Seven Times a Day

September 12, 2015 | Monastic Musings

Reflections from some of the nuns

When I first entered the monastery one of the sisters gifted me with a beautiful and very meaningful image to illustrate the horarium here at the Abbey and to share some of its significance and meaning with me.

The Hours of the Divine Office, she shared, were like the lines of the stave on which notes of music are written. It was on these stable, reliable and trustworthy lines that the music of our day is composed.
The melody, harmony and interweaving of sounds which we bring from all other parts of our day come together in our communal participation as we sing the praise of God seven times a day.

These calls to prayer bring us to remembrance of God, a period of recollection where we can stop, breathe and re – member ourselves as the body of Christ.

Once I heard of a busy and very successful businessman from New York who set his watch every hour to give a single soft chime. No one else knew what this chime signified but to him it was the reminder to stop for just one breath, to bring his mind and heart together in recollection of God and a moment of thanksgiving for the gift and blessing of life.

So simple. So powerful. So efficacious.

How wonderful to know that no matter who we are, what our walk in life, the practice of stopping, coming to an awareness of God in this present moment and offering a single-hearted sigh of thanks provides the stability which can underscore the offering of our whole day as gift and blessing.

Sr Magdalen Mather osb