The Divine Office during the Sacred Triduum and Easter

[KitSileya]

I am off work the days of the Sacred Triduum and Easter, and since I have been praying Lauds and Vespers regularly for some time now, I thought it would be nice to do as many of the other hours as I can during the 5 days from Holy Thursday to Easter Monday.

In addition to Lauds and Vespers, I’m thinking of praying the Office of Readings, one midday Hour, and Compline. I’ve been reading the instructions, but I can’t seem to get a proper grasp of which hours shouldn’t be prayed when you attend the Masses on these days.

I intend to go to Mass on Holy Thursday, the service on Good Friday, the Midnight Mass on Easter Eve, and the day Masses on Easter Day and on Easter Monday. Which of the hours should I not pray?

(I’m new to the forum, as you can see, so I apologize if I posted in the wrong forum.)

 

[scottywolf777]

I am off work the days of the Sacred Triduum and Easter, and since I have been praying Lauds and Vespers regularly for some time now, I thought it would be nice to do as many of the other hours as I can during the 5 days from Holy Thursday to Easter Monday.

In addition to Lauds and Vespers, I’m thinking of praying the Office of Readings, one midday Hour, and Compline. I’ve been reading the instructions, but I can’t seem to get a proper grasp of which hours shouldn’t be prayed when you attend the Masses on these days.

I intend to go to Mass on Holy Thursday, the service on Good Friday, the Midnight Mass on Easter Eve, and the day Masses on Easter Day and on Easter Monday. Which of the hours should I not pray?

(I’m new to the forum, as you can see, so I apologize if I posted in the wrong forum.)

Quite a commendable thing keep it up.
As someone who has prayed the office for some years now. If you do attend Mass on the triduum you would omit the vesper hours for those days since those services took the place traditionally in monastic houses of the vesper evening office Vespers being evening prayer and not cookies like Alf wanted when he stayed with some monks. Obscure joke from a 70’s Tv show don’t worry if you don’t get it. Vespers refers to Venus the evening star which rises around sunset… Easter Sunday the alleluias return in force and the psalms and canticles of easter will resonate until evening prayer on Divine Mercy Sunday with the propers of each day.
Hopefully that asnwers yourquestion.

 

[KitSileya]

So, lets make sure the ignorant convert understands correctly - I should omit Vespers on Holy Thursday, Good friday, and Holy Saturday.

Then what about compline on Holy Saturday? Should I pray that before the Easter Vigil even if I don’t go to bed until after the Midnight Mass?

 

[scottywolf777]

So, lets make sure the ignorant convert understands correctly - I should omit Vespers on Holy Thursday, Good friday, and Holy Saturday.

Then what about compline on Holy Saturday? Should I pray that before the Easter Vigil even if I don’t go to bed until after the Midnight Mass?

compline by definition (unless a trappist) is the last office of the day. Some Benedictine communities also have nocturnes or night offices that are prayed between midnight and sunrise but, you wouln’t have access to those offices. So compline properly should go after the Vigil even though the tone is still somewhat somber. Be sure to pick an antiphon of Our Lady with lots of alleluias because alleluia is to quote St Augustine Our easter song.
Instructions for 4 Vol and one Vol are the same. Again the rubrics tell you to omit the vespers of the triduum if you attend that day. If you should miss for any reason go ahead and say it for that day. If you should forget and say vespers or feel inspired to do it anyway on those days nobody will frown. I actually have in the past done it anyways. as a way to reenforce the theme of the day.
I am impressed that you know about the Liturgy of the Hours as a convert. Many born catholics have never even heard of it but, next to the mass and sacrements it’s our oldest and most official way to pray and praise God. Keep up the good work!

 

[KitSileya]

Thanks for the help!

Actually, I converted 14 years ago this Easter, and started going to Mass and RCIA 2 1/2 years before that. Among the other converts in my parish (indeed in the diocese) it was pretty usual to be somewhat intellectual and traditional, so I bought a one-volume breviary pretty early, even though I was just a high school student at the time. It was just usual among my peers.

However, it is only recently that a full breviary (4 volume set) has become available in the vernacular of my country, and while I have bought it, and use it when praying with others, I have also bought the English 3 volume set, as my prayer language is English. This coincided very nicely with my discernment process towards perhaps becoming a Lay Dominican, so now I try to pray Laudes and Vesper (we use the Latin names in my vernacular, and I think them much more beautiful than Morning and Evening Prayer - alongside Matutin for Office of Readings, Kompletorium for Night Prayers or Compline, and Ters, Sext and Non for the Prayers during the Day.)

 

[porthos11]

I am off work the days of the Sacred Triduum and Easter, and since I have been praying Lauds and Vespers regularly for some time now, I thought it would be nice to do as many of the other hours as I can during the 5 days from Holy Thursday to Easter Monday.

In addition to Lauds and Vespers, I’m thinking of praying the Office of Readings, one midday Hour, and Compline. I’ve been reading the instructions, but I can’t seem to get a proper grasp of which hours shouldn’t be prayed when you attend the Masses on these days.

I intend to go to Mass on Holy Thursday, the service on Good Friday, the Midnight Mass on Easter Eve, and the day Masses on Easter Day and on Easter Monday. Which of the hours should I not pray?

(I’m new to the forum, as you can see, so I apologize if I posted in the wrong forum.)

If you attend the Evening Mass on Holy Thursday, you omit Vespers.
If you attend the Good Friday liturgy, you omit Vespers.
If you attend the Easter Vigil, you omit Compline, and the Office of Readings for Easter Sunday.

 

[KitSileya]

Thank you. That was a clear overview. I’m sure the Lord wouldn’t have been offended if I’d erred and prayed some of the hours I should have skipped, but I like knowing things for sure, and doing things correctly. Perhaps it’s the convert in me, but I don’t like not knowing the forms and rituals of hte Church.

 

[scottywolf777]

Thank you. That was a clear overview. I’m sure the Lord wouldn’t have been offended if I’d erred and prayed some of the hours I should have skipped, but I like knowing things for sure, and doing things correctly. Perhaps it’s the convert in me, but I don’t like not knowing the forms and rituals of hte Church.

Out of curiousity, where are you from? I doesn’t say in your byline.
I am glad that people do say the Breviary. I have taught several people how to do it. This has also included folks who haven’t joined a community that requires it like the Lay Dominicans or Secular Franciscans. the Breviary is after all the “Official” prayer of the Church along with the Mass and sacrements, not that devotions like the rosary, stations of the cross, novenas etc should be discouraged either.

 

[Gertabelle]

Actually, when I was in the Benedictine monastery we prayed Compline on Holy Saturday. I remember this because it was the only day of the entire year on which Compline was changed for the day. Every other solemnity, including Easter, it remained the same (for every Monday, every Tuesday, etc.) except for the addtion of the alleluias.

I don’t know if that was just a Benedictine thing or not

Gertie

 

[scottywolf777]

Actually, when I was in the Benedictine monastery we prayed Compline on Holy Saturday. I remember this because it was the only day of the entire year on which Compline was changed for the day. Every other solemnity, including Easter, it remained the same (for every Monday, every Tuesday, etc.) except for the addtion of the alleluias.

I don’t know if that was just a Benedictine thing or not

Gertie

Hi Gertie again!
I’m not a Benedictine, I am a lay Franciscan and I have done it but, in vol 2 of the 4 vol set I just noticed it does say to omit Office of Readings presumably so as not to be redundant. I just compaired the rubrics mentioned between the four vol and the one vol and the one vol does NOT mention any omitting of Holy Sat vespers or compline. I guess I’ll have to ask one of the friars when I go to the Mall later this week for confession. Why the 2 differing rubrics when the books are published by the same people!

 

[KitSileya]

scottywolf777, I live in Norway, so pretty far away, and in diaspora. One of the nice things is that the Catholic Church in the Nordic countries is a world church in miniature - over 40 nationalities represented in my parish alone, and the majority are either first or second generation immigrants, or have only one Norwegian parent. The downside is that we have large national groups, so we end up with Masses said in other languages than Norwegian, or rather instead of Norwegian or Latin, especially during the weekdays.

I don’t know whether it is usual among Catholics here to pray the liturgy of the hours, but in general converts here are pretty educated, and really explore the traditions of the Church, which is how I ended up with a breviary early on. We’ve been airing the idea of having the parish priests pray at least Vesper in church rather than in their chapel so that the lay people can join in (as they did in my last parish), so we’ll see how much interest there is in that.