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Luigi_Daniele
Guest
- instead of* the Liturgy of the Hours valid?
I mean absolutely no disrespect to those who pray the MD in any way. I am interested in it, but I want to be praying with the Church, above all.
Thank you.
- Status
I mean absolutely no disrespect to those who pray the MD in any way. I am interested in it, but I want to be praying with the Church, above all.
Thank you.
J
Joannm
Guest
As an Oblate of a specific monastery you can pray what your particular community prays or you can pray any version of the LOTH. At least that is what our Oblate director told us. The Diurnal follows the pattern of praying the psalms set forth by St Benedict in the Rule. For Benedictines it is the Official LOTH.
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OraLabora
Guest
I think it’s a gray area. SP allows the use of the 1960 Roman Breviary. The MD is proper to Benedictines (which includes Cistercians) that use the older pre-Vatican II monastic office. There are very few monasteries that do. I know of three for sure and I think there’s one in Italy as well. In N. America there’s Clear Creek (Solesmes Congregation), in France, Fontgombault (also Solesmes Congregation) and Barroux which was formerly schismatic but came back into communion with Rome and was allowed to keep the older Office and Mass. If you’re somehow affiliated to one of those houses as an Oblate then it would be liturgical, outside of that, I’m not so sure.
To be liturgical BTW, the MD must be prayed in Latin.
Personally the full Monastic Office (even without Matins) either pre- or post-Vatican II is probably over the top for lay use. Moreover if you regularly attend an OF Mass, I would say that the LOTH or one of the post-Vatican II monastic office variants would make much more sense. The LOTH and the Mass really are all one liturgy of which the Mass is the summit. For the MD and the OF Mass, the liturgical year won’t line up, for starters. The MD will also follow the Benedictine calendar of saints, and while it is mostly the same as the Roman calendar, there are some significant differences. It really doesn’t make much sense to pray the MD or one of the Monastic Offices unless you’re somehow attached to a monastery (or live near one and participate in their offices regularly so it would make more sense to use that Office when praying away from the monastery).
In my own case I’ve done the rounds of a few Offices as an Oblate: Monastic Schema A which is the post-Vatican II version of the office used in the MD; schema B which my abbey uses, and the LOTH. Personally I’ve found a great sense of balance with the LOTH in my current circumstances; when I worked from home almost all the time, I preferred my abbey’s schema, but now 3 days a week I have a monster commute so the LOTH does it for me. I pray Lauds and Vespers and Sunday Compline in Gregorian chant in Latin; I chant the psalm first, then re-read it in French (my mother tongue). The mixture of Gregorian psalmody as a mantra, and then the silence to meditate the psalm, gives me a great sense of peace and a great sense of satisfaction that I’m praying with the Church. I’ve also found ways to draw “traditions” out of the LOTH. They’re there if you know where to look for them by using various options. Lauds and Vespers take me about 20 minutes, which seems just about right. The Office of Readings, which I recite recto-tono in French, also takes about the same time. The other offices and Compline are about 10-12 minutes chanted or just around 8 minutes recited. I’ll go back to my abbey’s office when I’m retired
One has to keep in mind that the MD is designed for monks who spend a great deal of their day in choir chanting it. Even today monks that use the post-Vatican II version of that Office (more or less everything the same as the LOTH except for the Benedictine psalm schema of 250 psalms per week), are allowed to use the shorter LOTH when outside the monastery, or assigned to an external apostolate. The LOTH is a great gift to the Church. While the MD (or the Breviarum Romanum) were never intended for lay use, the LOTH is (and it is even encouraged by the Church), and is very well adapted to those with busy lives, clergy or lay alike.
To be liturgical BTW, the MD must be prayed in Latin.
Personally the full Monastic Office (even without Matins) either pre- or post-Vatican II is probably over the top for lay use. Moreover if you regularly attend an OF Mass, I would say that the LOTH or one of the post-Vatican II monastic office variants would make much more sense. The LOTH and the Mass really are all one liturgy of which the Mass is the summit. For the MD and the OF Mass, the liturgical year won’t line up, for starters. The MD will also follow the Benedictine calendar of saints, and while it is mostly the same as the Roman calendar, there are some significant differences. It really doesn’t make much sense to pray the MD or one of the Monastic Offices unless you’re somehow attached to a monastery (or live near one and participate in their offices regularly so it would make more sense to use that Office when praying away from the monastery).
In my own case I’ve done the rounds of a few Offices as an Oblate: Monastic Schema A which is the post-Vatican II version of the office used in the MD; schema B which my abbey uses, and the LOTH. Personally I’ve found a great sense of balance with the LOTH in my current circumstances; when I worked from home almost all the time, I preferred my abbey’s schema, but now 3 days a week I have a monster commute so the LOTH does it for me. I pray Lauds and Vespers and Sunday Compline in Gregorian chant in Latin; I chant the psalm first, then re-read it in French (my mother tongue). The mixture of Gregorian psalmody as a mantra, and then the silence to meditate the psalm, gives me a great sense of peace and a great sense of satisfaction that I’m praying with the Church. I’ve also found ways to draw “traditions” out of the LOTH. They’re there if you know where to look for them by using various options. Lauds and Vespers take me about 20 minutes, which seems just about right. The Office of Readings, which I recite recto-tono in French, also takes about the same time. The other offices and Compline are about 10-12 minutes chanted or just around 8 minutes recited. I’ll go back to my abbey’s office when I’m retired
One has to keep in mind that the MD is designed for monks who spend a great deal of their day in choir chanting it. Even today monks that use the post-Vatican II version of that Office (more or less everything the same as the LOTH except for the Benedictine psalm schema of 250 psalms per week), are allowed to use the shorter LOTH when outside the monastery, or assigned to an external apostolate. The LOTH is a great gift to the Church. While the MD (or the Breviarum Romanum) were never intended for lay use, the LOTH is (and it is even encouraged by the Church), and is very well adapted to those with busy lives, clergy or lay alike.
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OraLabora
Guest
Actually it isn’t. The Monastic Diurnal is based on the pre-Vatican II Monastic Office. Monasteries that do the OF Mass (and that’s most of them), have 4 “official” schemas to choose from:
Schema A which has the same psalm arrangement as the MD except that the psalms of Prime can be redistributed either into Vigils or the minor hours;
Schema B which recites all 150 psalms in a week (but has a couple of two-week options);
Schemas C and D which are two-week psalters.
These schemas are essentially identical (except of the calendar of saints) to the LOTH; for instance the collects will be the same. Beyond those schemas, monasteries are essentially free to set their own; I was at an abbey in the UK last year that have a 4-week cycle for Matins (which combined the Office of Readings and Lauds) and mid-day prayer, and they used the Monastic Antiphonary for Vespers and Compline (which are on a 1-week cycle). It was a pretty interesting hybrid, that I rather liked.
The MD would only be for monasteries using the EF Mass.
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Joannm
Guest
No necessarily so. I was on retreat at a monastery that used it and they didn’t celebrate the EF. They did chant the LOTH in Latin every day however.
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OraLabora
Guest
Yes, but it was most likely the post-Vatican II version of the MD. The readings, and collects would have been the same as the LOTH. At least in our congregation, the monasteries using the original Benedictine schema (Solesmes and St-Wandrille), that do BTW chant the Office in Latin, use the post-Vatican II version. Our abbey uses a different schema (Schema B) that recites all 150 psalms in a week. It is also congruous with the LOTH for readings and collects, and Lauds and Vespers are chanted in Latin.
At Solesmes and St-Wandrille, the Mass is OF and chanted in Latin. At our abbey, the Propers and Ordinary are in Latin/Greek, but the rest chanted in French.
The Monastic Diurnal, and the current Monastic Schema A, have the same psalm arrangement, but while the former can be prayed in Latin only, the latter can be in Latin or the vernacular, and in the case of the MD the readings, collects, etc, would be pre-Vatican II and in the latter, identical to the LOTH except for the Benedictine saints.
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YoungTradCath
Guest
Just bought a vintage one.
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Luigi_Daniele
Guest
Thanks you all for the information.
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