This is the Liturgy of the Hours for December 31. Your local date is .
Dear Community,
Adoremus.org had published a fragment from the January 2022 Bishop’s Committee on Divine Worship Newsletter concerning the progress ICEL and USCCB made on the new edition of the Liturgy of the Hours. The text of the newsletter is summarized here, the full text can be accessed at Adoremus.org website.
ICEL has nearly finished its part of the work on the new edition of the Liturgy of the Hours. The USCCB should finalize the remaining non-Scriptural elements of the book in the coming year. The last piece to be completed will be the Scripture, and it is hoped that all the necessary votes of the body of bishops will have taken place by the end of 2023. Afterward, the various texts will be assembled and transmitted to the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments for confirmation. The publication process can only begin when that confirmation is received. Taking these factors into consideration, the current estimate is that printed books could be available in 2025. Further updates on the progress of the project will continue to be posted at USCCB.org.
Details about the progress on each section of the Liturgy of the Hours, Second Edition and further updates can be found at USCCB website.
Source: Adoremus.org
As a teenager I am most interested to see how the Office will be re-rendered into English. I certainly cannot say I much appreciate the watering down of Biblical language that has occurred in recent decades but I am resigned to an even more childish translation being adopted by the USCCB moving forward. The meaning of the scriptures will always be beautiful, even if the word choice sometimes feels worthy of derision. Going by my limited experience and view of the situation, it feels to me that the Church at large is trying to simplify and “modernize” as much as possible in the hopes that it will hold onto a younger generation of Catholics that are trickling out of the Church. Unfortunately our current generation of Bishops seems oblivious to the fact that young people are leaving the Church not because it seems too deep and mysterious, but because it seems too pointless and shallow. The edginess of being Catholic shouldn’t be hidden, it should be embraced. For devout Christians like me who pray for the Church to return to it’s more serious and solemn origins Novus Ordo, simplified translations, and the watering down of Catholicism is a chance to pray fervently for our leaders and to have faith that the Church is wholey in Christ’s hands. Either he will revive the church in the western world, or we he will give us the opportunity to be martyrs within a few decades, or he will do something wonderful that we could never predict. Whatever he does let us do omnia pro gloria Christi.
I do hope the OT quotes in the new revision hew closely to the Hebrew original. As one who reads the OT in the original Hebrew, which predates Christ, I truly want the Church to use the translation Jesus himself would have understood to be true. The NABRE OT translation is the closest the Church has of the original Hebrew text. But many of the bishops are very unhappy with the NABRE translation of certain key verses, which is why their release says that they will use a translation ‘based on’ the NABRE. The NABRE translations are correct, but they ‘rock’ the world of some Catholics. I fear the bishops will have a very hard time coming to an agreement over the OT translation, particularly regarding certain key prophetic verses. Thus, I do not look for the revision to be complete and marketable by 2025.
Not a fan, at all, of the NABRE! As one who ALSO READS Hebrew, this translation is biased (for obvious reasons) and the language and semantics is too sloppy and heavy for reading. However, the Roman Catholic Church has a bad history of translating the Bible into English.
HERE IS A GOOD EXAMPLE (there are many more) WHY THE NABRE IS WRONG: Consider the text from the Masoretic which MOST English translations are based up: Deuteronomy 32: 7-8 “7 “7 Remember the days of old, consider the years of generations past.Ask your father, he will inform you, your elders, they will tell you:8 When the Most High allotted each nation its heritage, when he separated out human beings,He set up the boundaries of the peoples after the number of the divine beings; This verse does not refer to “divine beings” at all! (Strictly covert in my view.) In the HEBREW: ךיבא לאש רדו-רד תונש וניב םלוע תומי רכזז 7:ךל ורמאיו ךינקז ךדגיובצי םדא ינב ודירפהב םיוג ןוילע לחנהבח 8 At the end of verse 8, the Masoretic Text says “children of Israel; the Dead Sea Scrolls do not! In the DSS hext reads “sons of God!” That is a significant difference; this verse in the New American is textually inferior; it changes the entire INTENTION. WHY? Israel did NOT exist at the time of Babel. See Biblical Hebrew scholar Dr. Robert Altaer for more insight; I believe he wrote an article on this issue.
The NABRE is not perfect. No translation is perfect. Yes, the Church has a history of warping translations to meet its collective needs. No doubt.That’s why I stick with the original Hebrew text. I read the OT only in Hebrew.
I am not sure where the comments above came from. (They are from Oct 29th till about Nov 8th of 2023) …The comments may have begun much before but those are the only ones about a new translation of the Divine Office that I can see above…I am not sure what the comments about things affected by “liberalism” refer to. I am thinking that it “might refer” to gender inclusive language. Maybe not. When I say or “hear” the Divine Office , as I do using this web site I will often in my mind change the language to men and women or to the word “persons”. I am a Roman Catholic priest and I have a special love for the 4th Eucharistic Prayer which I recently found was from either Basil or Gregory..The phrase which I especially esteem is where the prayer includes…”AND ALL THOSE WHO ARE SEEKING GOD WITH A PURE HEART. I find it a beautiful phrase of what today many of us call “inclusive language”…Another change I make either in my mind or out loud when I am using that 4th Eucharistic Prayer at Mass is that I change it to US or to WE rather than MEN. I am 84 and like many of you grew up with the understanding that MEN can refer to both men and women. And many prayers try to say “men and women” when the text has just MAN.. I know many of us can get into the so called “tempest in a teapot” over some of these issues. I have a personal wish that the phrase would be as it once was…AND THE WORD BECAME FLESH…because it emphasizes the fact that the Word of God who we came to know as the man Jesus Christ…took on our humanity and united it to his divinity so that we could unite our humanity (as happens in Baptism) to his humanity through his Passion, Death and Resurrection….That´s all I have to say for the moment. I hope I haven´t raised any “tempests” (storms) in a teapot…or anywhere else..
Dear Father, Thank you for your thoughts. I believe there is positive inclusivity from love and negativity inclusivity that is the work product of divisive minds. The Lord’s Word is positively inclusive bevause it wants every soul united to Him. Beautiful! Those who “take offense” of the use of the word “man”- which for centuries was understood to represent all of mankind, including women, are deflecting from the call to conversion. They are playing semantically irrelevant games as an excuse to not look at what they are called to do- repent! They pick and pick at little things so as to avoid the bigger ones. If I take umbrage with language I am therefore exempt from living out the textual messages. Lord, send your Holy Spirit to oversee translations of Your Word and pierce our hearts with only the truth. Spare your Word from woke agendas and convert every heart to yourself.
I lived through Pope Paul VI, Pope John Paul II, Pope Benedict, and now Pope Francis. I have not always agreed with them. But I am a Roman Catholic, so I respect the fact that through the College of Cardinals the Holy Spirit made clear what God wants from each of the Popes he appoints. They reflect a need of their times. I don’t always have to agree with them, but I do have to respect them and their work. This use of the word “liberalism” reflects a lack of faith in our Church and how it responds to contemorary needs.
I think we have to not form an opinion before we see the new office and then read it and see how it’s been done.
The new translations of the psalms and canticles are already available to purchase: Abbey Psalms and CanticlesUnited States Conference of Catholic Bishopshttps://www.usccb.org › resources › abbey-psalms-and…
The USCCB store is closed.You can order it from here:https://agapaostore.com/products/the-abbey-psalms-and-canticles-1-pc
I agree about not passing judgment until we see the revision. However, based on many factors including what was removed when the novus ordo was implemented I too have very low expectations that this revision will be an improvement. It seems our leadership won’t fix what is broken and instead messes up that which is working.
I’m afraid I share Carol Davis’s comment of May 23rd. I follow secular politics, and the influence of political and cultural trends on the changes pouring out of the Vatican is very troubling.
Amen! Thank you, amen!
Glory to God! A revision of the Liturgy of the Hours has been a dire need for many years now! I cannot wait to see it completed. Thank you for sharing!
Why? I have never found the 1st edition problematic. Every time something is “updated” or revised we seem to lose something blessed and find ourselves confronted with more liberalism.
The current edition is the epitome of what you just described. Having come out of the post VII 70s, the translation is terrible. Hopefully, the new translation will be a bit closer to the traditional Office. At this point, anything would be an improvement.
I don’t understand. Why is there a dire need for a revision?