DECEMBER 31 MORNING PRAYER
SAINT GABRIEL HOURS
Praying with Christ. Every Day. Every Where.
DECEMBER 31 MORNING PRAYER
CHRISMAS WEEK
DECEMBER 31
PSALMS OF THE FEAST
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VIRTUAL RESOURCES
FULL ROMAN RITE SERVICES
Three Models (Options) for Praying this Morning
Praying with Christ Every Day, Every Where will be greatly helped by a variety of models and options.
Becoming skillful in understanding and adapting these models for both personal and communal prayer is a major goal of this website.
The Instruction for the Liturgy of the Hours promotes both recitation in common as well as singing the Hours.
The first model with its option below emphasizes recitation in common. the second model emphasizes the sung nature of the celebration. The third model with its easy-to- read monthly booklet is very suitable for personal meditative prayer and study, including marking the text.
Each of the three Options contains the full official text of Roman Rite for Morning Prayer.
Links to two websites are embedded here for convenience so that one does not have to go to their websites, then locate the desired posting. Embedded links do not contain YouTube advertisements.
Each of three Options has a beginning hymn. These are noted below to help you chose among options. You can begin with one option and its hymn then with a little dexterity switch to another option.
RECITATION IN COMMON MODEL
DIVINE OFFICE.ORG OPTION
Excellent model of small (household size) community reciting the office with sung hymn at the beginning. Experience the Hours as community prayer even when praying alone and as skill building in preparation for praying with others as a small group.
Invitatory Psalm 95Hymn: "Brightness of the Father's Glory"Translation by Mount Saint Bernard's Abbey of "?" *******************************************************
Invitatory Psalm 95
Hymn: "Brightness of the Father's Glory"
Translation by Mount Saint Bernard's Abbey of "?"
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COMPLETELY SUNG MODEL
SING THE HOURS OPTION
Excellent model of totally sung office mostly by one very talented young person. His father is an excellent translator of Latin Hymns. Although they use some Latin, there is always an English translation. They use simple, mainly Gregorian, chants.
If you desire to sing along, try chanting only every other verse. Listen to the cantor for the remaining verses. This corresponds to the ancient practice of alternating between cantor and choir.
Invitatory: Psalm 95Hymn: "Martine, pro apostolis," English translation by St. Cecilia's Abbey, Ryde, UK,English Gospel Canticle & Lord's Prayer*******************************************************
Excellent model of totally sung office mostly by one very talented young person. His father is an excellent translator of Latin Hymns. Although they use some Latin, there is always an English translation. They use simple, mainly Gregorian, chants.
If you desire to sing along, try chanting only every other verse.
Listen to the cantor for the remaining verses.
This corresponds to the ancient practice of alternating between cantor and choir.
Invitatory: Psalm 95
Hymn: "Martine, pro apostolis,"
English translation by St. Cecilia's Abbey, Ryde, UK,
English Gospel Canticle & Lord's Prayer
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PERSONAL MEDITATION MODEL
WORD ON FIRE OPTION
Bishop Baron's organization recently began producing a monthly booklet that contains Morning, Evening, and Night Prayer for each day. It reads straight through like a book, except for the beginning hymns for each hour which are all in the back of the booklet.
Below is a close approximation to the hymn they have chosen. Often the video has more or different verses. Sometimes the translation is different. Sometimes the tune. More rarely the choice of hymn has been changed due to the lack of available videos.
WORD ON FIRE BOOKLET: DECEMBER 2022, pages 636-672
Hark, the Herald Angels Sing (Tune: Mendelssohn - 3vv) Chet Valley Churches
79,313 views / Nov 24, 2020
79,313 views / Nov 24, 2020
HYMN SELECTED FROM MY PERSONAL FAVORITES
This fourth hymn option reflects the blog author's music collection (first vinyl discs, then cassettes, then CDs) that have been used over the years to support celebration of the Hours.
Iste Confessor Domini (Confessor Bishop, Hymn)
20K views / 11 years ago
Gregorian Notation and Chant
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THE FOUR WEEK PSALTER
The Roman Rite Liturgy of the Hours spreads the Book of Psalms over four weeks. See the top of this post for the current Psalter Week. Morning and Evening Prayer each day have two psalms.
There is an ancient tradition of personal meditation and prayer at the end of each psalm. There are many videos on the internet with psalms sung in a variety of ways, using different languages and translations, and drawing from different musical and spiritual traditions. Some presentations have beautiful slides or videos that can both enhance and interpret the psalm.
A major goal of this website is greater understanding
of the Four Week Psalter and its psalms.
VIDEOS FOR THIS HOUR'S PSALMS
The video selections are intended as a stimulus to personal prayer and meditation in the period after the group have recited the psalm in the first option, or the cantor has sung the psalm in the second option, or while a person is looking at the written psalm in the third option above.
PSALM 147
PSALM 147
Psalm videos were selected to provide as much variety as possible while maintaining substantial ritual consistency by using the same authors or similar musical pieces in the same Hour. Preference was given to videos that covered most of the psalm. No attempt has been made to judge accuracy of translations. Those celebrating have already experienced the official text.
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THE GOSPEL CANTICLE
Canticle of Zechariah
Morning and Evening Prayer at Weston Priory
1,375 views Dec 11, 2020 (1998)
Antiphon:
Cry out in the stillness of morning.
With joy greet the dawn of this new day.
Pour out your heart like water.
Lift your hands to God in praise.
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FOURTH MODEL (OPTION) FOR PRAYING
BECOMING A BLOG AUTHOR OPTION
Using the Word on Fire monthly booklets or any Breviary with authorized texts, one can enhance one's celebration of Morning Prayer with the last four videos chosen by this Blog author without using of either of the first two Virtual Breviary YouTube channels. In other words, this Blog is a Virtual Breviary on its own as long as one has a paper or virtual text.
You, too, can publish your own Virtual Breviary (or at least a Virtual Four Week Psalter) for free by opening a Blogger account, and then embedding your selection of free YouTube videos. Once you embed YouTube videos in your site, they no longer show advertisements. In other words, you can do what this Blog author has been doing for decades through a costly music collection.
Both DivineOffice.org and SingtheHours are lay, grass roots, voluntary initiatives, built upon love of the Hours and many hours of free work, then eventually supported by many viewers, and some donations.
A major goal of this website is to encourage individuals to create websites
fostering the Hours, especially Virtual Psalters and Virtual Breviaries,
for themselves, friends and communities.
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POST FORMAT AND STYLE NOTE
This Blog may appear to be complex but is actually very simple.
The only new material consists of two posts per day, one for Morning Prayer and one for Evening Prayer. The new material for each hour consists almost entirely of YouTube videos found above, i.e., two links to Virtual Breviaries, two links to opening hymn videos, two links to psalm videos, and a link to a Gospel Canticle video. Seven substantial virtual resources for celebrating the Hours. This Day. Any Where.
The material in purple is the framework and vision provided by the blog for using these resources. The material in red is the framework provided by external structures, e.g., the liturgical year, the order of the celebration, websites, hymns, etc. Texts in black regular type are factual information. Texts in italics reflect the blog's framework and vision.
The material below this Format and Style Note is the Blog's framework and vision for using the resources above this note.
The first section below consists of Basic Practices using the virtual material provided above for each day. These practices are both simple stepping-stones to using the virtual resources of this Blog as well as fundamental practices for continued Praying with Christ. Every Day. Every Where.
The second larger section below on Advanced Practice provides a framework and vision for integrating the Hours into one's life, includes links to many pages which elaborate that framework and provide additional resources. It is a user-friendly manual readily available all the time however it can be ignored most of the time
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This Blog may appear to be complex but is actually very simple.
The only new material consists of two posts per day, one for Morning Prayer and one for Evening Prayer. The new material for each hour consists almost entirely of YouTube videos found above, i.e., two links to Virtual Breviaries, two links to opening hymn videos, two links to psalm videos, and a link to a Gospel Canticle video. Seven substantial virtual resources for celebrating the Hours. This Day. Any Where.
The material in purple is the framework and vision provided by the blog for using these resources. The material in red is the framework provided by external structures, e.g., the liturgical year, the order of the celebration, websites, hymns, etc. Texts in black regular type are factual information. Texts in italics reflect the blog's framework and vision.
The material below this Format and Style Note is the Blog's framework and vision for using the resources above this note.
The first section below consists of Basic Practices using the virtual material provided above for each day. These practices are both simple stepping-stones to using the virtual resources of this Blog as well as fundamental practices for continued Praying with Christ. Every Day. Every Where.
The second larger section below on Advanced Practice provides a framework and vision for integrating the Hours into one's life, includes links to many pages which elaborate that framework and provide additional resources. It is a user-friendly manual readily available all the time however it can be ignored most of the time
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