You might consider some reading for your Advent preparation.
If you haven’t yet read Benedict XVI’s third volume of Jesus of Nazareth: The Infancy Narratives, it is a great place to start!
The Holy Father’s book presents a real defense of the historicity of the infancy narratives.
US hardcover HERE. Kindle HERE. Unabridged audio HERE. Large print HERE.
UK hardcover HERE. Kindle HERE. Large print HERE.
Also, for Advent, you might try something I read two years ago. Try the reflections by a priest who died under the Nazi regime, Fr. Alfred Delp, in the book Advent of the Heart: Seasonal Sermons And Prison Writings 1941-1944. Kindle HERE. UK HERE.
Loading ...
St Alphonsus Liguori also has a wonderful book of meditations for everyday in Advent that’s worth a ponder
Tackling Fr. Faber’s Spiritual Conferences this year
These sound great, but I was already planning to read The Imitation of Christ. Old time spiritual classic. :)
Also there is the St. Andrew Christmas Novena
Say 15 times a day from St. Andrew’s Day (30 November), ending on Christmas Eve.
Hail and blessed be the hour and moment in which the Son of God was born of the most pure Virgin Mary, at midnight, in Bethlehem, in piercing cold. In that hour, vouchsafe, O my God! to hear my prayer and grant my desires, through the merits of Our Saviour Jesus Christ, and of His Most Blessed Mother. Amen.
And for those of you who pray The Liturgy of the Hours — the Church’s official daily prayer (not a private devotion) — don’t forget to change your breviary and put you ribbons in place. For those who pray the Two-Year Lectionary for the Office of Readings, it will be Year I. For the Psalter, for the 1st week in Advent, it will be Week I; yet don’t forget the Propers for the season, first the Propers up to 16.xii, the the Propers from 17.xii onward. During Advent for the Invitatory, I use Psalm 95 through 16.xii, the Psalm 100 all the way through Epiphany.
I wish we could call LOTH something else. “Divine Office” is a left-over from the days when the LOTH was considered a duty delegated to clergy; V2 teaches that the LOTH is for everyone, and V2 made the Office much more user-friendly for folks in the secular workaday world. I wish we had a term like the German Tagzeitenliturgie, “the Liturgy of the Day Times” — but I guess that will never catch on.
Dear Sid Cundiff in NC,
the Divine Office can, of course, be prayed by anyone, who then joins in with the Church praying.
The Divine Office need not be prayed by everyone. Nor “it need not, but you really should” and so on to further degrees… And yes, those who are clergy do pray it on behalf of us others. Which does not mean we cannot pray it for ourselves.
By the way, while I get what you mean by objecting to “Divine Office” – though I don’t, along the lines of “to praise God, that is our job [office]” as in the hymn -, what’s the problem with “Liturgy of the Hours”? And the word “Tagzeitenliturgie” is in quite widespread disuse, to be sure (outside of, perhaps, the German Institute for Liturgy). The thing is called Brevier traditionally, or Stundengebet or Stundenbuch
Our new pastor (no friend of tradition) has placed in our vestibule “The Little Red Book” which was published by the diocese of Dearborn.
Anyone have experience with this publication?
I am genuinely puzzled as to why “Divine Office” would mean something delegated to the clergy, who are not divine. It is an office directed to Divinity, so Divine Office makes perfect sense.
There is a many-day prayer involving St. Andrew that I like to pray, which reminds me I have to look up that prayer card as it begins tomorrow on his feast day, which is also the beginning of Advent. Oh my.
Fleeb, there is no Diocese of Dearborn, probably originated in the diocese of Saginaw MI.
Monastic Diurnal….Lauds and Vespers; and Sermons of St. Bernard of Clairvaux for Advent and Christmas found here among other places….
http://archive.org/stream/sermonsofstberna00bernuoft/sermonsofstberna00bernuoft_djvu.txt
Semperficatholic ,that is the the one I am doing ,love it’s simplicity. Oh, along with the wonderfully arranged Magnificat,specially made for bleeryeyed and muffleheaded morning people like me.
Sid Cundiff,
I wish we could call LOTH something else. “Divine Office” is a left-over from the days when the LOTH was considered a duty delegated to clergy; V2 teaches that the LOTH is for everyone, and V2 made the Office much more user-friendly for folks in the secular workaday world. I wish we had a term like the German Tagzeitenliturgie, “the Liturgy of the Day Times” — but I guess that will never catch on.
The phrase Divinum Officium is found in the Rule of Benedict, which predates the tendency of monks to become priests.
The priestly obligation continues. In the Counter Reformation Church, however, there was the tendency toward a utilitarian approach to liturgy. This was due to the influence of the Jesuits and other religious institutes that had no communal liturgy, thus no Gregorian Chant. And so the Divine Office was seen only as an obligation.
In Catholic Europe the Divine Office was very accessible. Benedictine Abbeys, Dominicans, OFM Conventuals all had public office. Although all are found in the US, nevertheless, the Jesuits dominated the Church here.
Further, the US has no tradition of Cathedral Canons, who publicly chanted the Office.
This isn’t an advent thing per se, but I’m going to start “Divine Intimacy” by Father Gabriel Magdaeline O.C.D
Thank you so much for the recommendation of Fr. Delp’s book. I read the first few chapters this morning and it is excellent.