Vatican II at 50 - The Liturgy of the Hours

Carpe diem is a Latin phrase and a favored quote on everything from bumper stickers to ball caps.  It’s often translated as “sieze the day.”  This phrase is believed to have come from an ancient poem which encourages one of the characters in the poem to forego his mourning and to embrace life. 

One of the ways the Church “seizes the day” is to pray the Liturgy of the Hours.  The Liturgy of the Hours, also called the Divine Office, is a set of daily prayers composed from psalms and other scripture, hymns,  and readings from the Fathers of the Church.  Together with the Eucharist, the Liturgy of the Hours comprises the official communal prayer of the Church.  The purpose of the Liturgy of the Hours is to praise God and to sanctify the day along with the range of human activity which occurs throughout the day.

The Liturgy of the Hours can be traced back to our Jewish ancestors who were bound to pray at fixed times during the day.  The earliest Christian communities adopted this model of prayer, praying primarily in the morning and in the evening, but also at the third (9am), sixth(12noon) and ninth hours (3pm), according to the Greco-Roman division of the day which began at 6am.  Throughout history, the office has undergone a great deal of revision and reform.  The continuous cycle of prayer became a mainstay of life in a monastery.  Praying the hours became more elaborate and more complicated. Several books were required:  a Bible, a hymnal, a psalter, etc.  So a breviary was developed which provided a reference guide of which texts to pray when.  Soon all of the texts were included in one book, also called a breviary, which made praying the hours much easier especially for monks while traveling. 

But, praying the hours isn’t for monks only.   The revisions made by the Second Vatican Council attempted to simplify the office so that the prayer could easily be done in common.  The Liturgy of the Hours is available in book format, but daily prayer has also gone digital with several websites and even an app.   In this way  we too are encouraged to forego our mourning and to embrace life, every moment of every day.  Amen!

Vatican II at 50 - The Cup We Drink

When you grow up in an Italian family as I did, special meals always included wine.  Wine meant gathering, celebration, friendship and intimacy.  Because drinking wine was often associated with holy days like Christmas and Easter, wine also symbolized a connection to God.  It’s no mere coincidence that wine has played a significant role in salvation history.  There are numerous stories about wine and vines in the Hebrew Scriptures.  The vineyard is a symbol of Israel, God’s chosen people.  In the New Testament, Jesus reveals himself as the true vine and us as the branches, calling us to remain in him and bear fruit. 

One of the ways we remain in Jesus is to drink from the cup at Mass.  At the Last Supper, Jesus said, “Take and drink.”  And for the first 600 years the Church did.  But the Middle Ages witnessed a decline in the use of the cup.  Controversies arose over whether the laity or only the priest should drink from the cup.  In the 16^th century, the Council of Trent affirmed that the cup was to be reserved only for the clergy.  For the next 400 years it was—until the Second Vatican Council.  Vatican II restored the laity to drink from the cup at the discretion of the local bishop.  Subsequent documents have encouraged the laity to take from the cup with this explanation:

Holy Communion has a fuller form as a sign when it is distributed under both kinds.  For in this form the sign of the eucharistic banquet is more clearly evident and clear expression is given to the divine will by which the new and eternal Covenant is ratified in the Blood of the Lord.  GIRM #281

Drinking from the cup, then, offers us the profound opportunity to profess our share in the Covenant and to be filled with the very life force of Jesus, filling the world  with a faith that, like wine, only improves with time.  Amen!

Vatican II at 50 - The Bread We Break

I was in Haiti shooting a video when I heard what sounded like a crying baby.  I looked down from the lens of the camera to see a knife at the throat of a small goat.  Needless to say, I was a little shaken—and even more so the next day when that goat was served up for dinner.  We who shop in grocery stores where food is precisely packaged, neatly assorted, or nicely shined take it for granted that in order for us to live, something has to die.  With so much packaged food and meals ready to eat, we scarcely consider the process of food preparation.   This is especially true when it comes to one of our staple foods, bread.   Soil is tilled, seeds are planted, weeds are removed, plants are harvested, threshed winnowed and ground.  And that’s just to get the flour!!  Then, there is the making of the bread, not to mention the marketing, sales, hauling and distribution.

Indeed, it takes many hands to make bread, something the liturgy helps us to remember when we praise God for the “fruit of the earth and work of human hands.”   In the same way it takes a village to make bread, it takes a community to make Eucharist.  We are called to join the priest in offering the sacrifice of Christ along with the sacrifice of our own lives, whose seeds are also planted, weeded, harvested, threshed, winnowed and ground.   As Vatican II stresses:

The faithful, in virtue of their royal priesthood, join in the offering of the Eucharist.  Lumen Gentium #10

This is why the Church teaches that we should eat only the bread consecrated at that particular liturgy, rather than take bread from the tabernacle, which is reserved for the sick:

The more complete form of participation in the Mass by which the faithful, after the priests’s communion, receive the Lord’s body from the same sacrifice, is strongly endorsed.  Sacrasanctum Concilium #55

It is most desirable that the faithful, just as the Priest himself is bound to do, receive the Lord’s Body from hosts consecrated at the same Mass..so that even by means of the signs Communion may stand out more clearly as a participation in the sacrifice actually being celebrated.  GIRM  #85

We are called to participate in the sacrifice, the process of dying to self, so that others might live.  Amen!

Vatican II at 50 - The Spirit of the Eucharistic Prayer

One of my best friends and her husband are now separated.  Their six-year-old daughter who longs to have the family back together recently said to her mother, “Mommy, I want you and daddy to eat together!”  What a profound statement!  This child knows the power of sharing a meal together.  She understands that eating together can bring healing, reconciliation, and unity.  So did Jesus.  That’s why he gave us the Eucharist, so that we could be healed, reconciled and united. 

Sharing a meal together can change hearts.  That’s a grace for which we pray each time we celebrate the Eucharist.  Our Eucharistic prayers call upon the Holy Spirit to not only change the bread and wine into the Body and Blood of Christ but to transform us as well.  Here is an example from Eucharistic Prayer II:

Make holy, therefore, these gifts, we pray

by sending down your Spirit upon them like the dewfall,

so that they may become for us 

Humbly we pray,

that, partaking of the Body and Blood of Christ

we may be gathered into one by the Holy Spirit.

The special term for invoking the Holy Spirit is a Greek word called epiclesis.  The epiclesis appears in most of our eucharistic prayers, save one.  Eucharistic Prayer I, also called the Roman Cannon, emphasizes Christ, the apostles and the saints, with scant mention of the Holy Spirit.  This was the only eucharistic prayer used from the 5^th Century until the Second Vatican Council.  Since Vatican II, the Church has added numerous eucharistic prayers, including eucharistic prayers for children and eucharistic prayers for reconciliation.  As we honor the Holy Trinity this weekend, let us pay close attention to the calling down of the Holy Spirit in our eucharistic prayers, for nothing the Spirit touches is ever the same.  Amen!

 

Vatican II at 50 - The Spirit's Gifts

The Second Vatican Council declared the Church to be the “people of God,” and in so doing encouraged the laity to offer their gifts in order to build up the Body of Christ.  Indeed, the past 50 years has seen a surge in lay ministry, in particular, lay liturgical ministry.  Parishioners actively minister as cantors, lectors, ministers of Holy Communion, etc.  But from the beginning, council documents have cautioned against playing more than one liturgical role:

In liturgical celebrations each one, minister or layperson, who has an office to perform, should do all of, but only, those parts which pertain to that office by the nature of the rite and the principles of liturgy.  Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy #28

Still, this isn’t always easy when there are not enough people to fulfill all the roles needed in liturgy.  Nor is it easy in our current society which encourages constant multi-tasking.  Still as we celebrate Pentecost and acknowledge the gifts the Spirit has given, it’s worth remembering that the Spirit calls the entire community to particular gifts.

Though many of us participate in a particular liturgical ministry, all of us are called to the ministry of the assembly, whose work is poetically captured here:

     Yours is a share in the work of the Spirit of all that is holy,

     for in who you are and in what you do is found the most powerful experience of the sacred.

     Yours is the kingdom community whose very assembling is sacrament of God's presence in the      world.

     In the living words, gestures, sacrifice and meal of your common prayer,

     the living God is disclosed as the faithful and redeeming Lord

     whose tent is pitched among us.

     Come to your ministry from your personal prayer.
     Come prepared to be surprised by God's word and presence.
     Come as you are!
     Come as sinners who need to find mercy, as the redeemed who need to give thanks.
     Come with all that needs to be healed, to the Lord who comes to heal you.
     Come with no expectations but the sure hope of communion with the Holy One
     in the family of God's people.

Taken from Yours is a Share by Austin Fleming.