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Feb. 17th, 2003 08:33 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
klsiegel320Home again! I had a serendipitous weekend (by which I mean, a typical weekend at Holy Cross). Saw lots of old friends; got some good supportive hugs which was very necessary right now...got my liturgy fix for the next little while.
I'm returning in two weeks for a retreat entitled "Singing and Praying," which I am very much looking forward to. For me, since I was about ten, singing and praying have been more or less interchangeable. I find sometimes that certain hymns or songs become prayers, depending on what's going on in my life when I encounter them.
We did some of that on Saturday. The monastery has begun keeping every Saturday as a vigil for peace. There's a sign-up on the bulletin board, just like the one for Maundy Thursday vigil, and we take it in turns to go and sit for fifteen minutes at a time. A small prayer sheet is thoughtfully provided, if we need words. I just sit, and breathe, and try to breathe in the hatred and breathe out peace to those who hate.
We also did a little advance singing and praying. Elizabeth - a priest in residence in the guesthouse - led about a half hour of chant/singing/praying for peace. We did a lovely Veni Sancte Spiritus which I believe is a Taize chant, and we did the Dona nobis pacem (the round that everybody knows).
I noticed an interesting thing, or rather I realized an interesting thing: the psalter for all three of my visits (this past plus the next two) will be exactly the same. This registered on me Friday evening, when I realized that since I'm visiting three times at two-week intervals, and the psalms run in two-week sets...I'll get the same set of psalms three times.
Specifically, it will be the end of Week I and the beginning of Week II all three of the times I'm at the monastery *until* I go for Easter - which will be Week II into Week I. And I have to say, I love it when we switch over to the Week I psalms for Easter Sunday. It feels like the whole world just starts over for a fresh chance.
This numbering refers to the psalm sets that are used at the Daily Office. The entire psalter is divided across Matins, Diurnum, Vespers, and Compline, in two full-week sets. The changeover is Vespers on Saturday (which of course is when Sunday begins - we still do the "day begins at sunset thing," we've just lost touch with it in most churches).
I have a feeling there are things this set of psalms has to say to me, over the next month. I'll have to remember to switch sides of the chapel periodically - since the psalms are chanted or recited antiphonally, which side you sit on determines which verses you chant and which you just hear. Sometimes, I've found, it can be important to *say* certain things, vocalize certain words - even if they aren't words I'm happy to hear or say. So...we'll see.
Yesterday was a little exciting, getting home - I had managed to miss any mention of this coming storm, and so was stunned to learn that Washington had 8 inches, and Philadelphia was covered, and it was on its way north. I left about 1:30, figuring I'd find out if I could drive faster than the storm could fly.
The answer is: close enough. I met the storm at the Union Tolls, and drove into the beginnings of it to get the rest of the way home. The parking lot was just covered when I pulled up...none too soon.
That's about all for the moment; more later.
I'm returning in two weeks for a retreat entitled "Singing and Praying," which I am very much looking forward to. For me, since I was about ten, singing and praying have been more or less interchangeable. I find sometimes that certain hymns or songs become prayers, depending on what's going on in my life when I encounter them.
We did some of that on Saturday. The monastery has begun keeping every Saturday as a vigil for peace. There's a sign-up on the bulletin board, just like the one for Maundy Thursday vigil, and we take it in turns to go and sit for fifteen minutes at a time. A small prayer sheet is thoughtfully provided, if we need words. I just sit, and breathe, and try to breathe in the hatred and breathe out peace to those who hate.
We also did a little advance singing and praying. Elizabeth - a priest in residence in the guesthouse - led about a half hour of chant/singing/praying for peace. We did a lovely Veni Sancte Spiritus which I believe is a Taize chant, and we did the Dona nobis pacem (the round that everybody knows).
I noticed an interesting thing, or rather I realized an interesting thing: the psalter for all three of my visits (this past plus the next two) will be exactly the same. This registered on me Friday evening, when I realized that since I'm visiting three times at two-week intervals, and the psalms run in two-week sets...I'll get the same set of psalms three times.
Specifically, it will be the end of Week I and the beginning of Week II all three of the times I'm at the monastery *until* I go for Easter - which will be Week II into Week I. And I have to say, I love it when we switch over to the Week I psalms for Easter Sunday. It feels like the whole world just starts over for a fresh chance.
This numbering refers to the psalm sets that are used at the Daily Office. The entire psalter is divided across Matins, Diurnum, Vespers, and Compline, in two full-week sets. The changeover is Vespers on Saturday (which of course is when Sunday begins - we still do the "day begins at sunset thing," we've just lost touch with it in most churches).
I have a feeling there are things this set of psalms has to say to me, over the next month. I'll have to remember to switch sides of the chapel periodically - since the psalms are chanted or recited antiphonally, which side you sit on determines which verses you chant and which you just hear. Sometimes, I've found, it can be important to *say* certain things, vocalize certain words - even if they aren't words I'm happy to hear or say. So...we'll see.
Yesterday was a little exciting, getting home - I had managed to miss any mention of this coming storm, and so was stunned to learn that Washington had 8 inches, and Philadelphia was covered, and it was on its way north. I left about 1:30, figuring I'd find out if I could drive faster than the storm could fly.
The answer is: close enough. I met the storm at the Union Tolls, and drove into the beginnings of it to get the rest of the way home. The parking lot was just covered when I pulled up...none too soon.
That's about all for the moment; more later.
