A riddle for you, with six parts, one answer: What is Catholic worship? What is Gregorian Chant? What do “professional Catholics”–priests, monks, nuns–do all day? What converted and settled Catholic Europe? How do we work to “order our days aright,” optimally patterning our personal praying and working each day? What is the basis, bedrock, seedbed,…
The fundamental fact about the liturgical year is that it is a sanctification of time. Certain key events in the history of salvation, and certain key elements of faith, have become attached to certain dates of the calendar like gems on a bracelet. This bracelet is like a magnificent rosary. We cannot handle it without…
When it comes to learning Church Latin, we all should imitate what we did as babies. Be a baby listening to our Holy Mother, the Church, at prayer, and learn Latin as you go. I’ve written some lessons I hope can help you learn Latin while praying along with the Church’s ongoing prayer. Many posts…
How’s your evening routine every day? Is it peaceful and recollected, with your thoughts tending toward heaven as you head to bed each night? Well, it can be that way–that is what the prayer of Compline is for.
Oh, how skeptical and dismissive I was—and oh, how many slices of humble pie I get to eat, while my mother watches! When she started praying the Divine Office years ago, I thought that she must: 1) have too much free time, 2) think that “normal” Catholic devotions aren’t good enough for her, or 3)…
From a beautiful hymn from Lauds the-day-before-yesterday: “Tui precatus munere/Nostrum reatum dilue./ Arcens mali contagium,/ vitae repellens taedium.” —or— “Now join thy prayers with ours, who pray/ That God may pardon us and bless;/ For prayer keeps evil’s plague away,/ And draws from life its weariness.” Yes! That is exactly what I have been feeling.…
Do you want to really feel and understand the sacred rhythm behind the Liturgical Year? Like me, have you spent years sitting in the pews thinking, “Why do we even bother?” Because the only differences you can perceive in most parishes between, say, Ordinary Time and the Easter Season are different felt banners and different sacro-pop songs strummed during Communion. As…
Since Christmas is nearly here, your evening prayers can reflect that in a special way, starting tonight. From the beautiful and sacred tradition of the Church’s prayer in the Divine Office (during Vespers), we receive the O Antiphons at the end of Advent. These short prayers, each beginning with an address to God using a…
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