Chapter 13: Lauds on ordinary days (paragraph 1)

On ordinary days Lauds should be celebrated like this: the sixty sixth psalm should be said with its antiphon but rather slowly, as on Sunday, to make sure that all are present for the fiftieth psalm which is said with its antiphon. (From para. 1 of Ch. 13 of Saint Benedict's Rule, trans. by Patrick Barry, OSB, 1997.)

Rather slowly -- those are the words I respond to here. In my eyes, Benedict expresses compassion for those, like me, who are often burdened by a human sense of time -- procrastinating or rushing as my ego dictates, and so often out of kilter with a sacred sense of time. For me, the mantra is a tool of compassion, because it always lets me begin again, and draws me towards presence.











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