The
divine office, or the "public prayer of the church," began when early Christians maintained the Jewish practice of praying the psalms at particular points of the day.
Chant for the
Divine Office covers a very broad range of types of manuscript books, so in addition to antiphoners, readers will find entries for such liturgical sources as Vesperales, an antiphoner-cantatorium, hymnals, books of short responsories, diurnal breviaries, a tonary, and an interesting assortment of books containing Office chants in addition to other non-Office and even non-liturgical material.
This is the first Sunday that we begin reading from the Lenten Triodion, the volume of the
Divine Office which contains the hymnody proper to the Lenten period.
(53) Przywara repeatedly renders recommendations from the Exercises in terms of the practice of the
Divine Office. For instance, according to Przywara, the still, self-recollection that Ignatius prescribes before beginning an hour of prayer corresponds to the statio of prayer in choir, that is, the moment of silence and self-examination when the monk prepares to enter into his stalk.
For example, although they share with other Benedictines the recitation of the daily
divine office, manual labor, and hospitality, this group follows the primitive observance of St.
A significant part of each day is made up of the
Divine Office, a set of prayers which take place at regular intervals.
Hiley's account of the Mass and
Divine Office is one of the clearest and most readable available, illuminated further by the line art of the previous section.
for the
divine office. This "astringent piety" (66) included adoration of an inscrutable God, before whom the human being was to annihilate herself, and to whose providence abandon herself.
Closely observing the sisters, the filmmaker witnesses the daily rhythms of
divine office behind the nunnery walls, and the strength of these women as one of the sisterhood passes away and a novice joins their ranks.
In The Last
Divine Office: Henry VIII and the Dissolution of the Monasteries Geoffrey Moorhouse details Henry VIII's ruthless dismantling of the British monasteries in the sixteenth century by describing the last days of the Benedictine Priory in Durham, England.
On top of that she went to Mass daily and said the
divine office, wrote continually (and very well), and gave lectures all over the country.
The term "
Divine Office," applied traditionally to what is also called the "Liturgy of the Hours," in the words of the Catholic Encyclopedia "signifies etymologically a duty accomplished for God." Monastic life such as that depicted in Into Great Silence shows us that such a duty could become the basis for a life of contemplative devotion and the principle of order for the arrangement of daily activity.