Catholic Conundrum # 5: Liturgy of the Hours/Divine Office/Morning, Evening.....and Night Prayer and all the times of the day I don't yet know about. :)

Whew. That title about wore me out!


But seriously this whole prayer of the Church thing is pretty epic but at times a little confusing. Luckily, I am extremely blessed to have had a few very nice and patient sisters in Christ help me out. Plus, I am all rather new at this whole faith sharing business so I am grateful they have put up with my awkwardness.


Unfortunately, I can't recall the first time I prayed evening or morning prayer. I actually think it was at Sojourn.......but I can't be for certain. I remember thinking....huh? And okay can I leave now?


All this talk about Zion.....whatever that is :) and playing lutes and harps and timbrels. Actually, my confusion on this was simply my lack of reading pretty much anything in the Psalms tab of my Bible growing up. What does it all mean?!! haha


On top of this there are what seems a bajillion.....okay at least three prayer books you could get for the Liturgy of the Hours: Shorter Christian Prayer, Christian Prayer and the four volume one. Oh and you can get it on your cell phone. Plus, various saint related or Marian versions. Don't forget your nook or kindle as well!


However, the more I pray this form of prayer the more beautiful it gets to me. It seems to be constructed so perfectly. When I read about something I have been thinking about.....or feeling about, it gives me hope. Besides that, think of all the billions of Catholics worldwide united in this prayer. Wow. It certainly doesn't get better than that. Which leads to me to another thought- I wonder out of all the 1.18 billion Catholics worldwide, how many of us practice this faithfully? What would happen if we all did? :)


One last funny- I recently learned the difference in Evening prayer and Night prayer. As in like this past Friday recently. I had no idea about the little Night prayer section in my book. I knew it was on my phone but thought it was pretty much the same thing. I made a couple comments to a friend about the awesomeness of something I prayed about during evening prayer......... admittedly these comments where late-r night comments. So brought forth the questions------are you doing night prayer or evening prayer? Ummmmmm.....evenight. That's one right?


So my learning continued. :) I was like do you know how hard it is for me to do evening prayer that early?! (Yes, such a rough life). I was used to doing it right before bed. How was I to break a habit I have been doing for a whole......three weeks? And because I was getting a bit of crap for my sleeping and prayer habits I made this:

Yes, I copied off that genius who made the "And With Your Spirit" one.


Now off to figure out the correct times for all the other prayers.