Thinking about buying Christian Prayer...

[Antonius Block]

I've been wanting to start praying parts of the Liturgy of the Hours (I primarily go to mass in the OF, so that makes more sense for me than the old Roman Breviary), and so I've been thinking of picking up a copy of Christian Prayer. Does it have all of the Hours, readings, etc, in it? What are its limitations?

I've been reading a bit about the Liturgy lately, and I can't figure out the 2-year cycle for readings, and whether that fits into the Liturgy of the Hours. Any advice on this?

I'm afraid I don't know enough to ask more specific questions: I just need help!

Maybe you would like the Little Office?

I don't know much--anything--about the Little Office. I just looked up the postconciliar version on liturgies.net, and it looks like it has fixed psalms, antiphons, and hymns for each day of the week, and doesn't vary throughout the year. Is this correct? I suspect I'd get worn out with the lack of variety. I already get bored praying the same Night Prayer every night for a month from Magnificat magazine. Perhaps I'm missing something?

[SearchingCatholic]

I can't stop you, knock yourself out.  Enjoy the psalms that have been removed for being "unchristian."  Enjoy the four weeks to say almost all the psalms.

I can't stand the new breviary, having prayed it for two years.  The intentions that you pray are also terribly translated.  One prayer in English asks God to provide adequate housing for the homeless.  The Latin asks God to provide the homeless a heavenly home.  Huge difference.

I have the 4 volume set for the OF since that is all I knew until recently.  That is a very different translation.  How else does the pre-concilliar  version differ from the new version?

Also, is it possible to find the pre-concilliar version in a Latin-English translation since my Latin is minimal at best?

[markadm]

I have the 4 volume set for the OF since that is all I knew until recently.  That is a very different translation.  How else does the pre-concilliar  version differ from the new version?

Also, is it possible to find the pre-concilliar version in a Latin-English translation since my Latin is minimal at best?

There are structural differences in the Offices. Mostly the number of Psalms have been reduced for each Hour, but also the order of things has been changed internally.

There are some Latin-English versions, but they are very hard to get a hold of.

[Rosarium]

I don't know much--anything--about the Little Office. I just looked up the postconciliar version on liturgies.net, and it looks like it has fixed psalms, antiphons, and hymns for each day of the week, and doesn't vary throughout the year. Is this correct? I suspect I'd get worn out with the lack of variety. I already get bored praying the same Night Prayer every night for a month from Magnificat magazine. Perhaps I'm missing something?

It is on a weekly cycle, but most of the hours are the same each day.

Anyway, it is little (obviously) and cheap to buy, so maybe it would interest you.

[mike6240]

Due to my busy schedule I use "A Short Breviary for Religious and the Laity" published in 1951 (my version) by the monks of St. John's Abbey, Collegeville.  It's a scaled down English version (thee's and thou's) of the old Roman Breviary (all in english, no latin).  It's awesome.  It has all eight hours (Matins, Lauds, Prime, Terce, Sext, None, Vespers & Compline) for both the liturgical and the sanctoral cycle (scaled down).  They have one on ebay now.  I heartily recommend it.  It's simple to use and gives you a much better link to the real Divine Office than the post-Vat. II LOTH.  For those who's time is limited but want to pray the Divine Office this is definitely the book, in my opinion.  It's easy,  simple to use and will lead you eventually to the complete Roman Breviary.

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=400092501159&rvr_id=&crlp=1_263602_263622&UA=M*S%3F&GUID=50db09ba1250a0b58af69636fff113ce&itemid=400092501159&ff4=263602_263622#ht_3641wt_928

Not sure if the above link will work but go on ebay and search under - A Short Breviary.

Edit to note:  This book is as rare as hen's teeth to find and I would recommend anyone who has interest in an english version of the Roman Breviary to pick one up.  These hardly ever come up on auction or for purchase.  It's just by chance this one is being offered on Ebay today.

[Windmill]

I just bought the Monastic Diurnal after much research on the various forms of the Divine Office.  You can get it here for a good price:

http://www.acbooks.net/Merchant2/merchant.mvc?Screen=PROD&Store_Code=ACB&Product_Code=CATHAT5xy1

And you can read a review about it here:

http://absnospin.blogspot.com/2008/01/monastic-diurnal-review.html

[Credo]

Concerning the two-year cycle of lessons in the Office of Readings which is located in the back of Chirstian Prayer, it’s simple enough to figure out. Like the weekday Gospel readings at Mass, if the majority of a liturgical year is an odd number year, then it is considered to be Year I. Therefore 2010 is considered Year II. As for the second lesson in the Office of Readings, the Patristic sermon (more or less, there is some variation), I believe this can only be found in the French-Latin 6-volume set of books which go by the title Lectionnaire Monastique. In addition, I have heard rumors that the Spanish edition of the LOTH has the 2-year cycle of Biblical and Patristic readings within the covers of the regular LOTH. There were some English volumes by the name of Christian Readings which seem to have featured the 2-year cycle. However, these are long out of print and seem only to have been intended to accompany the American Interim Breviary of 1970.

There is a rather detailed explanation as to why only ½ of the lessons in the Office of Readings were ever made available to most of the Christian peoples in Stanislaus Campbell’s From Breviary to Liturgy of the Hours. One can understand everything one will ever need to know about the liturgical reforms of the 1960s from reading that one vignette by Campbell.

Do you know where to find the Latin version?

The Vatican bookstore sells the Latin edition.

It is better than the English on a structural level. In particular, the US English edition of the LOTH is missing 2/3 of the Sunday Lauds/Vespers antiphons which the Latin has had since 1985. These correspond to the Gospel readings in "Years A, B, and C" in the Novus Ordo Missae. However, owning the original Latin LOTH myself, and having read reviews of the revised Latin editions which were produced in 1985 and 2002, I can say that the book published by the Vatican are simply plain looking. They're just ink and paper. No effort was made to beautify the volumes. There are no illustrations in the books; neither is there any gold leafing on the pages. The books’ publishers didn’t even round the page edges, so dog-earing is a problem. It is clear that the Vatican books are being produced as proof copies whereupon – it seems to me – that national publishers are supposed to take the Vatican editions and publish their copies (which never ends up happening -- vernacular translations being preferred for popularity and "sellability").

A shortened Latin-English edition would be ideal (a la Christian Prayer)

Lauds and Vespers: Latin-English Enlarged Edition (Latin and English Edition) (Hardcover) - http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0970402295/ref=pd_lpo_k2_dp_sr_1?pf_rd_p=486539851&pf_rd_s=lpo-top-stripe-1&pf_rd_t=201&pf_rd_i=1889334324&pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_r=0CAJCW3XHET7ZZMEYVM8

The above is an English-Latin edition of Lauds and Vespers for the year. The translation is solid. It is better than the ICEL edition. Like the Vatican edition, however, it has no aesthetic value. There are no illustrations, no gold leafing. At least in my copy, too, the binding was poorly done, allowing pages to fall out.

If you want a solid English translation of the LOTH, with all the revisions since the ‘70s (which the Catholic Book Publishing Co. hasn’t updated in the United States), then the African edition of the Office may be right down your alley:

African Liturgy of the Hours - http://www.paulinesafrica.org/catalogue2/new_in_liturgy_of_hours.html

[Credo]

I just looked up the postconciliar version on liturgies.net, and it looks like it has fixed psalms, antiphons, and hymns for each day of the week, and doesn't vary throughout the year. Is this correct?

No. There is a great deal of variability throughout. If memory serves, the Psalm structure for Lauds and Vespers ("Morning" and "Evening Prayer") runs on a four-week cycles, as does one of the three "Little Hours" (the Psalms for the other two "Little Hours" are repeated everyday), the Office of readings is on a two-week Psalm cycle, and Compline ("Night Prayer") is on a one week cycle. There are also great changes in everything from hymns to antiphons to readings as the seasons of the Church roll by.

I already get bored praying the same Night Prayer every night for a month from Magnificat magazine.

I cannot comment on the Magnificat, except to say that it is only modeled on the actual Divine Office. Their selection of Compline may be from Sunday evening. This particular Hour in the actual Office has a special pastoral indult attached to it by which an individual can say only Sunday evening Compline, and whereby he does not need to say the proper Compline Psalms and prayers from the entire week. The reason for the indult is to allow a person to sing Compline from memory should they so desire.

[Windmill]

If you are wanting to stay with the OF of the Office, then I'd do what I did: get Lauds and Vespers listed by Credo, and then stalk eBay to find a copy of Ad Completorium by Paxbook.  It's Night Prayer in Latin only, but it's the same thing each week, so you don't have to be a Latin scholar to get it.  This way, you get the major hours of the day without having to deal with any "ICEL-izations". 

As an aside, I've discovered that the translations on the Divine Office are next on the To Do List of the NCCB.  They will take the Lauds and Vespers listed above as the starting point (so says the editor, Fr. Stravinskas).  This alone would stop me from shelling out the dough for a full set of the ICEL LotH.  This is actually one reason I strongly considered a pre-concilliar Office.  I want stability because I want to use this sucker until it falls apart.   

[Credo]

I've discovered that the translations on the Divine Office are next on the To Do List of the NCCB.

This is correct. Having spoken to a bishop from Connecticut about this very subject, there will be a new translation of the LOTH within the next decade or so. While the original ICEL translations of the Mass and Office leave quite a bit to be desired, I will be sad to see my present English LOTH go by the wayside, if only for familiarity reasons.