Liturgy of the Hours for Laymen Before Vatican 2?

[Edward_H]

Maybe if I say it yet one more time.

I have no problem with the LOTH.
It’s a beautiful complement and is actually part of the Church’s Liturgy itself.
Beautiful “vocal” prayers, capable of stirring the mind and the heart toward God.

That said. It’s not for everyone, and no Catholic should be “shamed” or nudged to take up this heavy a burden.

The interest of a person - who sees perhaps what it seems to do for people who do the LOTH - is what should draw them to consider doing it themselves. They don’t need to be nudged in the least into doing it. It should be a free choice that begins with their own curiosity.

Clearly, not everyone who does the LOTH is affected so profoundly that there is a groundswell around the LOTH. It’s certainly not convincing me that LOTH people have a generous spirit, patience, acceptance of different ways to pray, cheerfulness, or serenity. No one here has done a good sell job for me, a cradle Catholic who attends daily Mass.

The cheerfulness, patience, spirit of generosity, serenity should be an OUTCOME of such a good prayer life.

And clearly here…based on the grotesque caricatures that others here have made of my points…go look at my points again…LOTH is not having the effect (interior and thus, apostolic) that it could be having.

So, it’s a great thing. It’s not for everyone. It can overwhelm new Catholics. They should be made fully welcome to learn about it…so many treasures of the Church we hvae…but we need to realize that we’re dealing with humans, all of us: it’s difficult to start a new habit and we don’t want to make our brothers or sisters experience exasperation or frustration around the topic of prayer right out of the gate.

And of course, there are many other ways to pray.

 

[angel12]

There are too many people on this forum who have gotten into an uncharitable habit of grotesquely distorting what someone has written in order to dismiss it.

Quoting your own statements is not “grotesquely distorting” anything.

 

[Edward_H]

paste them, but justice demands you also post the full context of them. Do it.

 

[OraLabora]

One thing that I think bears mention, is that the LOTH is not a prayer that affects one profoundly at the start. It fact it can be quite discouraging with the complicated rubrics, available options, etc.

It is instead a prayer one grows into. I have been praying it for over 15 years, but at first it was in fits and starts, enthusiasm then discouragement, then another try, then fall-back, etc. I’d say it’s been about 8-10 years since I really started to pray it more consistently.

I liken it to water dripping against a rock. It takes a long time but eventually the water wears a groove into the rock. It’s the same with the LOTH. It’s hard at first. Over time though, it becomes habit-forming. You suddenly find yourself regurgitating psalm verses that fit the situation. You realize that the drip drip drip of the prayer is wearing a groove on your soul, and you start to reap the graces of the prayer.

But it does require perseverance to reach that point. There have been, and are still days when I simply don’t feel like it. But I stick to it anyway, and those are often the days when I get a special insight or grace from the prayer.

Some people in their initial enthusiasm want to go whole-hog and take on, for instance, the pre-Vatican II breviary, or one of the monastic breviaries. I strongly discourage that for newbies to the LOTH. There’s no better way to discourage the LOTH than overdoing it at the start, especially with the more convoluted pre-Conciliar rubrics.

I’ve vacillated back-and-forth between the Roman LOTH and the monastic version (1-week psalter) used by the abbey I’m attached to. I’ve been growing more and more into the monastic version, but my first attempts at it when still working (I’m now retired) would discourage me as I’d often have to miss one or two of the Canonical hours. It was by observing that this happens to monks as well, that helped me overcome scrupulosity with the Divine Office. My scrupulosity was my biggest obstacle.

If anybody shows interest in the LOTH, I strongly counsel them to start with the current Roman LOTH, and to go easy, maybe start with Lauds and Vespers at first (with perhaps Compline, or maybe even only Compline to start as it is easy and the exam of conscience at the end of the day is really helpful), then as they get used to it they can go deeper into it with the Office of Readings and mid-day prayer.

It’s much easier to get hooked on this drug by slowly increasing the dose, then overdosing on it at the get-go!

 

[phil19034]

Maybe if I say it yet one more time.

I have no problem with the LOTH.
It’s a beautiful complement and is actually part of the Church’s Liturgy itself.
Beautiful “vocal” prayers, capable of stirring the mind and the heart toward God.

That said. It’s not for everyone, and no Catholic should be “shamed” or nudged to take up this heavy a burden.

The interest of a person - who sees perhaps what it seems to do for people who do the LOTH - is what should draw them to consider doing it themselves. They don’t need to be nudged in the least into doing it. It should be a free choice that begins with their own curiosity.

Clearly, not everyone who does the LOTH is affected so profoundly that there is a groundswell around the LOTH. It’s certainly not convincing me that LOTH people have a generous spirit, patience, acceptance of different ways to pray, cheerfulness, or serenity. No one here has done a good sell job for me, a cradle Catholic who attends daily Mass.

The cheerfulness, patience, spirit of generosity, serenity should be an OUTCOME of such a good prayer life.

I think everyone here can agree with this. And I don’t think anyone on this tread would attempt to “shame” anyone into praying it.

And clearly here…based on the grotesque caricatures that others here have made of my points…go look at my points again…LOTH is not having the effect (interior and thus, apostolic) that it could be having.

Again, comments like this are simply going to tick people off again, since you were the one who started the whole argument by saying that praying the LOTH was clericalism without being very specific in regards to what you meant.

<< continued >>

 

[phil19034]

<< continued from my previous post >>

So, it’s a great thing. It’s not for everyone. It can overwhelm new Catholics. They should be made fully welcome to learn about it…so many treasures of the Church we have…but we need to realize that we’re dealing with humans, all of us: it’s difficult to start a new habit and we don’t want to make our brothers or sisters experience exasperation or frustration around the topic of prayer right out of the gate.

And of course, there are many other ways to pray.

Again, I don’t think there is a single person on this thread who would disagree with this. I think everyone would agree 100%.

However, this is not what you originally stated. Whatever message you originally intended to convey didn’t come across like this post. What everyone took from it was that praying the LOTH was a form of clericalism, and that was exactly what everyone was arguing against.

On forums like this, it’s important to keep in mind that voice infection is lost and without context, posts can be misinterpreted. Therefore, a lot of people tend to simply be direct / blunt, which sometimes can be mistakenly be taken as rude.

Also, people will use this forum years from now to read questions that they have and see previous answers. For someone who is interested in the LOTH, to read on here a year from now that it is “clericalism” would not be helpful to that person who wants to pray it. However, this post would be helpful, as would the post @OraLabora posted after yours.

In closing, I think this conversation is wrapped up. God Bless and please continue to take part in CAF.

 

[Edward_H]

Grátias tibi, Deus…

 

[Edward_H]

t praying the LOTH was clericalism without bei

I didn’t say it was clericalism…I said there is present in the Church a tendency to clericalize the lay…and LOTH is one of those practices (among others) of clericalizing the lay. I then listed other examples.

and then the very first response I got was someone arguing that “clericalizing” the lay is not a bad thing.

I haven’t backed away from that point. It’s entirely defensible.

 

[phil19034]

phil19034:

t praying the LOTH was clericalism without bei

I didn’t say it was clericalism…I said there is present in the Church a tendency to clericalize the lay…and LOTH is one of those practices (among others) of clericalizing the lay. I then listed other examples.

and then the very first response I got was someone arguing that “clericalizing” the lay is not a bad thing.

I haven’t backed away from that point. It’s entirely defensible.

Edward, yes, there is a tendency by some to clericalize the laity by some. And yes, people who are guilty of clericalism may use the LOTH to clericalize, just like some clericalize by using the orans posture, during mass.

But again my friend, that was NOT the message people received by reading your org post. This was your post:

The focus on the “liturgy of the hours” for the lay is another indication of a sort of “clericalizing” of the lay that has been going on for too many years.

The flood of deacons, EMHC’s, “hospitality ministers”, etc. etc. are other signs of this.

Take even the dissenting news magazine called the National Catholic Reporter…as vehemently anti-institutional Church as it is…nearly all of its angry articles center of clericial matters.

They are every bit as clerical at NCR as a group of Latin Mass only parents hoping all their children become priests or sisters.

Almost everyone understood (right or wrong), from the first sentence that you were objectively stating that laity praying the LOTH was clericalizing" the laity.

Now based on multiple discussions, we now understand the context and understand that you were speaking subjectively not objectively. However, that was not the way most understood it originally.

Anyway, I think we are good to put this to bed.

God Bless

 

[Edward_H]

is another indication of a sort of “clericalizing” of the lay

"is another indication of a sort of “clericalizing” of the lay "

This doesn’t say that all who do use the LOTH are giving in to clericalism.

That’s your mistake.

 

[phil19034]

phil19034:

is another indication of a sort of “clericalizing” of the lay

"is another indication of a sort of “clericalizing” of the lay "

This doesn’t say that all who do use the LOTH are giving in to clericalism.

That’s your mistake.

Seriously? I said:

Almost everyone understood (right or wrong), from the first sentence that you were objectively stating that laity praying the LOTH was clericalizing" the laity.

The fact that you are not willing to concede that your word choice opened to the door to misunderstanding is curious.

I more than happily admit that I misunderstood your org post. And I was not being rude to you or disrespectful to you.

There is no need to respond back. Just please keep in mind that if a ton of people are telling you that you are wrong when you know you are correct; perhaps it means you didn’t communicate what you meant to communicate.

God Bless.

 

[Edward_H]

Thanks.

Or perhaps “a ton” (an exaggeration, need I count) of people (of like mind) gravitated to this subject when they saw the title, because it’s their favorite hobby horse, and perhaps were a bit too defensive.

That possibility is as plausible. But thanks, and goodbye.