Sunday 2 August 2009

IX Sunday after Pentecost

Today is the ninth Sunday after Pentecost and the first Sunday of August. It is of semi-double rite. The first Sunday of August is the Sunday closest to the Kalends of August. If, for example, August 1st were a Monday the first Sunday would actually be on July 31st. In the Breviarium Romanum the collects and third nocturn lessons for the VII Sunday and following Sundays are given after the lessons for the fifth week of August.

At Vespers yesterday commemorations were sung of St. Peter's Chains, St. Paul, St. Alphonsus de Liguori and St. Stephen I.

At Mattins in the first nocturn the lessons are the Incipit, or beginning, of the Proverbs of Solomon with their responsories, not the lessons given for the IX Sunday. In the Breviary these texts for the first Sunday of August are printed after the 11th week of Pentecost. The reason for this is that the time after Pentecost can be either shorter or longer depending on the date of Easter. In the second nocturn the lessons are from a treatise of St. Ambrose on Psalm 118 - the 'psalm of the Law'. In the third nocturn the lessons are a homily of St. Gregory and the responsories are Domine, pater etc those given for the 1st to 3rd Sundays of August. These, as noted above, can be found in the section of the Breviary after the fifth week of August.

At Lauds commemorations are sung of St. Alphonsus and St. Stephen. At Prime Quicumque and the Dominical preces are omitted because of the occuring double feast.

Mass follows Terce. The Gloria is sung, the second collect is of St. Alphonsus, the third collect of St. Stephen. The Creed is sung and the preface that of Sunday.

At Vespers commemorations are sung of the following feast of the Finding of the Body of St. Stephen and St. Alphonsus.

In the 'liturgical books of 1962' the Feast of St. Peter's Chains is abolished so no commemoration of that, or anything else, at Vespers. Mattins is chopped down to one nocturn of three lessons. St. Alphonsus and St. Stephen are not commemorated at Lauds or Mass. At second Vespers there is no commemoration of the Finding of the Body of St. Stephen - that feast has been abolished too.

4 comments:

Francis said...

Dear Rubricarius,

This is a question concerning
LAUDS FOR AUGUST 8TH 2009

As tomorrow August 9th is a Sunday, the vigil of Saint Lawrence is anticipated today, with a commemoration at Lauds. In the breviary for August 9th it says, 'Et fit Commemoratio Vigiliae S. Laurentii Martyris: Antiphona et Versus de Feria occurenti, ut in Psalterio'. But as today is Saturday, the antiphon and verse given in the Psalter are those of the Saturday Office of Our Lady, 'Beata Dei Genitrix ...' and 'Benedicta tu ...' Is this the correct antiphon and verse, to use for the commemoration of the Vigil (though obvisouly with the Collect of the Vigil)?

Rubricarius said...

Dear Francis,

I have mentioned the anticipated Vigil in tomorrow's post.

To answer your question: For the commemoration of the anticipated Vigil of St. Lawrence the antiphon etc is taken from Lauds II (i.e. the old ferial Lauds before the 1911-13 reform).

If there were no occurring feast of nine lessons today this would be used for the Office of the Vigil of St. Lawrence with ferial preces etc.

So the antiphon on the Benedictus is Illumina, Domine * sedentes in tenebris et umbra mortis, et dirige pedes nostros in viam pacis. The antiphon is Repleti sumus and the response Exsultavimus.

Francis said...

Ahh, of course! Thank you very much, I should have realised that.

Rubricarius said...

Francis,

A pleasure to help.

When the Office was new to me I asked the complilator emeritus, Mr. John Tyson, a question about commemorations.

"John" I said, "I understand about the antiphon, the versicle and response and the collect but I don't understand about the hymn."

"Hymn? What's the hymn got to do with it?" John asked me.

"Well, the Ordo says I V so I presumed that meant the first five verses of the Office hymn. But what happens if the hymn doesn't have five verses?"

"You fool! You blithering fool" replied John, chortling with laughter in his inimitable manner. "I V means of first Vespers, nothing to do with the hymn."

Suitably admonished I took some consolation when I learnt from a friend that he at one time thought that on simples and semi-doubles the verses of the psalms were only said as far as the asterisk!

These things are all easy when one knows - hence the purpose of this blog to disseminate information about the rite.