Little Office instead of Divine Office

[YerBoii21]

I know that the Little Office of the Blessed Virgin Mary has been used in the past as the common prayer of the Church, and you can still pray it as a valid liturgical device. My question is if you could pray it in the place of the Divine Office and fulfill the clerical request obligation.

 

[phil19034]

My question is if you could pray it in the place of the Divine Office and fulfill the clerical request obligation.

My understanding is “no.”

If one has an obligation to pray the Divine Office then the Little Office would not count under the usual circumstances.

 

[Tis_Bearself]

My question is if you could pray it in the place of the Divine Office and fulfill the clerical request obligation.

No.

These days, the Little Office is not the common prayer of the church, and I am not aware of its being liturgical in any way. It’s permitted as a private devotion but not liturgy.

 

[TomH1]

No, a priest would have to pray the official Divine Office of his diocese (or its equivalent in law)/institute/society. There may be genuine circumstances in which he could find himself unable to pray the entire Office or part thereof. That would be a matter for his ordinary. He may be excused the entire Office or the part he cannot say. His ordinary would be able to direct him to pray some or the whole of the Little Office of he Blessed Virgin Mary.

 

[OraLabora]

Some priests are also oblates (there are several attached to our abbey) and they can also get permission to pray the Monastic Liturgy of the Hours instead of the secular Liturgy of the Hours. But then the Monastic Liturgy of the Hours is approved liturgy.

The Little Offices are devotions. Carthusians pray it, but in addition to the monastic Divine Office that they use (basically a copy of the original Benedictine schema). But it’s in their constitutions I imagine. One wonders, in all that, where they found the time to chop their firewood for the winter…

 

[edward_george1]

I’m wondering if the modern Little Office might not fulfill the obligation. It’s actually just the texts of the Common of the Blessed Virgin from the Liturgy of the Hours, as I recall. I had a book with that in it when I was in college, before I moved on to praying the full office. If nothing else, if one had only that book and not the full LOTH, he probably should use it to keep up his office.

-Fr ACEGC

 

[TomH1]

they can also get permission

That is the key thing here: permission. A priest needs permission to say an Office other than the one proper to his diocese (or its equivalent in law/institute/society.

The Little Offices are devotions.

I agree and I have no example of a priest being given permission to use it. In my first post on the thread I suggested a priest may be given permission by his ordinary to say the Little Office of the Blessed Virgin Mary under certain circumstances.

 

[MikeInVA]

I’m wondering if the modern Little Office might not fulfill the obligation.

I’m guessing it depends on your state of life. A lay person can use it, no problem, religious are bound to the rules and propers of their orders - so it would depend on the order. Diocesan clergy probably need permission from their bishop.

 

[OraLabora]

That is the key thing here: permission. A priest needs permission to say an Office other than the one proper to his diocese (or its equivalent in law/institute/society.

Yes that’s true. One variation not requiring permission is when a secular priest attends an office of a religious order, such as when visiting a monastery. Attending that liturgy fulfills the obligation. However that is covered in the General Instruction.

 

[edward_george1]

Can I see a reference to that? As I’ve always understood, the obligation is fulfilled by any approved translation, and there isn’t a need to get permission to do otherwise. And there isn’t really a translation proper to one’s Diocese.

 

[TomH1]

Can I see a reference to that?

I do not have one. It is what I have learned over the years.

there isn’t really a translation proper to one’s Diocese.

Of course, not to one’s specific diocese but certainly to the territory of the episcopal conference in which one ministers.

I believe that you are based in the USA. Am I wrong in believing that you cannot satisfy your canonical obligation to say the Liturgy of the Hours by using the three-volume Divine Office (published by Collins) and authorised by the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of England and Wales?

 

[edward_george1]

As I understand it, it may be used in private recitation to fulfill one’s obligation. The restriction is on using it for public worship.

It doesn’t make sense to say that I can’t fulfill my obligation with an English translation that varies slightly from the one in use in my territory, but I can with a foreign language version that wouldn’t have an approval in my territory. I pray the office in French on occasion, and there isn’t an approved French translation in the United States because there doesn’t need to be.

 

[TomH1]

I wonder if that is where I may have got confused and it relates to public recitation.

I also do not understand why we have a different approved English translation in England and Wales from the USA. While we use the same ICEL translation for Mass our bishops did their own translation for the Office.

 

[MikeInVA]

The restriction is on using it for public worship.

But isn’t the LotH by definition public worship? Maybe I’m wrong, but I was taught that the Divine Liturgy and the Divine Office are the public prayers of the Church, and the Rosary, no matter where or how many people pray together, is private prayer.