Daily Office

Common Prayer in History.

“The angels from the first moment of the creation sang God’s praises, Sanctus, sanctus, sanctus, Dominus Deus, Sabaoth. Plena est omnis terra gloria ejus [Isaiah 6:3]” (Edward Quigley, The Divine Office).

The People of God have always sung their common praises unto the Most High at fixed times throughout the day:

• 11-10th centuries BC — King David, under divine inspiration, wrote in the Psalms, “in the evening, and morning, and at noon-day will I pray” (Psalm 55:18); “at midnight I will rise to give thanks unto thee” (Psalm 119:62); and “seven times a day do I praise thee” (Psalm 119:164 [emphasis added]).

• 7th-6th centuries BC — Daniel the Prophet, a captive in Babylon, “went into his house; and his windows being open in his chamber toward Jerusalem, he kneeled upon his knees three times a day, and prayed, and gave thanks before God” (Daniel 6:10 [emphasis added]).

• 1st century AD — Jewish synagogues gathered for prayer and the reading of the Scriptures during the first centuries of the Christian era. The fourth century Church Father St. Epiphanius of Salamis wrote, “…in the morning and in the middle of the day and in the evening, three times a day when they say their prayers in the synagogues…” (Panarion 29:9 [emphasis added]). Our Lord Jesus “took part in the public prayers of the synagogue—when ‘as was his custom’ he entered on the Sabbath—and in the prayers of the temple which he called a house of prayer.” (GILH, 4; cf. Luke 4:16; Matthew 21:13).

• 1st-2nd centuries AD — The early Christians continued to imitate our Lord by praying in common throughout the day. “Peter and John went up together into the temple at the hour of prayer, being the ninth hour” (Acts 3:1 [emphasis added]); “Peter went up upon the housetop to pray about the sixth hour” (Acts 10:9); “at midnight Paul and Silas prayed, and sang praises unto God” (Acts 16:25); and St. Paul urged his converts to sing praises to God in psalms and hymns (cf. GILH, 5; Ephesians 5:19; Colossians 3:16; and 1 Corinthians 14:26). “Wherever a Christian community was established, prayer, and in fact common prayer, became one of its chief activities” (Pius Parsch, The Breviary Explained, p. 5).

Common Prayer in the Christian Context.

In the Daily Office the Christian Church now gathers together in the singing of Psalms and the reading of the Scriptures so as to sanctify the day (cf. Mediator Dei, 147; GILH, 10-11), praise God without ceasing, intercede for the salvation of the world, and celebrate the mystery of salvation in Christ Jesus who has assumed all of sacred history into his person (cf. CIC, 1173). This daily prayer of the Church serves as a memorial recapitulation of our Lord’s life, death, and resurrection that teaches and sanctifies us day by day through the imitation of Christ in our lives (cf. Mediator Dei, 101-2; Sacrosanctum Concilium, 102). For the “victory won by Christ must be repeated in each one of us, until the end of time. […] This is why we meditate on the pattern of his life, proclaim it, preach it, celebrate it: to make it ever more deeply our own. This is why the Apostolic Church left us a book and a rite, word and sacrament, so that what Christ did and was, we may do and be, in him. For this reason, sacred history is never finished: it continues in us” (Robert Taft, The Liturgy of the Hours in East and West, p. 338).

The Church—the mystical body of Christ, the spouse of Christ, the vine whose root is Christ—continues the work of Christ: sacrificing, suffering, praying, and preaching (cf. Pius Parsch, The Breviary Explained, p. 4); so as to “complete what is lacking in Christ’s afflictions for the sake of his body” (Colossians 1:24). The Gospels give us accounts from the life of our Lord Jesus Christ upon earth which show that to him praying is like breathing, of utmost importance, for example:

•  Being baptized in the Jordan, “and praying, the heaven was opened and the Holy Ghost descended in a bodily shape like a dove upon him, and a voice came from heaven, which said, Thou art my beloved Son; in thee I am well pleased” (Luke 3:22). “His prayer must have been profound, even ecstatic, so that at his baptism it was accompanied by a manifestation of the Holy Trinity” (Pius Parsch, The Breviary Explained, pp. 4-5).

• Even when he was busy with his work for souls “he withdrew to the wilderness and prayed” (Luke 5:16) and “in the morning, rising up a great while before day, he went out, and departed into a solitary place, and there prayed” (Mark 1:35).

• Especially before important occasions, such as choosing his Apostles, at the Last Supper, and his Passion, he passed whole nights in prayer (cf. Luke 6:12; John 17:1-26; Matthew 26:36-45; Mark 14:32-41; and Luke 22:39-46).

Prayer can therefore also be compared to the breath of the mystical body of Christ, who continues to do what he did (cf. GILH, 6-7) and “prays without ceasing” (1 Thessalonians 5:17) because her Lord exhorted her, saying, “men ought always to pray, and not to faint” (Luke 18:1; cf. GILH, 5). “Breath is an unmistakable sign of life. Consequently, where there is prayer, there the life of the Church is manifest, whether it is the prayer of the parish, the family, or individual souls, all of which are cells of the one Church. Here we may insert a practical, pastoral idea that for many is surprisingly new: every community realizing that it is a part of the Church has the task and duty of praying and, moreover, of praying in common” (Pius Parsch, The Breviary Explained, p. 5; cf. GILH, 1 & 9).

Common Prayer as a Duty of the Faithful.

This duty of praying in common was considered an obligation of all the faithful for much of the Church’s history, “There is just as much (indeed, more) extant historical evidence for the obligation of daily morning and evening prayer, in common and incumbent on all, laity as well as clergy and religious, as there is for the obligation of Sunday Mass. That does not change until the Middle Ages, and even then it changes only in the West” (Robert Taft, The Liturgy of the Hours in East and West, pp. 305-306).

Today “the duty of common prayer, which belongs to the whole Church with its members, has actually fallen on priests and religious, for whom it is of serious obligation. Through them the mystical body breathes and thereby lives” (Pius Parsch, The Breviary Explained, p. 6). They say the Office “as public officers of the Church, who officially stand before the Throne of God and make intercession for the whole body of Christ’s Church. When performing this duty, even when alone, they cease to be private individuals; they are invested with the public character of ambassadors to the heavenly Court” (The Little Office of the Blessed Virgin Mary Fully Explained and Annotated).

“[H]owever, […] all Christians have the duty, or rather the right, to pray together, as a community. In this matter the priest has not the slightest advantage over the layman” (Pius Parsch, The Breviary Explained, p. 6). Thus the Church exhorts us, “members of the Christian faithful, according to circumstances, are also earnestly invited to participate in the [Office] as an action of the Church” (CIC, 1174 §2).

Common Prayer as an Action of the Church.

“[W]hen this wonderful song of praise is rightly performed by priests and others who are deputed for this purpose by the Church’s ordinance, or by the faithful praying together with the priest in the approved form, then it is truly the voice of the bride addressed to her bridegroom; It is the very prayer which Christ Himself, together with His body, addresses to the Father” (Sacrosanctum concilium, 84).

The Daily Office is a liturgical prayer, a corporate act—meaning that it is an action of the whole body—of the Church. Whenever we partake in the Daily Office it is the Church who is praying through our lips and as we pray she “through our tears, weeps with those who are sad, and through our joy she rejoices with the joyous and repents with the penitent. Every feeling of our Mother the Church finds its echo in our own expanded hearts” (Pius Parsch, The Breviary Explained, p. 7-8; cf. GILH, 22 & 108; Sacrosanctum concilium, 84-5). Therefore, those who “take part in this public Office do not stand before God in their own name, nor yet in the name of the faithful assembled, but in the name of Holy Church” (The Little Office of the Blessed Virgin Mary Fully Explained and Annotated; cf. Sacrosanctum concilium, 85).

Cranmer’s Reforms. 

Thomas Cranmer, the first Protestant Archbishop of Canterbury, promulgated the Book of Common Prayer (BCP) in 1549. This Prayer Book, the BCP, was designed to serve as the uniform liturgy for the Church of England and included all of its services. However, many parts of the liturgy were either simplified or removed from Cranmer’s Prayer Book. The various services found in the Breviary, spread throughout the day, were replaced by two services: Mattins (Morning Prayer) and Evensong (Evening Prayer).

While the diagram above illustrates how Cranmer simplified the Daily Office, it should be noted that alongside the normal services found in the medieval Breviary there existed various votive services that were often repeated daily by laity and clergy alike. These votive services, especially the services of the Virgin, could be found in medieval Primers (prayer books) and likely helped to inform some of Cranmer’s decisions. For example, the Te Deum and the Benedicite were only sung on Sundays in the normal services, but in the services of the Virgin the Te Deum was said daily except for in Advent, Pre-Lent, and Lent while the Benedicite was recited daily at Lauds even within Lent.

In 1552 Cranmer reformed the liturgy once again, though his alterations to the Daily Office were relatively minor: prefacing the services with a penitential rite, moving the Apostles’ Creed to be before the Kyrie, and moving the final versicle in the Suffrages (called ‘Preces’ in the diagram above) to preface the Kyrie. His decision to place the penitential rite before the service was likely influenced by the reformed Catholic breviary of Cardinal Quiñones which included the Confiteor before the service.

The Lectionary.

It should be noted that the lectionary found in Divine Worship: Daily Office (DW:DO), the Daily Office used by Catholics of the Anglican Patrimony, differs Cranmer’s BCP Daily Office lectionary. Cranmer’s lectionary, unlike medieval lectionaries, followed the civil year calendar (January, February, and so on) rather than the church year calendar (Advent, Christmastide, and so on). This is because Cranmer saw his Daily Office as a vehicle for reading through sacred Scripture and therefore he did not wish for the readings to be interrupted by the seasons and holy days of the church year. Whereas the lectionary in DW:DO, the 1961 revision of the 1922 Daily Office Lectionary, is an Anglo-Catholic lectionary that follows the traditional church year and includes specially selected readings for holy days.

What is an Anglo-Catholic?

Anglo-Catholics are Anglicans who seek to restore continuity with the medieval church by restoring practices (and even doctrines) that had been stripped from the Church of England during the Protestant reformation. Traditional hymnody and the use of antiphons were often restored to the Daily Office in Anglo-Catholic ‘enrichments’ for the BCP and examples of these can be found in DW:DO. It should be noted that this description of Anglo-Catholicism does not capture all of the complexities of the movement and its history. For example, many if not most of the early Anglo-Catholics in the 19th century would have been uncomfortable with practices and doctrines such as the invocation of Saints and the Eucharistic sacrifice of the Mass; whereas today the majority of Anglo-Catholics invoke the Saints in prayer and believe that the Mass is not only a sacrifice of praise, but also a re-presentation of Calvary (ex. The Shape of the Liturgy by Gregory Dix).

Lesser Hours.

While Cranmer’s Daily Office only had two services, Mattins and Evensong, DW:DO also includes the lesser hours throughout the day and Compline at night. These services are drawn from various sources and vary between the North American Edition (NAE) and Commonwealth Edition (CE). For example, the CE’s Prime and Compline are almost entirely derived from the 1928 Proposed BCP of the Church of England, whereas the layout of the NAE’s Compline is mostly derived from the 1979 BCP of the Episcopal Church with the option to choose between variable psalms assigned to the days of the week (derived from the Vatican II Liturgy of the Hours) or the invariable psalms used in medieval Latin breviaries (4, 31:1-6, 91, and 134).

Here are some video tutorials to get acquainted with DW:DO:

North American Edition.

• Daily Office Orientation: How to say Morning and Evening Prayer

Commonwealth Edition.

• Introductory Videos

• How to Pray

There are also some sites that display the texts of today’s Daily Office for you:

North American Edition.

• Covert

Commonwealth Edition.

• Daily Office Online (OLW) - RECOMMENDED. HAS SETTINGS FOR ALL ORDINARIATES.

• Daily Office Online (OLSC)

• Aldred

• Sing the Office