Chapter 16: The hours of the work of God during the day
And so at these times let us offer praise to our Creator because of his justice revealed in his judgements -- that is at Lauds, Prime, Terce, Sext, None, Vespers and Compline and in the night let us arise to praise him. (From Ch. 16 of Saint Benedict's Rule, trans. by Patrick Barry, OSB, 1997.)
Keeping time holy is, for me, one of the most wonderful of monastic disciplines. In my life, I have the stability of my twice-daily practice of meditation, a stability which spreads itself out into more continuous prayer -- of my breathing the mantra on a path of redemption, redeeming me, my conditions, and redeeming time.
In this times, when many things demand for my attention, the discipline of taking 'spiritual pauses' to say or to even remember the divine office at various times of the day, reminds me of my real essence and purpose in life.
ReplyDeleteThe psalms, I am learning, are something to be savored throughout the day, and not just to be read and then put down. Small phrases can be repeated bringing me close to God, to Christ. Christ lived out the psalms and I am struck by certain phrases that bear this out. In psalm 107, of course written before Christ, God is praised because, "he stilled the storm to a whisper: all the waves of the sea were hushed." There I see Christ in the boat with the apostles afraid of the storm. Christ calmed the storm to a whisper. This is for me, one small example of how the psalms transcend time, show Christ in his divinity and allow me to pray using the words of the psalms, "O Lord, calm the waters of my body and my senses of mind and heart so that I can hear your whisper close to the ear of my heart." I am indebted to those dear psalmists of long ago for helping me to formulate prayers knowing that Christ used them also.
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