The
Liturgical Year
The calendar of the Roman Church included a great number of
feasts that fell into two main categories: the Feasts of the
Lord and the Feasts of the Saints.
The year of the Church starts with the First Sunday of
Advent: that is, with the first of the four Sundays preceding
Christmas which constitute a period in preparation for the
arrival of Christ. Beginning with this day the year can be
divided into four periods: the first centering around the
Nativity, the second leading up to Easter, the third leading
up to Pentecost, and the fourth comprising the rest of the
year.
The Christmas period continues with the Second, Third, and
Fourth Sunday of Advent, the last being preceded by the Ember
Week of Advent. In this week three days--Wednesday, Friday,
and Saturday——are set apart for fasting and prayer.
Altogether there are four such Ember Weeks, one in each of the
four seasons of the calendar year.
After the Fourth Sunday of Advent comes the Nativity of Our
Lord (Christmas) on December 25, which is followed, a week
later, by the Circumcision of Our Lord on January 1 and, on
January 6, by the Epiphany, which commemorates the adoration
of the Magi (Three Holy Kings). The Sundays after Christmas
are: Sunday within the Octave of Christmas, Sunday between
Circumcision and Epiphany, Sunday within the Octave of the
Epiphany, and Second (Third, etc.) Sunday after the Epiphany.
In the seventeenth century two feasts were introduced: that
in honor of the Most Holy Name of Jesus, and the feast of the
Holy Family. The first of these falls on the Sunday between
the Circumcision and the Epiphany or, if no Sunday occurs
between these two feasts, on January 2. The second falls on
the Sunday within the Octave of the Epiphany. The traditional
formulary for this Sunday is transferred to one of the
following week days.
The second period starts with Septuagesima Sunday, that is,
the ninth Sunday before Easter. Since Easter is a variable
feast whose date depends upon the moon (Easter is the first
Sunday after the full moon that falls on or next after the
twenty-first of March) the beginning of this period varies
accordingly—— from as early as January 18 to as late as
February 21. As a consequence., the number of Sundays after
Epiphany varies from a minimum of one to a maximum of six.
Septuagesima Sunday is followed by Sexagesima, Quinquagesima,
and Quadra— gesima Sunday. The Wednesday before Quadragesima
Sunday is Ash Wednesday, the beginning of Lent, the long
period of fasting before Easter. Quadragesima Sunday is
therefore also called the First Sunday of Lent, and is
followed by the Second, Third, and Fourth Sunday of Lent. The
liturgical importance of the Lenten period is indicated by the
fact that not only tine Sundays but each week day has its
individual liturgy and chants.
After the Fourth Sunday of Lent the next two Sundays are
Passion Sunday and Palm Sunday, the second of which opens the
Holy Week leading to Easter. This is indeed the most solemn
week of the entire liturgical year; each day is filled with a
ritual of steadily increasing importance, elaboration, and impressiveness,
especially Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, and Holy Saturday.
The liturgy for these three days alone fills almost 150 pages
in the Liber usualis. The crowning point is Easter
Sunday, celebrating the Resurrection of Our Lord. Its miraculous
event continues to be commemorated in daily celebrations
during the ensuing week, called Easter Week (Easter Monday,
Easter Tuesday, etc.).
The Saturday of this week marks the beginning of the third
period called Paschal Time. The next day is Low Sunday, also
called Quasimodo Sunday after the Introit Quasimodo
which opens its Mass. This, being the first Sunday after
Easter, is followed by a Second, Third, Fourth, and Fifth
Sunday after Easter. The next Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday
are the Litanies or Rogation Days, days of special
supplication, which are followed, on Thursday, by the
Ascension of Our Lord. The next Sunday is called Sunday within
the Octave of the Ascension and precedes Whit Sunday (Whitsun
Day) or the Feast of Pentecost, which commemorates the
descent of the Holy Spirit on the Apostles. Similar to (and
in imitation of) Easter Week, each day of the following week
is celebrated in commemoration of Pentecost. The fact that
this also is an Ember Week explains the varying designations
for the single days: Whit Monday, Whit Tuesday, Ember
Wednesday, Thursday in Whitsun Week, Ember Friday, and Ember
Saturday. This is the end of Paschal Time.
The next day is Trinity Sunday, which marks the beginning
of the final period of the year. The last major feast of the
Temporale, Corpus Christi, falls on the Thursday thereafter,
and is followed, on Friday of the next week, by the Feast of
the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus. The Sundays of this season are
simply numbered as Sundays after Pentecost, Trinity Sunday
being the first in the series. Since the date of Pentecost
varies with that of Easter——it occurs exactly seven weeks
after Easter, as is indicated by its name which is the Greek
word for “the fiftieth” (day)--the number of these Sundays
varies from a minimum of twenty—three to a maximum of
twenty—eight, a fluctuation corresponding to that of the
Sundays after Epiphany: the fewer Sundays after Epiphany, the
more there are after Pentecost, and vice versa. In fact, the
services for the additional Sundays after Pentecost are taken
from those provided for the last Sundays after Epiphany. The
regular succession of Sundays in the final period is
interrupted only by the Ember Week of September.
The numerous feasts for the Saints of the Roman Church are
grouped under two categories, Common of Saints and Proper of
Saints. The latter includes the feasts in honor of a specific
Saint or, occasionally, two specific Saints, e.g. St. Andrew,
St. Lawrence, SS. Peter and Paul, etc. In the early medieval
books the feasts of the Lord as well as those of the Saints
(then much fewer in number than now) were arranged together
according to their succession during the year, and it was not
until the thirteenth century that the groups were completely
separated. When this was done, some of the feasts of Saints
were left in their original place, mainly those that occurred
right after the Nativity, probably because their association
with the Nativity was too close to be destroyed. To the present
day the Proper of the Time includes five feasts of Saints: St.
Stephen on December 26, St. John the Apostle on December 27,
Holy Innocents on December 28, St. Thomas on December 29,
and St. Silvester on December 31.
The Common of Saints gives the chants, prayers, etc. that
are used for various Saints, these being grouped under categories
such as Martyrs, Doctors, Virgins, Virgin Martyrs, etc. For
instance, St. Jerome is a Doctor of the Church, and therefore
the service for his feast is found in the Common of Doctors.
Eight times during the day a service for the offering of
prayer and worship is held. This is called the Divine Office,
Canonic Hours (from canon law) or Office Hours. These are:
1 - Matins (matutinum) before sunrise
2 - Lauds (laudes) at sunrise
3 - Prime (ad primam horam)
4 - Terce (ad tertiam horam)
5 - Sext (ad sextam horam)
6 - None (ad nonam horam)
7 - Vespers (ad vesperam) at sunset
8 - Compline (completorium) before retiring
Prime, Terce, Sext, and None take their names from the old
Roman calendar, in which the hours of the day were numbered
from six in the morning (prima hora) to six in the afternoon,
so that mid—day was sexta hora. Naturally, the time when
these Offices are held varies somewhat with the seasons of the
year.
The hours from Prime to None are called Little or Lesser
Hours, because of the greater simplicity of their services.
Also the term Day Hours is used, properly, to denote all the
Hours other than Matins, that is, from Lauds to Compline.
The Office Hours were not instituted together at a given
date, but developed gradually during the first six centuries
of the Christian era. The earliest was the Night Office, called
Vigils (wakening), which had its origin in the custom of
keeping watch the night before Easter, in expectation of the
reappearance of Christ. Later this custom was observed weekly
before each Sunday though no longer as a continuous gathering
during the entire night. In the fourth century we find it
divided into three separate Prayer Hours: one at sunset, when
the lamps were lighted, and therefore called lucernarium; one
after midnight; and one at sunrise, called laudes matutinae
(morning praise). Eventually these received the names Vespers,
Matins, and Lauds. Terce, Sext, and None originally had the
character of private Prayer Hours, held in the family or in
small groups. The Rule of St. Benedict, dating from around
530, is the earliest document containing the complete course
of all the eight Office Hours.
In addition to the Office Hours, the daily ritual includes
the Mass, which is of an entirely different character. The
Office Hours are mainly occasions for prayer, similar to and,
no doubt, partly derived from the prayer hours of the Jews.
The Mass, on the other hand, is a service of distinctly
Christian character, although it also incorporates elements of
an ancient Jewish ritual. It is essentially the commemoration
of the Sacrifice of Christ on the Cross, taking on the form of
a mystic repetition of the Last Supper. Like the Last Supper,
the Mass took place originally in the evening, was later
shifted to the morning hours, and is now generally celebrated
in the forenoon, between Terce and Sext. Originally called
Eucharistia (Eucharist being the Greek word for “good
grace”), it was later called Missa, a term derived from the
words of the closing benediction, “ite, missa est”
(Depart, this is the dismissal), and used as early as 400 (St.
Ambrose).
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