Paschalis 3

Friend,

The world goes not well but the kingdom comes. May this message meet you in hope and peace. It’s taken me this long to adjust to the lockdown. At first, first I avoided this page. Everyone was in quarantine and nobody went anywhere. I didn’t have anything to do. There is still paperwork to receive in the mail. Either you were ‘essential’ or a liability. It seemed like my job was to not do anything.

That is until I started to hear from friends. There creeped in a sense of gloom; hopelessness. Self-seclusion wasn’t something new to me. It’s not even novel to the Catholic tradition. But my frustration grew because I couldn’t communicate my hope. I almost ran empty of hope myself. So, I started a new project. Parish masses needn’t corner the market on livestreams. My new page seeks to be a virtual monastery. I planted the start of a whole brand. It’s been a wild ride so far. If you’re here because of those efforts. Welcome, here is where we hope.

When the Spirit encounters in us the response of faith which he has aroused in us, he brings about genuine cooperation. Through it, the liturgy becomes the common work of the Holy Spirit and the Church.

CCC 798

Sorrow often seems to threaten hope. And there is plenty to make us sorrowful. Yet, the Liturgy of the Hours [citation needed] trains us to hope. This prayer of the people of God teaches us hopefulness. Here, we turn to St. Thomas Aquinas. He gives five remedies to sorrow. (Hat tip: Virtual Catholic Conference). We can see each of these remedies active in the liturgy. What follows is a proof through example.

**Side note: Tradition calls the Liturgy of the Hours by different names: Divine Office, Canticle of Divine Praises or simply the Hours or the Office. To prevent monotony, I’ll use these different names. But rest assured, they all refer to the same prayer.

Check out Msgr. Charles Pope’s commentary on the Summa Theologiae. My concern here is how the liturgy relieves pain; and thereby encourage you to pray the Divine Office as well.

First, the liturgy creates a space for joy. This is straight forward enough. Pleasure “drives out the sorrow.” The psalms are a major source of this pleasure in the Hours. The Bible Project [insert link to psalms video] has a great primer on this book of scripture. The name “psalms” refers to songs of praise.

“They have pressed me hard from my youth,”

let Israel sing.

“They have pressed me hard from my youth,

But could never overcome me.

Ps. 129: 1-2

This has been a major function of the psalms. That holds true for Jews and Christians, past and present. The liturgy prays the psalms to rejoice. So, as the People of God rejoice, they relieve their sorrow. Yet, the psalms are not only happy songs.

Just as powerful, the liturgy affirms the need for tears; as well as their usefulness to relieve pain. The psalms cover the whole of human condition. If someone experienced it, chances are there’s a psalm about it.

“They surround me all the day like a flood;

Together they close in against me.

Friend and neighbor you have taken away:

my one companion is darkness.

Ps 88:18-19

The psalmist often cries out to God. Some of these cries are out of justice; in response to a wrong the psalmist did. Others are out of confusion or desperation. When we weep, Aquinas argues, it’s as if we exhale our sorrow. This is not simply a few tears, as Matt Fradd explains. Both Aquinas and Fradd have in mind the “ugly cry.” When we pray the psalms, we affirm this need. Sorrow is part of our existence. The liturgy’s use of psalms allows us to exhale our sadness.

Let's pause to reflect. We'll cover the rest of Aquina's remedies later. For now, it's enough to focus on the human aspect. The Liturgy of Hours acts in the incarnation. The psalms sing of all the joys and pain we experience. The liturgy says "You have a right to feel how you feel." It is peculiar to Christian hope to say "God enters into that." The conviction of the resurrection is this: the God raises up our human experience. He joins our joys and pains to himself.

And that's my reason for hope.