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The prayer hours of the Christian Church find their origins in the
ancient prayers of the Jewish Synagogue, the prayer patterns of the
apostles, the early Eucharist, and the monastaries. The prayer of
the Church, the Divine Office, is not something left to monks, nuns,
or clergy alone, but is the foundation of daily Christian life, the
tradition entrusted to the Church (2 Thess. 2.15; 1 Cor. 11.2) to
hold fast.
As Prosper of Aquitaine stated in his defense
against the Pelagians, Lex Orandi, Lex Credendi: the rule
of our prayer is the rule of our belief. In the Office we read and
pray from Scripture, from the writings of the Holy Fathers, and
from the legend of the lives of the Saints; we sing canticles, and
pray for the Church, the living and the dead, and for each other.
The heart of the Office is in the singing/saying of Psalms and the
Lord's Prayer. The Psalms attest to the Jewish cycle of prayer,
three times a day, or seven times, and at midnight. The New Testament
speaks of the Apostles going to Temple for prayer at the third hour,
the sixth hour, and the ninth hour. We read of Jesus praying the
Psalms, and clearly he knew them well, as he quoted them during his
last moments on the cross. The Didache, an early Christian rule,
speaks of Christians praying the Lord's Prayer three times a day.
In the cathedral tradition of Cranmer and King Edward VI we say
Morning and Evening Prayer. In Cranmer's Morning Prayer we have a
mix of the midnight, morning, and first monastic hours, and in
Evensong, or Evening Prayer, we have Vespers and Compline. Cranmer's
name for these two services was The Book of Common Prayer,
by which name we now commonly call our entire service book. (Cranmer's
name for his first service book in English, before the inclusion
of the Ordinal and Articles of Religion, was, The booke of the
common prayer and admininistracion of the Sacramentes, and other
rites and ceremonies of the Churche after the use of the Churche
of England.)
Since the summer of 2005 we have offered Morning Prayer on Tuesdays, and now Thursdays, and on occasion Evening Prayer. The ideal is daily Morning and Evening Prayer. Please join us, and help make this happen. Whenever the Church prays, we offer ourselves to God, a sacrifice of praise of thanksgiving. Please see the Service times, and Upcoming Events page for a detail of service times.