Liturgy of the Hours: It's not just for clergy anymore ____________________________________________________________ By Cindy Wooden - CNS ____________________________________________________________ VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- For the past 16 months, Pope John Paul II has been encouraging people to pray with the Psalms, and particularly to pray the Liturgy of the Hours. The papal audience talks reflect a growing reality: Priests and religious are not the only ones using the breviary for morning and evening prayer. What's more, convents and monasteries are not the only places where lay people can experience the chanting or recitation of the prayers communally, the way they were designed to be prayed. The first 23 papal talks, which began in March 2001, were published in book form by the Vatican this summer; the book is available only in Italian. "It is an encouraging fact that many lay people, both in parishes and in church groups, have learned to value" the Liturgy of the Hours, the pope said in the first talk of the series. The psalms used in the liturgy, Pope John Paul said, are highly poetic prayers reflecting a full array of human feelings: "joy, recognition, thanksgiving, love, tenderness and enthusiasm, but also intense suffering, sorrow and requests for help or for justice, which sometimes are expressed with anger or imprecation." "The whole human being is found in the psalms," he said. At St. Peter's Basilica, like in many cathedrals around the world, everyone is welcome to join in Sunday evening vespers. The Sunday prayer is the only part of the Liturgy of the Hours celebrated in public by the Chapter of St. Peter's Basilica, the group of priests who ministers full time there. The number of participants changes with the seasons, one of the priests said. As few as 50 people will add their voices to the chants sung entirely in Latin in midwinter, but with the spring and summer tourist season, the numbers quadruple, he said. Just down the street at the Carmelite-run Church of Santa Maria in Traspontina, everyone is invited to join the recitation of morning and evening prayer in Italian every day. "We've always done it," said the pastor, Carmelite Father Alberto Campagnucci. The congregation usually includes about two dozen people, mostly laity who stay for the prayers after the parish's morning and evening Masses. But the most famous place in Rome for communal evening prayer is the Basilica of Santa Maria in Trastevere, which gathers as many as 1,000 people at 8:30 every night. In addition to singing the psalms to Eastern melodies, the service includes the reading of a Gospel passage and a reflection usually offered by a lay person. However, when guests of a certain stature stop by, they are invited to preach. Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, prefect of the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith, gave the reflection July 10, for example. In the past two years, other guests leading the reflection have included the Orthodox patriarchs of Constantinople, of the Armenian, Syrian and Ethiopian churches and Archbishop George C. Carey of Canterbury, head of the Anglican Communion. The prayer is the centerpiece of the activity of the Sant'Egidio Community, a group of lay people engaged in all sorts of social services, ecumenical and interreligious dialogue and works for peace. One of the pope's introductory remarks about the Liturgy of the Hours could have been written with the community in mind: "Thanks to the communal prayer of the psalms, the Christian conscience remembers and understands that it is impossible to turn to the Father, who is in heaven, without an authentic life of communion with one's brothers and sisters, who are on earth," the pope said. Evening prayer used to be sung in the Church of Sant'Egidio near the basilica, but moved in 1998 when the church underwent renovation. About 200 people could fit inside Sant'Egidio, if they filled the choir loft as well as the main body of the church. The congregation always included visitors, but it was not until the prayer moved to the Trastevere basilica that the community realized what a huge outreach it was. [mail_this.gif] "Praying with the psalms and the prayer of the church feeds those who are hungering for the word of God and thirsting for authentic inspiration," said Father Marco Gnavi, a member of the community. Added together, he said, the nightly congregation comes to between 150,000 and 200,000 each year; obviously, many are community members and friends who attend on a regular basis, but thousands are drawn from crowds who flock to the Trastevere neighborhood's squares and restaurants each night. "It is obvious the prayer is not our possession," Father Gnavi said.