Saturdays on “normal” weekends, we pray Night Prayer for “Saturday evening and the evening before Solemnities.” (I’m translating this directly from my French breviary—Le samedi soir et la veille des Solennités—and don’t know how it’s referred to in English as I don’t own an English-language breviary.)
When, like today, Saturday is itself a Solemnity, this NP is prayed on Friday evening. According to my pastor, the NP to pray on the evening of a Saturday Solemnity is also that for “Saturday evening and the evening before Solemnities.” Why do we not pray NP for “Sunday evening and the evening of Solemnities” (Le dimanche soir et le soir des Solennités)?
In this particular instance, (feast of St. Joseph), Evening Prayer tonight was not EP II of the solemnity but in fact EP I of Palm Sunday. Palm Sunday (and all of Holy Week for that matter) takes precedence over any other feast or solemnity.
Voir la “Table des jours liturgiques disposée selon leur ordre de préséance.” dans “Présentation Générale de la Liturgie des Heures”, which would be at the beginning of Volume I.
Interestingly in the Latin Editio Typica Altera the same collect is used for post EP I and post EP II Compline on solemnities that fall within a weekday, but in the French Liturgie des Heures, the collects are different for the eve and night of solemnities. As I use the option to pray psalms 4, 90 and 133 every day, the only thing that changes for me is is the collect.
So for tonight because it’s the Saturday before Palm Sunday, and Palm Sunday outranks the solemnity, we are praying NP of the Sunday.
Otherwise, I think your pastor is wrong. Assuming today was some other solemnity and tomorrow was an ordinary Sunday, the eve of the solemnity is still liturgically Sunday. Thus the prayer of NP would be NP of the Sunday, just as if the solemnity were on the Sunday, we always pray the collect for Sunday and not the collect for “solemnities falling on a weekday”. Even if this evening were the solemnity (which it is not), it is no longer a weekday but a Sunday that happens to be a solemnity.
I hope it all makes sense. What I said for tonight is also backed up by our abbey’s ordo, BTW.
I’m actually taking a little break from the Roman Liturgy of the Hours for Holy Week and am praying from the Liturgie Monastique des Heures that my abbey uses. That way I can invoke some nice traditions for the Triduum that the LOTH has dropped: starting straight on the first psalm, no opening verses, no hymn, no closing verses, no Gloria Patri. Plus the monks need new vocations so I am going to link my prayer with theirs for a while
Isn’t it something like 2:30 in the morning in France when you wrote your post?
) IOW, I asked about the situation this particular weekend presents and not about all Saturday Solemnity situations in the entire liturgical calendar. I assume his answer would have been different if another set of factors were in play, according to the rules you’ve provided.