God our loving Father, our minds were prepared for the coming of your kingdom when you took Christ beyond our sight, so that we might seek him in his glory. May we follow where he has led and find our hope in his glory, for he is Lord forever and ever. Amen. Okay. So, I promise, this is the last class for a while. How do you say that in Italian, for a while? Breve, maybe for a short time. I don't know. You don't do that to me, I'm sure. Don't do that to me on tape, I'm sure. So, where we ended off was at unnumbered point 23, I believe, reviewing, as we are, what

[01:12]

specifically the Benedictine Confederation called for in terms of the revamp of the Liturgy of the Hours in this beautiful document called the Directory for the Work of God that was issued in 1977 under the auspices of then Abbot Primate Rembrandt Weakland in response to Vatican II. You'll recall all that from last week. So, the Benedictine response also to the new theology of liturgy in Vatican II, specifically referring to monastic theology of liturgy and monastic liturgical theology. The last point I believe we hit was that the directives call for the monastic office of each house always to be open to all, that the monastic liturgical assembly should never constitute a closed group. It has to be open to anyone who wants to take part in it and learn from the liturgy above

[02:19]

all that the monastics should be able to set a good example and to show others how to worship God in spirit and truth, to pass on monastic form of prayer. Fagagini writes about the liturgical apostolate of monks. It's one of the things we do for the world. People come here to learn how to pray. So, we have to seek, we're supposed to seek, according to the directives, to make the work of God, to make the Opus Dei an occasion when anyone who comes can join in the prayer of the monks or nuns. Okay, then, primary versus secondary elements of the office. I like this. I don't know, I don't remember if I told this already when I was in St. Maynard. I remember Fr. Noah Casey, who was a spiritual director in the seminary, was explaining to the guys, when they pray the office, don't worry about, necessarily, all the communal parts if they're doing it by themselves. Get yourself down to the basics when you're by yourself.

[03:21]

For example, why are you saying the response reading? You say it, and then you answer yourself, and then you go back and forth. Which, in a sense, is like, if you recall at all, what I was talking about, the reform of Quinones before the Council of Trent, where he stripped the office down. It didn't get accepted for very long. He stripped the office down to its basics, just the psalms and to readings. Not a bad idea. It also carries across, for people non-monastics, this sense of the office as a liturgy of the Word, and carries also the sensibility of this Lectio Continuo scripture of psalmony. So, the directives tell us, too, these things are first. These are most important, primary. Hymns, psalms, readings, prayers. Everything else is secondary. Encourage to add them in, but everything else is secondary. The real important thing is the hymn. I think mainly because the hymn sets the tone for the day, for the hour of the day, for the morning or for the evening.

[04:21]

The hymn sets the tone for the feast. Also, a hymn has a tendency to collect the assembly, to gather the assembly together. The psalms, of course. The readings, of course. The prayer, of course. Makes sense. Everything else is secondary. What would be everything else? We don't add very much of the everything else. We do add the anathemas, which are highly recommended, to give some focus to the psalms. Acclamations, versicles, responsories, etc. The only responsories we use really are at vigils on Sundays, in the feast days. Now, all the Sunday vigils will have responsories after the first reading. At camp, when we have that, Into your hands, Lord, I commend my spirit. That's an example of a form of a responsory. Well, the old office was loaded with those things. So, after every reading, there'd be these responsories. Now, you'd have to have them all written down. You couldn't remember them all. And a lot of times, it would just be, the leader says one line, and you answer the second line.

[05:23]

And there'd be two lines from the psalm. Excuse me. It's the same thing that the Anglicans done at Calvary. I don't remember if it was either for vigils, professors, or for their consul. Where, at the end, they had a whole slew of those. Oh, really? Five or six prayers. We just had that one on the regular. Yeah, yeah. They had a whole page of these things. Yeah. Well, the Roman Rite, when it tried to get back to that noble simplicity, and that austerity, and that sobriety that's kind of a typically Roman thing, it's very easy for things to get added on over it. And we pay real close attention here to keep it down, pared down to its bare minimum, kind of the Zen approach. There's one little thing I'd like to get rid of at some point, and that's the Lord be with you before the closing at office. There's absolutely no reason for it to be there. I have a guess why it came in, but it doesn't introduce anything. So these things just creep in.

[06:24]

You don't exactly know why you're doing it, but we've always done it that way. So you see how things creep in. So, point 24 was, and this is an echo of point 15 and 20, the monastic character of the celebration is supposed to be preserved. We want to preserve all three things, so that the office is ecclesial, the office is local, but specifically that the office is monastic. Ecclesial in the sense that there are some objective standards. We're part of the universal church. Narrowing it down even more, we want to preserve also our local celebration of the work of God. So as you've heard me say over and over again, this directory was not a juridical norm. It left every house to be able to establish its own version of it. So that each community can be said to require its own proper liturgy. But, in that, it's important that it remain monastic.

[07:30]

The liturgy of the hours should show that it is esteemed above every other spiritual value of the day. It should be keeping in the tradition. And that's pointing back to other points of what are the specifically monastic characteristics of it. So, the objective standards of psalmody, of sobriety, of reading of scripture. But also, somehow the office is supposed to carry with it a sign, a sentiment, that it is the most important thing that goes on in this place. That's somehow what makes it specifically monastic. You can hardly grasp that. It's like trying to grab a cloud. But, the point needs to be made. Then, the number of hours, the directive, agreeing with Vatican II, wanted to alleviate the pensum, the obligation to do all the hours. Meaning, vigils, lauds, terse, sext, non, vespers, compen.

[08:36]

Prime was suppressed, of course. So, no longer did the Roman office require of anybody to do all seven of those hours. And, the Benedictine Confederation agreed with that. It would no longer be an obligation for us to do all seven hours. Instead, the directory wants to stress quality over quantity, they say. Rather, increase the quality of those that are celebrated. But, the point is made, if the number of hours are reduced, it doesn't necessarily mean there's a reduced amount of time given to it. So, maybe you should spend the same amount of time on it. It would be done better. So, you might be able to click off prime, terse, sext, and non in ten minutes. Whereas, maybe a midday prayer that takes a quality half an hour, really, with meditating on the sounds, would be a lot better than trying to cram four offices

[09:38]

into ten minutes. So that, also, that every, there's this phrase again, every communal liturgy be seen as a strong moment in the community. Not as an obligation, just get this thing in before lunch. But, every time we celebrate, it's a strong moment. A moment that really has had quality time, quality thought put into it. So that, there is more listening, more time for silent prayer, more singing, more variety in ways of celebrating. And, this way, also, there's no need to combine the hours. Because it's not an obligation. So, then, what? The principal hours are these. Lauds, Vespers, Eucharist, Vigils. It's funny that they add Eucharist in there.

[10:38]

This is what the directory recommends. And, I'll quote this. They quote the General Instruction of Liturgy of the Hours. By venerable tradition of the universal church, lauds as morning prayer and Vespers as evening prayer are the two hinges on which the daily office turns. They must be regarded as the principal hours and are to be celebrated as such. This point is made over and over again in the revamp of the office, both for monastics and for the Roman office. Focus your energy on lauds and Vespers as the top, as the most important things, the whole day turning on that. So, you can concentrate on the quality of those two prayers. Put a lot of effort into them. The preeminence, of course, of the hours rise from the fact that the morning remembers the memorial of resurrection, evening, the commemoration of the death of Christ.

[11:41]

How does the Eucharist compare, or how does it fit into the whole scheme of the Liturgy of the Hours? We're going to hit that right next. And this is, again, a direct quote. Both are analogous with the Eucharist, together with which they constitute the spiritual triad of highest importance in the arrangement of the monastic day. Now, it's rather beautiful that they bring in the Eucharist, and we're talking about the Liturgy of the Hours. There is certainly a progressive or a more liberal train of thought that would want to leave Eucharist out of this whole discussion. This does not be specifically monastic liturgy. But our constitutions, the directory of the work of God, and certainly the general instruction, want to bring it in, to incorporate it, to not see it as a separate thing. I remember Fr. Albert used to talk about Eucharist being our midday prayer. But I love this image here of,

[12:43]

together with Lodz and Vespers, they constitute the spiritual triad of the highest importance in the arrangement of the monastic day. So those are the three. And this is also a very good argument, though we moan about it sometimes, a very good argument for Eucharist being right in the middle of the day. And you can see how that... So Lodz, the Eucharist, the Vespers. The other beautiful thing, I think, in ours, the tie-in with Eucharist, and this is written up somewhere in the Apostle on Ham book, you'll remember this, is we right away start focusing on the Eucharist at Lodz because we use the Gospel of the day for our reading. So we right away are focusing toward Eucharist in Lodz. And certainly, I don't know if you've ever noticed this, we use the prayers from the Roman office, and for the most part, they are also the calex for Eucharist. They're the same prayers. I don't know how much you've ever paid attention to that.

[13:45]

The opening prayer at Mass is generally the closing prayer we use at Liturgy of the Hours. So we're focusing at Lodz straight on, onto the Eucharist. At night, and we're going to Lectio Continuum in the readings, but for sure on Sunday, I try to incorporate something about the reading from Sunday into it. But also, the most beautiful thing for me is the time at the Blessed Sacrament afterwards, though it's not exactly the exact same piece, the Eucharistic species, but there again is the tie-in with the Eucharist. We're there in the morning with the empty altar, we go to the Eucharist, and then at night we're giving thanks, and there we are with the Eucharist again around the altar. That it takes place all in the same space also, and then walking back and forth the Rotunda, and then walking back into the Rotunda somehow brings the Eucharist into Vespers. It's really, I've always liked that. Here's another quote. Listen to this and see if you catch what's funny about this.

[14:46]

We're talking about the difference between monastic and cathedral Vespers. It is appropriate that both hours should share in the acknowledged preeminence of Eucharist. Preeminence of Eucharist. Even in their external form of their celebration. So, lifting lauds and Vespers up to the preeminence of Eucharist. So they should have the same solemnity as Eucharist. Which can be given even greater solemnity by, listen to this, by singing a liturgy of light at lauds perhaps, or a liturgy of incense at Vespers. Where does that strike you? Yeah, but also these are the things that come out of this cathedral tradition. Remember in the old monastic tradition, you know, it was this total sobriety, and it's out of the cathedral tradition that comes the liturgy of light and the liturgy of incense adding other ceremonies. So here we are in the 20th century

[15:47]

being told to add these elements in, you know, to the monastic liturgy. So the line between cathedral and monastic is pretty blurry at this point. What would the liturgy of light be? It would be like, I think, I would imagine they're talking about the tenebrae that we use on Holy Week. Yeah, the welcoming of the light. What Acheson does is, they sort of run vigils and lauds together. After the liturgy, there's a long silence, and then there's a synchronous thing. Be with me, O Lord, my light and my hope. As I pray to you at dawn with my song. At that point, someone lights a candle to start fitting the rods. So that's how they integrate the light service. And it helps for them because otherwise the service would be blurred into the monastic liturgy, but it's a way to mark the service of light at the beginning. It would be interesting, I mean, I had not read that before,

[16:48]

and I was thinking too, I wonder when and how we could do something like that, a liturgy of the light. Except it's usually pretty bright by the time we start lauds. Well, there always is a candle lit, you just never can see it, because Gabriel likes to keep it up. Anyway, let's not get into that. And then the last point that gets added in here is, and vigils are also of great importance for the monastic, because of the eschatological meaning given to this office. Therefore, I mean, it seems to me, therefore the implicit recommendation is that it be celebrated as a vigil. Now, for example, our monastery in Rome, they use a midday office to do their office of readings, which, according to the Roman rites, you can do the office of readings any time of day. But still, there is something very monastic about this,

[17:49]

this thing of breaking up the sleep, or at least getting up very early, awaiting the dawn, that eschatological thing. Of course, the ancient thought of the Church was since Christ rose at dawn, he would come again at dawn, so we should be up watching and waiting in our vigil. And, the celebration of vigils is distinguished not by any external solemnity, but has its own special character, that of contemplative, peaceful, prolonged prayer. So it's meant to be a very quiet office with very little fluff to it, lots of listening, contemplation. We're doing pretty well according to this. We really do focus on these four offices and maintain them straight across the board. So I feel pretty good about that much. The other two points that get brought up are the importance of singing. And this has to do with raising, again, the lauds and vespers up to the preeminent status

[18:53]

of Eucharist. There are a lot of places that don't sing lauds and vespers still. I find that out more and more. They do a lot of reciting, except maybe on Sundays and feast days. And it's a pretty good thing. I think we should be happy that we continue to sing as much as we do. We sing really straight across the board and consistently. And the last part is on those who fulfill rose, which is not too important for our discussion. In a sense, that ends the talk about the discussion of the directives. But I wanted to talk specifically to bring it on home for our own practices a little bit. And even your opinions would be really fun to hear on this. And it is, what should we be doing as a community? What should we be doing individually? I've been bouncing around with this a lot. As you know, myself, I've been so deeply involved

[19:54]

in putting the office together for this place. If you want to know the briefest of history on it, when I got here, vigils was as it was. Lots of vespers were kind of a mixture of psalms from all the different places. About maybe less than a quarter of what we had were the psalms from Italy. And then Fr. Thomas and Robert and P.D. and Isaiah urged me to start working on the office and adapting what we have in Italy. So that's been the process. We had no anaphans almost at all. Thursday night was done, Sunday was done, Easter office was done and things like that. So we have a full cycle now. I don't think we're going to add any more to it. One thing we'd like to do, we keep talking about in the next project, is to have more psalms and vigils. To spread out and use more of the curses and vigils. We have discussions every now and then about midday prayer and about the encouragement for monks to be doing

[20:59]

any offices on their own, what and what not. There was an assumption at one time, even when I first got here, that monks were doing the little hours on their own. This was only seven and a half years ago. And Bernard tells me the reason we were exempted from the little hours is because we were hermits and we got a special exemption to do the little hours in private. So the bells even would ring. When Ranyo was first here, the bells would still ring for terse and known, I guess. Because mass would have been, take the place of sext. Now about two years ago, I put together a service of compliment and we do that optionally on Sunday nights. From my own personal opinion, I wouldn't like to see us daily do more hours together. I like the fact that we do midday prayer together once in a while, just to give people the idea of what it is, what that office is. And compliment also, to give people a model of what that office is.

[21:59]

And to celebrate together once in a while, I think just kind of adds a little fuel to it. But, that's my own opinion. I think the four that we do are fine with the addition of those others from time to time. But what should we be doing on our own? And this, I don't have any juridical norms for it either. Except, I don't know if you remember these lines from even the Postulant Handbook. We have nothing else on it, so I like to use this. Except we have the exhortation, because we're professed religious, to do something else. And we're supposed to be spending time in private prayer, but also to, the exhortation to profess religious is to do one of the little hours and to do compliment. So, because our emphasis from the section on communal liturgical prayer, because of our emphasis here on solitude in the cell, we do not pray all the hours together.

[23:01]

Therefore, it is recommended, especially for those in the first years here, to also pray those psalms in private that the community does not pray. I should add that it is also highly recommended to pray all or any of the psalms in the quiet of the cell, and especially in the heart. In the short rule of St. Romuald, the role of the psalms in the life of a monk receives a prominent place. The path you must follow is in the psalms. Never leave it, etc., etc., etc. This exhortation we don't make very often, and I'm just assuming it as my role, then, to add it in. Two things. One is that we're supposed to really immerse ourselves in the psalms, and we don't use them all in our liturgy right now. So, somehow I want to encourage us to get some familiarity with the rest of the psalms. And the other side is, do we need in our individual practice times of set prayer? And this is more a discussion

[24:04]

and something that I've been thinking about rather than, again, juridical norms. But I have a couple of solutions to that, a couple of suggestions that you might even want to try. And basically, I have four ideas. One was, and this is also recommended in the directives in the General Instruction of Liturgy Hours, one of them is to follow the Roman office. I'm talking purely out of personal bias at this point. I don't use this very often here, but on a desert day I do. And when I was in school, I used to love to follow the Roman office. When I'm on the road, I love to use the Roman office. Ruggiero teased me about it on the plane on the way to Italy, because I was trying to get over the jet lag by praying the offices at the proper time in whatever time zone we were in. It's in me to think that way. But I really enjoyed it,

[25:05]

and I was probably more faithful to it when I was down at school at St. John's than I even am here. I liked doing midday prayer by myself, I liked doing Compline, and I liked following the cycle of readings. So there's one idea, the Roman office, at least on the road. I think this is easier to use on the road than our offices. Another way would be this. Here, anyway. Is to actually think of two times of the day as break times for prayer. And I'm going to suggest something like 9 o'clock and 3 o'clock. I like 9.15 actually. Of ancient tradition, Psalm 119, 118, 119, has been the psalm that's used for Tursa, for that prayer. What I find is

[26:05]

I like using that for before Lectio. Because, of course, you know, it's the whole psalm about the Word. Every verse of that psalm somehow mentions the Word in one of its contexts. So for me, if my day works out, ideally, which it rarely does, to read a section of Psalm 119 followed by reading the Gospel of the day, doing Lectio in the Gospel. I find that a really nice time to do it. If I've done Lectio some other time, or if I only have the 15 minutes. Even just that experience of reading Psalm 119 and even just reading through the Gospel one time, I think it's a really nice breakup for my day. At 3 o'clock, there's probably just another suggestion. There are two ways, there are three different ways that I've approached it. Not that I'm compulsive about these things, mind you, but I feel like it's my job to experiment with prayer forms. One way is, I'm going to give you this. This is the schema

[27:09]

for midday prayer, and for church with Fr. Albert, who was still being used with some people when I was still here. On one side, if you turn over to where it says Terse, what that has, he has split up there, I have my Psalter marked with this, is the different sections of Psalm 118 to use for different days of the week. You know, it has 22 sections. So, except Sunday you use four, but every other day you use three of the sections. This is actually the pattern I follow. If I get my 9 o'clock prayer in, I would like to do Psalm 119, three sections of Psalm 119. I love things that are organized like this. I never do Monday's sections on Tuesday, I want you to know. Turn the page over then.

[28:09]

This is a schema that he came up with for midday prayer. These are psalms that one could use, for example, if you wanted to stop at 3 o'clock. When he put this together, these were not psalms we were using in the office. So this kind of complemented what we were doing. Unfortunately, at this point, it does kind of bleed over a little bit. If you're interested in these kind of things, and this is my chance to use them whether you're interested in them or not, I also came up with another schema. At some point, I want to put together a book with all the midday psalms in it, and I have another schema for it that you might want to follow too. I'm going to write it on the board. In case you're interested, I'm not going to look. Let's use writing down. But this uses the gradual psalms, focuses in on them. My idea is that if one were to celebrate one midday office, we would use one section

[29:10]

of Psalm 119 and two other psalms, for instance, as we do in midday prayer when we do it together. I think this is pretty much how they do it in Italy. Here's another schema that could be followed. 119 for me is the first one anyway. Here's another seven-day cycle. 10, 11, 12, 120, and then 121, 122, this goes back another 123, 124, 125, 126, 127, 128, 129, 130. So there's another cycle that could be followed should you want such a thing. These are pretty much psalms we don't do together as it is right now. Except for, well, for me it was 121 and 122

[30:11]

occasionally for feasts and things, for midday prayer. There's another scheme you could follow. I've tried all these. Excuse me, Seth, that's right. Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday. I'd be so embarrassed if there was only six days there. If I do them together, I would do it that way. I would do maybe one of the sections of 119 with those two as we do at midday prayer. And eventually if I ever do get to lay it out, that's how I'm going to lay it out with Psalm 119 and then those two. So if you're doing it as one office, you do one section. If you do it as two different offices, you have the 119. Does that make sense? It's a little complicated. And what I have, I've really enjoyed playing with these various forms of doing it. So I'm, that's why I'm finally after six years I get to tell somebody about it. Here's another idea. And I've got this written down somewhere else and I couldn't find it on one sheet of paper. If you're real interested, I'll find it for you. Is what I started doing

[31:15]

for a while then is I would, I have my psalter, I have a grail psalter marked with all the psalms we don't use in public offices. And I would use that for the afternoon and just go through all the psalms we don't use. Just in Alexio Continuum. Just those though. And that was real interesting because I was getting to see a character of the psalms. And again, one of the reasons I'm kind of pushing this is the point that we don't make very often. We have a great tradition of love for the psalms and we are urged by this Apostolic Handbook to pray all the psalms in some way, at least to be familiar with all the psalms. So that's one of the reasons I'm pushing this. How can we go about doing this in a way that's most palatable? And it says right here, I got that idea from the line that says to also pray those psalms in private that the community does not pray. So I think a familiarity with the whole psalter is really, really wonderful. I know Augustine

[32:17]

is really a hero in this one. And the last one of this, this has been my last experiment, and I'm liking this one the best of all of them, is to do Alexio Continuum with the whole psalter and to not worry about what we do in public and what we don't do in public. And I don't have necessarily a goal like I have to finish it in a week or I have to finish it in a day or two weeks, but just every time I sit down, whatever psalm I left off on, I pick up on. And what's so very interesting about that is to see the psalter itself in the continuous form, to see what Psalm 120 looks like next to Psalm 121. Because we're used to them on Monday and this one on Wednesday and this one on Thursday, but to see them all right next to each other in their own neighborhood is very interesting and moving in a different kind of way. And then we have these discussions back and forth about the violent imagery in the psalms. Somehow, even in context, I understand that in a different way.

[33:18]

It's not quite as jarring. In a sense, I'm reading it as literature with kind of an undiscriminating mind and just kind of letting it flow through. So, this also kind of ties in with the ancient Egyptian tradition of reading the whole psalter. We also had the tradition of reading the whole psalter every day for the sake of the dead, and maybe a whole other one, and this goes way back. So I like plugging into that tradition a lot. And I would urge you to try something like this. At this point, I've got the Compline prayers memorized, the two psalms for Compline memorized. I think other people do too. And I like the fact that I can lay down at night and say Compline to myself. So those two psalms, I don't go through the whole schema of seven or eight. I just use four and ninety-one. But I really like that. I'm happy that I have those two that are just that natural. I can say them even from my pillow in the Canonical of Simeon. The last thing I really have for you

[34:23]

is this article. And for the sake of the listening audience, we may just read it out loud. I think I've made that point strong enough. Let me give you this article. And this is actually what we're going to sum up with this. It's really, if you feel like it at all, looking up this article, it's in the American Venetian Review, 1992. It's there. The citation's on the bottom. It's a wonderful article. This guy, Philip Tymko, I think he's from New York. Copius. Abbey. And he wrote this, actually, for an East-West dialogue, a meeting of East-West dialogue to try to explain continuous prayer. And that's the theme I want to go back to. Though there is this strong emphasis of these strong communal moments, especially for Lauds and Vespers, for Vigils and Eucharist, we have to remember

[35:23]

that very first movement is this exhortation from St. Paul and this desire of the ancient monks to pray constantly. And this is not just the monastic monopoly. Everyone is urged to that. And the General Instruction of the Liturgy, the Aueritz, also brings up this point, pray constantly. So it's not just for monks. It's for everybody. The whole point is to pray constantly. There was the ancient argument, well, you shouldn't pray at set times a day. You should just pray constantly. Whatever. We can go back and forth about this. But I think this guy addresses that very well. The unfortunate thing is we can fool ourselves sometimes into thinking, well, and I've heard priests who are in more apostolic things, well, you know, the Psalms are so deep in my heart right now, I don't have to say the opposite anymore. Maybe. Maybe. Maybe that's true. It's going to take me a long time before I get to that point. I think it's very easy for us to kid ourselves about that.

[36:24]

So he's addressing, I left off the page before so you wouldn't have to do too much of it. He's addressing aramidical, semi-aramidical and cenobitic life. And there's not much talk about the semi-aramidical here. But I think we would fall kind of into that. Not strictly aramidical and certainly not strictly cenobitic, the semi-aramidical. And there's a whole lot in this that I really like. Maybe somebody else would read so we can break up the thing a bit. Guston, do you want to start? Start at, while the aim of the semi-aramidical life is the purification of heart and the perfection of joy, the aim of the aramidical life is contemplation and unceasing prayer. The Egyptians considered purity of heart a prerequisite for contemplation. The discipline of the monastery prepared a monk for a life of solitude, but the struggle did not stop there. Let's just, let's underline that point. Now how much is that in keeping with our

[37:27]

ancient tradition? The discipline of the monastery prepares the monk for the life of solitude. So there is, I mean that's certainly in the earliest Romualdian thing of the Cenobi, the Cenobia, preparing the monk for the entrance into the hermitage. Now we don't like to speak in that language too much anymore, but I still like it. Go ahead. After leaving the monastery to live as a hermit, the monk had to daily battle with himself so as not to lose the purity of heart he had gained. The hermit in his solitude was removed from the potentially distracting sights and sounds of the monastery, but now more than ever, the images that memory conjures up made it difficult for him to pray. Also, as Abba John informs us, the hermit's peace was often disturbed by visitors who had to be shown hospitality. And even when visitors did not arrive, the thought that they might and the desire to pray for them really did distract him. Now that sounds like Michael Fish

[38:29]

to me. For the sake of our listening audience. Are these questions? Yes, yes. Thus, in the midst of fasting, the hermit could find himself worried about the satisfaction of his own needs and those of his anticipated guests. Assaulted by these and other temptations, it was not easy for the hermit to be constant in prayer. Indeed, the battle at this stage of spiritual journey was in many respects more difficult. The temptations were more subtle, and without the guidance of a spiritual father, the possibility of self-deception was more real. That's a really important line right there. The possibility of self-deception can be really very strong for those in solitude. Little things need to be put in there even like a guard against our own self. It's easy to nap. It's easy to snack. What else is easy to do when we don't even have to bring about the rest of them? Fish, do you want to read a little bit? While the monastic fathers were forthright

[39:31]

about the difficulties the hermit would encounter, and persistence about the need for constant vigilance, it would be wrong to suppose that their thought spiritual perfection could be achieved by human effort alone. One need read only the confidences of Abbot Isaac on prayer to see that this is so. I want to underline his next line because this is like finally I found in print some corroboration of the thing that I keep saying all the time. Go ahead. He insists that contemplation is a gift of God and that nothing can be done without his help. Therefore, he advises those embarking on the contemplative life to keep constantly on their lips and before their minds the verse, God, come to my assistance. Lord, make haste to help me. We could skip that paragraph and go down to... Bede, would you read Anticipating? Anticipating the Greek Hesychast

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and the use of the Jesus prayer by several centuries, Abbot Isaac can probably claim the distinction of having transmitted the first Christian mantra. He instructs the monk to make the verse, God, come to my assistance. Lord, make haste to help me. So much a part of his life through constant use that he will grow accustomed to repeating it even in his sleep. He promises that the prayer will not only keep the monk free from harm, it will lead him to the visible and celestial contemplation and carry him on to that ineffable goal of prayer of which so few have had any experience. Now this section is not necessarily apropos to our discussion of Liturgy of the Hours per se, but I thought it was a nice introduction to what follows because that's so much in our tradition. We like this so much. The conclusion. Rene, would you? In considering the prayer practices of the early monks, we have seen that the ideal

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of the Hermits was to fill as literally as possible the commandment to pray without ceasing. Consequently, they chose to live in circumstances that were conducive to continual prayer and lived alone, kept at bodily needs to a minimum, and engaged in routine types of work that did not require much thought or the use of imagination and creativity. Thus, even while their hands were busy, their minds were free for contemplation. Senebites, for their part, lived in community. The complex needs of a community fall for a pooling of resources and a division of labor. As I frequently compare the monastic community to a body with many members, the members do not work for themselves but for the good of the whole. Those who did the cooking and the tailoring and the haplessly cobbling provided the shoes. Through the talents and labors of its members, the Senebitic community strove to be self-sufficient. In addition, communities like those of Basil operated charitable institutions to meet the needs of others.

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All of this took time and planning that did not afford the Senebites the leisure for contemplation enjoyed by the Hermit. Nevertheless, it must be said that prayer was as central to the life of the Senebites as it was to the Hermits. Senebites engaged in communal prayer at fixed times, but they did not regard keeping the hours as fulfillment of the duty to pray always. Therefore, they attempted to bring contemplative dimension to all their activities. In the midst of their work, the Senebites, no less than the Hermits, tried to retain a continual awareness of God's abiding presence. We are somewhere in between. Let's move on. Isaac, please. That's why we have prayer at fixed times. Because the day can be like that sometimes.

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Where the activities take us away. Go ahead. This is this whole paragraph that I like very much. Go ahead. Go ahead.

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The last part too. ... Now, I don't know about you, but I can admit to that. I could get so caught up. To me, this paragraph does not just refer to vigils, lauds, Eucharist and vespers, but I mean that stretch of time between 7.30 and 11.30 and that stretch of time between lunch and 6 o'clock where I find that I need that. Something to recall me to the true orientation of what my life is about. I need those times to set aside. Don, would you read? With Cassius. So, it's not so much as a pensum.

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It's not so much as the obligation. It's that you do this because you need to do this for yourself. Not because the Church is requiring it of you, but even if you're not home at 3 o'clock, stop and pray and call yourself back to the true orientation of the day. Even if you're not home at vespers, stop and pray. Why? To recall yourself to the true orientation of what your life is about. Go ahead. I had to impose the same duty on the folks who were traveling. I think it states very well the relationship between continual prayer and prayer for this time. I couldn't sum the whole thing up

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any better than that. I thought this was a really lovely article, a lovely way to sum it up. And that ends all I have to say on the Liturgy of the Hours. Do you have any other questions? Any comments, questions, rebuttals, arguments? But there's always, it seems to me, a firelight from other places and traditions. The monastic positions and monastic liturgists meet regularly, and they share things back and forth. So actually, it's simply the same thing.

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