Thursday, May 11, 2017

Morning Prayer Mash up

When I arrived in the sacristy this morning, before Mass, as I always do, I turned on the church lights, vested and sat down to pray my breviary -- i.e., the book for the Liturgy of the Hours. Almost always, I pray Lauds, or Morning Prayer first; then, if time allows, Office of Readings and Mid-morning Prayer.

Now, when we pray the office during Easter, there is some extra flipping around in the book; that's just how the breviary is laid out. That bears on what follows.

So, I started Morning Prayer, with Psalm 95, then the hymn, then the usual hymns. Then I flipped back to the second half...and I guess I got distracted, because...

A few minutes later, I was praying the first and second reading for Office of Readings. Then I looked at the time, and thought, wow, this went fast! I flipped to begin Mid-morning prayer...

Only to realize I'd skipped the psalms for Office of Readings! Oh well, I've done that before; so I then prayed the psalms. So then I figured, OK, I'm finished with Office of Readings; I'll pray the psalms for Mid-morning Prayer. When I finished those, I flipped back to pray the reading and final prayer of Mid-morning Prayer...

And then realized I'd never prayed the second half of Morning Prayer! So, then, I thought: now what?

So I finished Morning Prayer. Then, I finished Mid-morning Prayer.

To review, this is what I did:

1. First half of Morning Prayer
2. Second half of Office of Readings
3. First half of Office of Readings
4. First half of Mid-morning Prayer
5. Second half of Morning Prayer
6. Second half of Mid-morning Prayer

Some days I'm really foggy. It was that way till around noon.

5 comments:

Unknown said...

Dear Fr., Take it from one of your older sisters, it will only get worse before it gets better. At least you got it all in. I don't think you have anything to worry about or to confess as God understands our humanity. Just keep praying & it will all work out in the end. Oh by the way welcome to your mid 50's, love, Eileen

Darren said...

And this is why I use the Divine Office app from SurgeWorks :)

rcg said...

All of that is possible. But I would look at a) did you get enough sleep, b) are you feeling under the weather or perhaps dogged by Spring allergies, c) distracted by other personal issues you are dealing with at a subconscious level that saps your total mental resources.

You are not old by any measure and the mental faculties of a person can continue to increase for many more years. I would look at something physical first, then something emotional.

Just a guess.

Fr Martin Fox said...

A) yes
B) no, no
C) could be, but everything is pretty calm.

rcg said...

That's good to know. My sleep cycle about 5 hours per night until Thursday then I sleep a hard eight. During that long cycle I can get fuzzy. Maybe you are just due for some extra rest. In any case, if it continues and especially if you notice extra fatugue, get thee to a surgeon.