- Background, Pius X, early 20th century
guest post by James I. McCauley
This blog has been dedicated to
bringing souls to Christ by encouraging them to read the prayer of
the Church, that is, the Liturgy of the Hours. However, the Liturgy
of the Hours has a long backstory and I would like to share some of
it with you. Please note these articles are not meant to be
scholarly, but are meant to be overviews. You are welcome to make
comments and ask questions, but I have one rule – be charitable and
therefore do not tell me that this office is better than that office,
and so on. “The important thing to do,” as my good friend Father
Allan Weber, O.F.M has always said, “is to pray.”
Our story begins in the reign of Pius X
(Pope 1903-1914). On November 22, 1903 he issued his motu proprio
Tra Le Sollecitudini on the restoration of Church music.
Within the document the great and holy pontiff stated:
“It being our ardent desire to see
the true Christian spirit restored in every aspect and preserved by
all of the faithful, we deem it necessary to provide before
everything else for the sanctity and dignity of the temple, in which
the faithful assemble for the object of acquiring this spirit from
its indispensable font, which is the active participation in the holy
mysteries and in the public and solemn prayer of the Church.”
Among the many reasons Pius X reformed
the Roman Breviary with the Apostolic Constitution Divino Afflatu
on November 1, 1911, was to bring the above into effect. This reform
of the Roman Breviary provided the general layout of the psalter
until the promulgation of the Liturgy of the Hours in 1971. The
reforms of Pius X had the positive effect of reducing the burden on
those obligated to recite the psalter by reducing the amount of
verses the priest had to say by over a thousand verse lines per week!
Would you like to read from this Apostolic Constitution? Then pull
out Volume IV of the Liturgy of Hours and go to page 1336 for a
wonderful excerpt from this Constitution, which is the Reading for
the Feast of Pius X on August 21. Simply splendid!
Now, how are we going to get the laity
to actively participate in the Prayer of the Church? That is the
topic of the next article.
