How It All Started (LOTH & DO)

I use a wide variety of books to supplement my daily rhythm of prayer I've established for myself over these course of few years. As a child right up to my teens, any born Catholic would have to learn to say the basics "Our Father", "Hail Mary", "Glory Be". Then came recitation of the Rosary.

There were the colourful prayer booklets on prayers to Our Lady, Our Lord Jesus and to the Saints. Such was the seeds that were sown with text books I used during my primary-secondary years at Catechism class. (or more fondly known as Sunday School).

It was sometime during my college days when I went online, joined Catholic forums and stuff - I read alot about what people were doing "the Hours", "Divine Office", "LOTH", "DO", "Breviary". Imagine discovering, learning and nurturing a fascination for a form of devotion online! Pictures upon pictures of people doing the LOTH and DO everywhere. Well, a clear and successful testament to calls from our former Pope John Paul II pushing for evangelisation on the Internet and bringing the message of Christ further on the WWW.

One thing led to another and the next minute - I got myself a used copy of Christian Prayer (CP) abbreviated version of the Liturgy of the Hours; LOTH by Catholic Book Publishing (CBP) from a second-hand bookstore. Very nice black and red print throughout and had nice illustrations bringing to life the prayers inside and capturing the mood for silent contemplation during the recitation.

Then, my eyes caught site of another abbreviated edition of the LOTH by Daughters of St Paul (DoSP). This edition is by far what many traditionalists would call it the modern Diurnal without Matins (except that there is really no Office of Readings which is supposed to be a fusion of Matins & Vigils) This alternate edition of LOTH is more complete than CBP edition having no dual colour scheme employed by CBP. DoSP is more thorough in covering hours with Midmorning, Midday & Midafternoon; otherwise known as Little Hours with Terce, Sext & None as its tridentine names.

Humans being humans - there were forums and reviews comparing and pitting LOTH against another variant of the Hours known as the Divine Office (DO) This alternate translation is mainly for nations under the Commonwealth, UK, Ireland, and a few pacific islands formerly under British rule. Through the episcopal conferences of UK, British Isles, India, South East Asia; the nations half of the otherside of this planet subscribe to the British translation.

By far, I think only some countries like the Philipines and India were given special approval for both DO & LOTH to be publically recited.

Anyhow, that's when I decided to contact my local Catholic bookstore (managed by Daughter's of St Paul) and got hold of a copy of an abbreviated edition of the DO otherwise known as "Everyday Prayer" (EP) from one of the nuns when they had a book sale outside my neighbourhood's chapel.

*by now you would have noticed I seem to be collecting only abbreviated breviaries, not "complete editions". Well, due to financial constraints, I can only afford these ;o(

Anyway, when I started reading & reciting the DO, I generally liked it better (my apologies to those of you who love the LOTH) the wordings were much nicer and richer and there were many reviews saying the same thing about the British edition. Well, all the more for me to use it now! I have eversince referred to it as my main source of devotion till recently.

The EP is like the DoSP edition of CP; all is black and white. But the difference between the EP and the DoSP edition of the LOTH is that the DoSP edition has beautiful illustrations, and though there isn't any dual colour scheme like the CBP edition, fonts used are varied in the form of bolded or italicised fonts of different kinds - still making it more approachable in terms of format and outlook of the typeface.

The EP unfortunately has none of those - only simple black & white text. However, what makes me love EP so much is that the antiphons are repeated after every psalm appointed, and of course the translation or the wordings are from British sources and scripture excerpts come from the Jerusalem Bible (that's one of my favourite Catholic Bibles). Great translation for those who have not had a good grasp of Latin and it minimises page flipping.

Here, American translations for the collects tend to be noticibly bland be it in the LOTH or CP as attested by many people online. It is uninspiring at best.

Another shortcome about the EP is that it has only Morning (Lauds), Evening (Vespers) and Night (Compline) prayer. Additional materials offered are 1 excerpt for the Little Hours and 1 excerpt of the Office of Readings, plus office of the Dead, alternative psalms & collects to be used in the Commons section under the Sanctoral cycle, and in the midday hours.

I have mentioned earlier that I have grown to love all things that is pre-concilliar especially in liturgical disciplines. Well, all breviaries mentioned so far are fully English, and translations are mainly contemporary. This is where I find it is still lacking for the dual language option of Latin/English so prevalent in pre-concilliar breviaries and prayer books, and the traditional English translations from Latin as opposed to contemporary ones. I hungered for more options and so my search continued...