Liturgy of the Hours and bowing

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matthias

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I have a question about the Liturgy of the Hours (Divine Office). I pray the Liturgy of the Hours with a local community. It is generally formal in so far as they try to do everything in accord with the rubrics of the liturgy.

Recently I was curious about when the prescribed times to bow would be. We do a profound bow at the “Glory to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit” when we are standing at the end of the gospel canticle (Benedictus and Magnificat).

I was surprised when I looked in the GILH (General Instruction of the Liturgy of the Hours) and the word bow is not in the entire document. (link)

I did however fine websites such as (link) that state that one aught to do a minor bow at the mention of the trinity as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit or at the name of Jesus or Mary or the Saint in whose honor the liturgy is being celebrated.

This is not however in the GILH. However in searching I did find this in the GIRM (General Instruction for the Roman Missal), that is, for Mass.

OK…
My question…

Is it proper to take rubrics from the GIRM and apply it to the Liturgy of the Hours? It would be one thing if the GILH didn’t specify postures and we filled them in from another liturgical document but the GILH does tell us when to stand, sit, etc. So the omission of specifying bowing to me seems to indicate one aught not add bows.

OK that’s it. I’m kinda a liturgical legalist and I wasn’t sure if what we did was proper and upon looking I can not find anything official from the Chruch outlining any bows durring the Liturgy of the Hours.

The End.
 
Hi,

I have prayed the hours in three different parishes, and have never seen any bows. I would ask the person who leads the prayer why this is done.

I can’t see that this would be wrong, especially if the entire group does it.

Lux
 
I think it is by an oversight that the mention was omitted in the Liturgy of the Hours. The Ceremonial of Bishops mentions that the bow at the name of Jesus, etc. applies equally to the Mass and the Liturgy of the Hours - “the Mass or the Liturgy of the Hours” is the wording in 68(a)
 
AJV said:
I think it is by an oversight that the mention was omitted in the Liturgy of the Hours. The Ceremonial of Bishops mentions that the bow at the name of Jesus, etc. applies equally to the Mass and the Liturgy of the Hours - “the Mass or the Liturgy of the Hours” is the wording in 68(a)
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Yes, except that if you look at the footnote for that paragraph it cites the GIRM as the authority and the GIRM only mentions the mass. The ceremonial of bishops is not an official church text it is a collection of official rubrics and whatnot. The ceremonial of bishops does in fact specify that the minor bow at Jesus, etc. is for mass and the liturgy of the hours but when it cites as it’s authority a document that is only about the mass and it appears to just insert the words “or the Liturgy of the Hours” without any justification. The question still remains… is there any Church text that actually specifies bows in the LOTH? The GILH does specify postures so why would it then omit bows unless they were meant to be omitted?
 
matthias said:
Yes, except that if you look at the footnote for that paragraph it cites the GIRM as the authority and the GIRM only mentions the mass. The ceremonial of bishops is not an official church text it is a collection of official rubrics and whatnot. The ceremonial of bishops does in fact specify that the minor bow at Jesus, etc. is for mass and the liturgy of the hours but when it cites as it’s authority a document that is only about the mass and it appears to just insert the words “or the Liturgy of the Hours” without any justification. The question still remains… is there any Church text that actually specifies bows in the LOTH? The GILH does specify postures so why would it then omit bows unless they were meant to be omitted?
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The Ceremonial of Bishops says “A bow of the head is made …and the saint in whose honour the Mass or the Liturgy of the Hours is being celebrated” (68, a)

I think it is more a case of cross-referencing rather than citing as an authority. The rubrics of the Ceremonial are rubrics in themselves- they are not dependant on the rubrics given in the other liturgical books. The Ceremonial of Bishops applies equally when it comes to rubrics. For example, kneeling and incensing the Blessed Sacrament. It is an official Church book- though as you noted, more a collection of rubrics. Even traditionally, the rubrics of the Ceremonial have always been used to supplement the rubrics of the missal and the breviary when these have been unclear.

Sometimes, certain things are omitted from the relevant liturgical book- but supplied by other books. For example, for a long time after H late H John Paul II granted permission to bishops to bless with the Gospel book, this rubric was not found in the GIRM but in the rubrics at the beginning of the Book of the Gospels. Only when the next edition of the GIRM came out was this rubric incorporated into it. But in the interim it was wholly in keeping with the rubrics for the bishop to bless with the Gospel book.
 
We were always taught in grade school to bow profoundly in the first part of the “Glory Be”. And we were taught to bow our heads slightly at the mention of the holy name of Jesus. I think this is an unwritten Catholic tradition from ages gone by (or it was just a quirk taught by the order of nuns from our parish school-probably Sisters of Mercy 😃 ).
 
I asked a priest friend about this and he said nothing about the minor bows but instead that there was a profound bow at the “Glory to…” (Glory Be).

This is what we do in my local community. The priest is usually very well versed in liturgical texts (old and new) and he still prays the current office in Latin just to keep up his Latin skills. He said he isn’t sure where but he is sure he has read it somewhere and he said he’d get back to me.

I was unaware that the ceremonial of Bishops was actually an official text. I thought it was just an unofficial collection of official rubrics but I could certainly be wrong. I am a bit of an amateur.

Is anyone aware of anywhere other than the ceremonial of bishops that specifies bowing in the LOTH? How about profound bows?
 
The customs of bowing and the like at the Divine Office–except for at the Gloria Patri–vary from place to place. There is no one correcct way to carry these out.
 
I was in a Benedictine monastery for just over two years. We always did a profound bow at “Glory be.” It wasn’t something we invented. It was a practice that had been “handed down” for generations of nuns. There was nothing trendy or liberal about these nuns, who always followed the letter of the liturgical law. But honestly, if someone had told them they could no longer bow at the mention of the Most Blessed Trinity, I doubt very much you could stop them. I thinkg if we truly understood what we were doing, we would all be making a profound bow, from the very depths of our being, everytime we make the sign of the cross.

Just my two cents.

Gertie
 
When I was being taught the Liturgy of the Hours (by a Dominican Nun) she pointed out that each religious community has the authority to impose certain requirements on their members in the community. In fact just yesterday I was speaking about the Liturgy of the Hours with a retired order priest and he told me that when he was a young priest, his order required individual recitation of the Liturgy of the Hours and in fact forbade communal recitation. It took him quite awhile to become comfortable with communal recitation.
 
In my community we stand and make a profound bow for the “Glory Be”. Some of us will also make a slight bow for the name of Jesus or Mary or the saint whose feast day we may be observing, but some forget. We also cross ourselves for the opening line of the “Benedictus” and “Magnificat”.
 
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