From
the beginning two things have been the necessary form and
mystery of Christian spirituality. Two things, even before
the closing events of resurrection, ascension, and commission,
wove disparate and often renegade believers into an inspirited
body of the whole, connected to God and each other. Like
a double helix rendered elegant by complexity and splendid
by authority, the amalgam of gospel and shared meal and the
discipline of fixed-hour prayer were and have remained the
chain of golden connection tying Christian to Christ and
Christian to Christian across history, across geography,
and across idiosyncrasies of faith. The former is known as
the food and sustenance of the Church, the latter as its
work. The Divine Hours is about the second part
of this double strand, the work; it is a manual for the contemporary
exercise of fixed-hour prayer. Although
designed primarily for private use by individuals or by small
groups, The Divine Hours may certainly be employed
by larger and/or more public communities. Likewise, though
designed primarily for lay use, it can as well be employed
by the ordained in either private or corporate prayer.
Those
already familiar with fixed-hour prayer (variously referred
to as “The Liturgy of the Hours” or “keeping
the hours” or “saying the offices”) and
with its tools (the breviaries of monastic worship and the
Book of Hours manuals for laity that date from medieval times)
will find some modifications and innovations here. They may
wish to scan what follows for explication of these changes.
Others, especially those for whom keeping the hours is a
new practice, may wish to read the remainder of this introduction
more thoroughly. Copyright ©2000
Phyllis Tickle. From The Divine Hours: Prayers for Summertime by
Phyllis Tickle. Reprinted with permission of Doubleday Books.
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