So we're completing the first week of Ordinary time.
I've said it a couple of times, but it bears repeating."Ordinary" in this context does not mean routine, let alone dull or uninteresting. It means that the weeks are ordered, or numbered. With ordinal numbers, get it?
But there's nothing ordinary (in the sense of dull or unimportant) about the breathtaking poetry in the book of Sirach this week (Office of Readings). Nor this past Monday's reading from Pope St. Clement I, which was a lovely, long petitionary prayer which certainly covers every base. Nor Monday's daytime reading (midafternoon) from 1 Peter ever fail to inspire awe: realize that you were delivered not by any diminishable sum of silver or gold, but by Christ's blood beyond all price!
I've said it a couple of times, but it bears repeating."Ordinary" in this context does not mean routine, let alone dull or uninteresting. It means that the weeks are ordered, or numbered. With ordinal numbers, get it?
But there's nothing ordinary (in the sense of dull or unimportant) about the breathtaking poetry in the book of Sirach this week (Office of Readings). Nor this past Monday's reading from Pope St. Clement I, which was a lovely, long petitionary prayer which certainly covers every base. Nor Monday's daytime reading (midafternoon) from 1 Peter ever fail to inspire awe: realize that you were delivered not by any diminishable sum of silver or gold, but by Christ's blood beyond all price!
This coming Wednesday we learn how to become a hermit from St. Anthony. The heart-breakingly beautiful Psalm 42 pops up again on Monday morning. Tuesday's daytime readings remind us of the mystery and privilege of being a member of the Body of Christ.
And so it goes. The liturgy fills us with a thousand gifts, all year long. Never "ordinary".
Yet.
At the same time, I feel a good kind of ordinary (in the "ordinary" sense of the word) whenever I put away the Christmas paraphernalia, put the furniture back where it belongs, and get back down to the business. The relative quiet and the relatively slender to-do list clears my mind. And leaving behind for a while the page flipping and calendar checking of Christmastide does much to fuel the notion that ordinary time in the liturgy, is a little less cluttered, and breathes upon us a goodly simplicity. A needed break until Lent.
And so it goes. The liturgy fills us with a thousand gifts, all year long. Never "ordinary".
Yet.
At the same time, I feel a good kind of ordinary (in the "ordinary" sense of the word) whenever I put away the Christmas paraphernalia, put the furniture back where it belongs, and get back down to the business. The relative quiet and the relatively slender to-do list clears my mind. And leaving behind for a while the page flipping and calendar checking of Christmastide does much to fuel the notion that ordinary time in the liturgy, is a little less cluttered, and breathes upon us a goodly simplicity. A needed break until Lent.
Now then, it's been a while since I've done a formal "Q&A" post, partly because I've been a bad, neglectful blogger, and partly because you are free to ask any question on any post. but perhaps newer people don't know that. So please, if anything about the Liturgy of the Hours is confusing you, fire away!
