After
Friday Vespers:
Dirigatur, Domine, oratio mea; sicut
incensum in conspectu tuo. This short verse and response that occur before the
Magnificat in ferial vespers have a lot to teach us.
I come to the Divine Office with “my prayer” –
perhaps with my heart full of joy at the mercy of God I have experienced and
the blessings I have been given. Perhaps, more often, I arrive with a heart
that is tired because of so many things – concerns and worries, the burdens of
each day and even of the days ahead. I may even come with a heart that is
wounded, or scarred by sin.
In praying the Divine Office all and any of these
realities can be transformed into prayer. I can ask the Lord to take the
prayers of my heart and make them like incense in his sight: a sweet-smelling
offering that rises heavenward.
This is what the solemn celebration of Lauds and
Vespers so beautifully celebrates in its use of incense.
But it celebrates something more. The incense is
used ritually. It is used hierarchically. It is used ecclesially.
And so too, our prayers which we ‘send up to
heaven’ with the incense are no longer ours. They become the Church’s prayer.
The Church gives them wings, as it were.
Let us not underestimate this. The Divine Office
forms a large part of the Church’s Sacred Liturgy – even if we must pray it by
ourselves. In taking my place in celebrating it I, and my prayers, are no
longer simply my own. They become part of the Church’s prayer. And I place
myself at the service of the Church by giving voice to her prayers also.
This commercium, this exchange, is integral
to praying the Sacred Liturgy and is particularly poignant in the Divine
Office. From it we each have much to gain.
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