noon, and night.
anon, and +peace
As another protestant longing for stillness and contemplation in a busy world, I was interested in your thoughts about praying the hours. I have no idea how to discipline myself to do this but hope that when I am ready I will be able to maintain this in my life. I have difficulty because I am a person who rushes through life. Anyway thank you for the encouragement. I think I will snatch a few moments now to be alone and pray and meditate.
Posted by: Becky | February 03, 2005 at 07:13 AM
this past week there was a great program on NPR's speaking of faith..one of the speakers is http://www.phyllistickle.com/aboutauthor.html ..she has also written about praying the hours...I have never heard of this till this week..and I "hear" it again..funny how that works...
along the road with you...
Posted by: Alan Kearns | February 09, 2005 at 09:48 PM
I am in a similar situation. I am married and have a three year old son, but I also have a deep love for monasticism. I have often wondered why God would allow me to desire the monastic life so much but also give me this wonderful family. I think it is because I desire a closeness with God that is not prevalent in today's society or within Christianity at large; a continual devotion to God. The daily office is a great way to dedicate the day to the Lord at regular intervals. Although I have been sloppy at keeping times, I am getting better. If I were to never miss a beat but my prayer became mechanical it would profit nothing. So I take it a day at a time, growing in love with God my Father and growing in "monklikeness" in my heart.
Posted by: Paul | August 17, 2005 at 09:44 PM
Dear Friends in Christ,
Your comments and reflections here are truly captivating and inspiring!
As an Eastern Catholic whose grandfather was a married priest (with seven children), I loved observing him pray at different hours of the day.
The Benedictine tradition is one that is wide enough ecumenically to provide us all with important insights together with a framework for such praying, working and living in community (however one wishes to define "community").
There is much inspiration from the publications on the Divine Office by the Methodist Order of St Luke, the Lutheran Prayer Brotherhood that has published an excellent selection of psalm-collects, and other groups of both the Protestant and Catholic traditions.
For me, to have fixed times of prayer throughout the day offers not so much an escape from the day's troubles, but an escape "to" a spiritual space where one may calm down and put things in perspective while being "still and see that I am God" as the psalms relate.
Buoyed by such spiritual inspiration and renewed strength, I can go back into the world and do battle armed with noetic weapons of the Spirit.
And the Benedictine tradition, owing to its age, is one that is at the deepest roots of Lutheranism, Anglicanism and Methodism, as well as other traditions.
One great inspiration is the life of the Anglican Nicholas Ferrar and his family at Little Gidding in England. Following the Desert Fathers, they prayed 12/13 psalms at the beginning of each Hour, starting at 6:00 am and ending in the early evening. They then did Vigils in their chapel, taking turns reading the Psalms of David once more and so prayed the Psalter TWICE in one day!
No wonder King Charles I related to his RC Queen Henrietta about the Anglican family that "by its devotional life puts to shame the strictest Roman Catholic religious Order!"
In Christ,
Alex
Posted by: Alexander Roman | July 18, 2007 at 12:02 PM
I am an Orthodox Christian struggling with how to better incorporate prayer into my daily life. In fact, I found this page by Googling "praying the hours." I'm still trying to figure it out. I just know I have to figure it out!
Posted by: Becki | April 19, 2008 at 08:36 PM
Dear Friends in Christ,
Meditating in bed this morning, I heard an inner voice rather distinctly say "listen". The the thought came to me from somewhere "Pray the Hours". So I do a google, and am happy to find this site. Since I spend much of the day on the computer attempting, in my distractible way, to finish off a book, I was looking for a computer equivalent of some marvelous Little Gidding church bell sounding at appropriate times of day to call me to some appropriate Prayer of the Hour.
Haven't found anything yet. Maybe one could find a chiming clock which could be set to chime at the Hours?
As to the traditional prayers, I find them appropriate on the whole, though my own spirituality inclines me to look for some reference to "Thy mighty Resurrection and Glorious Ascension" to balance the Crucifixion prayers, which for me are inevitably a bit overwhelming. Most of all I am blessed by the sense of Our Dear Lord as loving, so tolerant, friend, with a marvelous gentle sense of humour, who my faith tells me, is always there even at times, when he feels no more than a sad distant memory.
My beautiful wife and I are Anglican-Episcopalians who regard ourselves as Catholics and go to Catholic monastic retreats as available.
Quite incidentally, since I see this site has some references to the question of gay marriage, I would mention that I must be among the few Christians who have no idea what God thinks about the matter for people other than myself (though he is extremely emphatic about the way he wants my own erotic life to be conducted). Other than that I presume the Laws of Charity apply here as everywhere else. In which case I believer that it would be courteous of the Gay Factions to call their marriages "Garriages" (or such) so as not to intrude on those of the heterosexual persuasion (my wife's suggestion). I also feel sad that the Episcopal Robinsonians seem to be persecuting the orthodox Episcopalians with an unholy fervor. Almost a return to the excesses of Reformation sectarianism, within what the civil laws now permit. Surely these differences are simply an opportunity for us to practice the virtues of toleration.
Grace and Peace,
Posted by: Tynegate | June 15, 2009 at 07:55 AM