
Canonical hours

In the practice of Christianity, canonical hours mark the divisions of the day in terms of fixed times of prayer at regular intervals. A book of hours, chiefly a breviary, normally contains a version of, or selection from, such prayers.
In the Roman Rite, canonical hours are also called "offices", since they refer to the official set of prayers of the Church, which is known variously as the ("divine service" or "divine duty"), and the ("work of God"). The current official version of the hours in the Roman Rite of the Catholic Church is called the Liturgy of the Hours () in North America or divine office in Ireland and Britain.
In Anglicanism, they are often known as the daily or divine office, to distinguish them from the other 'offices' of the Church (holy communion, baptism, etc.), which are commonly observed weekly or less often. In the Eastern Orthodox and Byzantine Catholic Churches, the canonical hours may be referred to as the divine services, and the "book of hours" is called the (). Despite numerous small differences in practice according to local custom, the overall order is the same among Byzantine Rite monasteries, although parish and cathedral customs vary rather more so by locale.
The usage in Oriental Orthodox Churches, the Assyrian Church of the East, and their Eastern Catholic counterparts all differ from each other and from other rites.
Development.
Judaism and the early church.
The canonical hours stemmed from Jewish prayer. In the Old Testament, God commanded the Israelite priests to offer sacrifices of animals in the morning and evening (). Eventually, these sacrifices moved from the Tabernacle to Solomon's Temple in Jerusalem. During the Babylonian captivity, when the Temple was no longer in use, synagogues carried on the practice, and the services (at fixed hours of the day) of Torah readings, psalms, and hymns began to evolve. This "sacrifice of praise" began to be substituted for the sacrifices of animals. After the people returned to Judea, the prayer services were incorporated into Temple worship as well. The miraculous healing of the crippled beggar described in Acts 3:1 of the apostles, took place as Peter and John went to the Temple for the three o’clock hour of prayer. The practice of daily prayers grew from the Jewish practice of reciting prayers at set times of the day known as : for example, in the "Acts of the Apostles", Saint Peter and John the Evangelist visit the Temple in Jerusalem for the afternoon prayers. Psalm 119:164 states: "Seven times a day I praise you for your righteous laws" (of this, Symeon of Thessalonica writes that "the times of prayer and the services are seven in number, like the number of gifts of the Spirit, since the holy prayers are from the Spirit"). In Act 10: 9, the decision to include Gentiles among the community of believers, arose from a vision Peter had while praying about noontime.
Early Christians prayed the Psalms (), which have remained the principal part of the canonical hours. By 60 AD, the Didache, recommends disciples to pray the Lord's Prayer three times a day; this practice found its way into the canonical hours as well. By the second and third centuries, such Church Fathers as Clement of Alexandria, Origen, and Tertullian wrote of the practice of Morning and Evening Prayer, and of the prayers at the third, sixth and ninth hours.
From the time of the early Church, the practice of seven fixed prayer times have been taught; in "Apostolic Tradition", Hippolytus instructed Christians to pray seven times a day "on rising, at the lighting of the evening lamp, at bedtime, at midnight" and "the third, sixth and ninth hours of the day, being hours associated with Christ's Passion." 
In the early church, during the night before every feast, a vigil was kept. The word "Vigils", at first applied to the Night Office, comes from a Latin source, namely the or nocturnal watches or guards of the soldiers. The night from six o'clock in the evening to six o'clock in the morning was divided into four watches or vigils of three hours each, the first, the second, the third, and the fourth vigil. In the evening the faithful assembled in the place or church where the feast was to be celebrated and prepared themselves by prayers, readings, and sometimes also by hearing a sermon. Pliny the Younger (63 – ) mentions not only fixed times of prayer by believers, but also specific services—other than the Eucharist—assigned to those times: "they met on a stated day before it was light, and addressed a form of prayer to Christ, as to a divinity ... after which it was their custom to separate, and then reassemble, to eat in common a harmless meal." This vigil was a regular institution of Christian life and was defended and highly recommended by St. Augustine and St. Jerome.
The Office of the Vigils was a single Office, recited without interruption at midnight. Probably in the fourth century, in order to break the monotony of this long night prayer the custom of dividing it into three parts or Nocturns was introduced. John Cassian in speaking of the solemn Vigils mentions three divisions of this Office.
Around the year 484, the Greek-Cappadocian monk Sabbas the Sanctified began the process of recording the liturgical practices around Jerusalem, while the cathedral and parish rites in the Patriarchate of Constantinople evolved in an entirely different manner. The two major practices were synthesized, commencing in the 8th century, to yield an office of great complexity.
In 525, Benedict of Nursia set out one of the earliest schemes for the recitation of the Psalter at the Office. The Cluniac Reforms of the 11th century renewed an emphasis on liturgy and the canonical hours in the reformed priories of the Order of Saint Benedict, with Cluny Abbey at their head.
Middle Ages.
As the form of fixed-hour prayer developed in the Christian monastic communities in the East and West, the Offices grew both more elaborate and more complex, but the basic cycle of prayer still provided the structure for daily life in monasteries. By the fourth century, the elements of the canonical hours were more or less established. For secular (non-monastic) clergy and lay people, the fixed-hour prayers were by necessity much shorter, though in many churches, the form of the fixed-hour prayers became a hybrid of secular and monastic practice (sometimes referred to as 'cathedral' and 'monastic' models).
In the East, the development of the Divine Services shifted from the area around Jerusalem to Constantinople. In particular, Theodore the Studite ( – ) combined a number of influences from the Byzantine court ritual with monastic practices common in Anatolia, and added thereto a number of hymns composed by himself and his brother Joseph (see for further details).
In the West, the Rule of Saint Benedict was modeled on his guidelines for the prayers on the customs of the basilicas of Rome. It was he who expounded the concept in Christian prayer of the inseparability of the spiritual life from the physical life. St. Benedict set down the dictum – "Pray and work". The Order of Saint Benedict began to call the prayers the or "Work of God." By the time of Saint Benedict of Nursia, the monastic Liturgy of the Hours was composed of seven daytime hours and one at night. He associated the practice with Psalm 118/119:164, "Seven times a day I praise you", and Psalm 118/119:62, "At midnight I rise to praise you". The fixed-hour prayers came to be known as the "Divine Office" (office coming from , lit., "duty").
Initially, the term "Matins" from Latin , meaning "of or belonging to the morning", was applied to the psalms recited at dawn. At first "Lauds" (i.e. praises) derived from the three last psalms in the office (148, 149, 150), in all of which the word is repeated frequently, and to such an extent that originally the word Lauds designated the end, that is to say, these three psalms with the conclusion. By the fourth century the word "matins" became attached to the prayer originally offered at cockcrow. and, according to the sixth-century "Rule of Saint Benedict", could be calculated to be the eighth hour of the night (the hour that began at about 2 a.m.). Outside of monasteries few rose at night to pray. The canonical hour of the vigil was said in the morning, followed immediately by lauds, and the name of "matins" replaced that of "vigils". Gradually the title "Lauds" was applied to the early morning office.
Already well-established by the 9th century in the West, these canonical hours consisted of daily prayer liturgies:
The three major hours were Matins, Lauds and Vespers; the minor hours Terce, Sext, None and Compline.
As the Divine Office grew more important in the life of the Church, the rituals became more elaborate. Praying the Office already required various books, such as a Psalter for the psalms, a lectionary to find the assigned Scripture reading for the day, a Bible to proclaim the reading, a hymnal for singing, etc. As parishes grew in the Middle Ages away from cathedrals and basilicas, a more concise way of arranging the hours was needed. So, a sort of list developed called the breviary, which gave the format of the daily office and the texts to be used. The spread of breviaries eventually reached Rome, where Pope Innocent III extended their use to the Roman Curia. The Franciscans sought a one-volume breviary for their friars to use during travels, so the order adopted the , but substituting the Gallican Rite Psalter for the Roman. The Franciscans gradually spread this breviary throughout Europe. Eventually, Pope Nicholas III adopted the widely used Franciscan breviary to be the breviary used in Rome. By the 14th century, the breviary contained the entire text of the canonical hours.
In general, when modern secular books reference canonical hours in the Middle Ages, these are the equivalent times:
Church bells are tolled at the fixed times of these canonical hours in some Christian traditions as a call to prayer.
Diurnal offices.
The diurnal offices or daytime offices (Ecclesiastical Latin: ) are the canonical hours during the day. Interpretation of their number and identity varies.
The monastic rule drawn up by Benedict of Nursia ( – ) distinguishes between the seven daytime canonical hours of lauds (dawn), prime (sunrise), terce (mid-morning), sext (midday), none (mid-afternoon), vespers (sunset), compline (retiring) and the one nighttime canonical hour of night watch. It links the seven daytime offices with Psalm 118/119:164, "Seven times a day I praise you for your righteous rules"; and the one nighttime office with Psalm 118/119:62, "At midnight I rise to praise you, because of your righteous rules",
In this reckoning, the one nocturnal office, together with lauds and vespers, are the three major hours, the other five are the minor or little hours.
According to Dwight E. Vogel, Daniel James Lula and Elizabeth Moore the diurnal offices are terce, sext, and none, which are distinguished from the major hours of matins (morning prayer), lauds and vespers and from the nighttime hours of compline and vigil.
Roman Rite.
In the Latin Church of the Catholic Church, bishops, priests, and deacons are obliged to recite the full sequence of the hours each day, keeping as far as possible to the true time of day, and using the text of the approved liturgical books that apply to them. The laity are exhorted to pray the hours.
Revisions.
The Council of Trent, in its final session on 4 December 1563, entrusted the reform of the Breviary to the Pope. On 9 July 1568, Pope Pius V, the successor of the pope who closed the Council of Trent, promulgated an edition, known as the Roman Breviary, with his Apostolic Constitution , imposing it in the same way in which, two years later, he imposed his Roman Missal. Later popes altered the Roman Breviary of Pope Pius V. Pope Pius XII began reforming the Roman Breviary, allowing use of a new translation of the Psalms and establishing a special commission to study a general revision, with a view to which all the Catholic bishops were consulted in 1955. His successor, Pope John XXIII, made a further revision in 1960.
Second Vatican Council revisions.
Following the Second Vatican Council, the Catholic Church's Roman Rite simplified the observance of the canonical hours and sought to make them more suited to the needs of today's apostolate and accessible to the laity, hoping to restore their character as the prayer of the entire Church.
The council abolished the office of Prime, and envisioned a manner of distributing the psalms over a period of more than 1 week. The Roman breviary is published under the title . A translation is published by Catholic Book Publishing Corp. under the title "The Liturgy of the Hours" in four volumes, arranged according to the liturgical seasons of the Church year.
The current liturgical books for the celebration of the hours in Latin are those of the (second typical edition) promulgated in 1985. The official title is .
Current practice.
After the Second Vatican Council, which decided that the hour of Prime should be suppressed, Pope Paul VI decreed a new arrangement of the Liturgy of the Hours. The modern Liturgy of the Hours usage focuses on the three major hours and from two to four minor hours.
The major hours consist of the Office of Readings (formerly Matins), Morning (or Lauds) and Evening Prayer (or Vespers). The character of Morning Prayer is that of praise; of Evening Prayer, that of thanksgiving. Night Prayer has the character of reflection on the day that is past and preparing the soul for its passage to eternal life. In each office, the psalms and canticle are framed by antiphons, and each concludes with the traditional Catholic doxology.
Byzantine Rite usage.
Historical development.
Because the Rite of Constantinople evolved as a synthesis of two distinct rites – cathedral rite of Constantinople called the ("sung services") and the monastic typicon of the Holy Lavra of Saint Sabbas the Sanctified near Jerusalem – its offices are highly developed and quite complex.
Local variations.
Two main strata exist in the rite, those places that have inherited the traditions of the Russian Church which had been given only the monastic which is used to this day in parishes and cathedrals as well as in monasteries, and everywhere else where some remnant of the cathedral rite remained in use; therefore, the rite as practiced in monasteries everywhere resembles the Russian recension, while non-Russian non-monastic customs differs significantly. For example, in the Russian tradition, the "all-night vigil" is served in every church on Saturday nights and the eves of feast days (all though it may be abridged to be as short as two hours) while elsewhere, it is usual to have Matins on the morning of the feast; however, in the latter instance, Vespers and matins are rather less abridged but the Divine Liturgy commences at the end of matins and the hours are not read, as was the case in the extinct cathedral rite of Constantinople.
Also, as the rite evolved in sundry places, different customs arose; an essay on some of these has been written by Archbishop Basil Krivoshein and is posted on the web.
Liturgical books.
The (; Church Slavonic: , ), or "Book of Hours", provides the fixed portions of the Daily Cycle of services (, ) as used by the Eastern Orthodox and Eastern Catholic churches.
Into this fixed framework, numerous moveable parts of the service are inserted. These are taken from a variety of liturgical books:
Liturgical cycles.
Various cycles of the liturgical year influence the manner in which the materials from the liturgical books (above) are inserted into the daily services:
Weekly Cycle.
Each day of the week has its own commemoration:
Most of the texts come from the , which has a large collections of hymns for each weekday for each of the eight tones; during great lent and, to a lesser degree, the pre-lenten season, the supplements this with hymns for each day of the week for each week of that season, as does the during the pascal season. Also, there are fixed texts for each day of the week are in the and "Priest's Service Book" (e.g., dismissals) and the Kathismata (selections from the "Psalter") are governed by the weekly cycle in conjunction with the season.
Fixed Cycle.
Commemorations on the Fixed Cycle depend upon the day of the calendar year, and also, occasionally, specific days of the week that fall near specific calendar dates, e.g., the Sunday before the Exaltation of the Cross. The texts for this cycle are found in the .
Paschal Cycle.
The commemorations on the Paschal Cycle (Moveable Cycle) depend upon the date of Pascha (Easter). The texts for this cycle are found in the , the , the and also, because the daily Epistle and Gospel readings are determined by this cycle, the "Gospel Book" and "Apostle Book". The cycle of the continues through the following Great Lent, so the variable parts of the lenten services are determined by both the preceding year's and the current year's dates of Easter.
8 Week Cycle of the Octoechos.
The cycle of the eight Tones is found in the and is dependent on the date of Easter and commences with the Sunday after (eighth day of) Easter, that week using the first tone, the next week using the second tone, and so, repeating through the week preceding the subsequent Palm Sunday.
11 Week Cycle of the Matins Gospels.
The portions of each of the Gospels from the narration of the Resurrection through the end are divided into eleven readings which are read on successive Sundays at matins; there are hymns sung at Matins that correspond with that day's Matins Gospel.
Daily cycle of services.
The Daily Cycle begins with Vespers and proceeds throughout the night and day according to the following table:
The Typica is served whenever the Divine Liturgy is not celebrated at its usual time, i.e., when there is a vesperal Liturgy or no Liturgy at all. On days when the Liturgy may be celebrated at its usual hour, the Typica follows the sixth hour (or Matins, where the custom is to serve the Liturgy then) and the Epistle and Gospel readings for the day are read therein; otherwise, on aliturgical days or when the Liturgy is served at vespers, the Typica has a much shorter form and is served between the ninth hour and vespers.
Also, there are Inter-Hours for the First, Third, Sixth and Ninth Hours. These are services of a similar structure to, but briefer than, the hours. their usage varies with local custom, but generally they are used only during the Nativity Fast, Apostles Fast, and Dormition Fast on days when the lenten alleluia replaces "God is the Lord" at matins, which may be done at the discretion of the ecclesiarch when the Divine Liturgy is not celebrated.
In addition to these public prayers, there are also private prayers prescribed for both monastics and laypersons; in some monasteries, however, these are read in church. These include Morning and Evening Prayers and prayers (and, in Russia, canons) to be prayed in preparation for receiving the Eucharist.
The full cycle of services are usually served only in monasteries, cathedrals, and other . In monasteries and parishes of the Russian tradition, the Third and Sixth Hours are read during the Prothesis (Liturgy of Preparation); otherwise, the Prothesis is served during Matins, the final portion of which is omitted, the Liturgy of the Catechumens commencing straightway after the following the Great Doxology.
The Midnight Office is seldom served in parishes churches except at the Paschal Vigil as the essential office wherein the burial shroud is removed from the tomb and carried to the altar.
Aggregates.
The sundry Canonical Hours are, in practice, grouped together into aggregates so that there are three major times of prayer a day: Evening, Morning and Midday. The most common groupings are as follows:
When there is an all-night vigil.
On the eves before Great Feasts and, in some traditions, on all Sundays, this grouping is used. However, the all-night vigil is usually abridged so as to not last literally "all-night" and may be as short as two hours; on the other hand, on Athos and in the very traditional monastic institutions, that service followed by the hours and Liturgy may last as long as 18 hours.
On the eves of Christmas, Theophany, and Annunciation.
When the feast is a weekday (or, in the Russian tradition, on any day for Christmas, Theophany), Vespers (with the Liturgy in most instances) is served earlier in the day and so Great Compline functions much as Great vespers does on the vigils of other feast days.
Alexandrian Rite.
The Alexandrian Rite is observed by the Coptic Orthodox Church of Alexandria and the Coptic Catholic Church. The cycle of canonical hours is largely monastic, primarily composed of psalm readings. The Coptic equivalent of the Byzantine "Horologion" is the Agpeya.
Seven canonical hours exist, corresponding largely to the Byzantine order, with an additional "Prayer of the Veil" which is said by Bishops, Priests, and Monks (something like the Byzantine Midnight Office).
The hours are chronologically laid out, each containing a theme corresponding to events in the life of Jesus Christ:
Every one of the Hours follows the same basic outline:
East Syriac Rite.
The East Syriac Rite (also known as the Chaldean, Assyrian, or Persian Rite) has historically been used in Syria, Mesopotamia, Persia, and Malabar. The nucleus of the Daily Office is mainly of course the recitation of the Psalter. There are usually seven regular hours of service;
the following are the times of prayer:
When East Syriac monasteries existed (which is no longer the case) seven hours of prayer were the custom in them, and three "hulali" (sections) of the Psalter were recited at each service. This would accomplish the unique feat of the common recitation of the entire Psalter each day.
The present arrangement provides for seven "hulali" at each ferial night service, ten on Sundays, three on "Memorials", and the whole Psalter on Feasts of the Lord. At the evening service there is a selection of from four to seven psalms, varying with the day of the week, and also a "Shuraya", or short psalm, with generally a portion of Psalm 118, varying with the day of the fortnight. At the morning service the invariable psalms are 109, 90, 103:1–6, 112, 92, 148, 150, 116. On ferias and "Memorials" Psalm 146 is said after Psalm 148, and on ferias Psalm 1:1–18, comes at the end of the psalms.
The rest of the services consist of prayers, antiphons, litanies, and verses ("giyura") inserted—like the Greek stichera, but more extensively—between verses of psalms. On Sundays the Gloria in Excelsis and Benedicte are said instead of Psalm 146. Both morning and evening services end with several prayers, a blessing, ("Khuthama", "Sealing" ), the kiss of peace, and the Creed.
The variables, besides the psalms, are those of the feast or day, which are very few, and those of the day of the fortnight. These fortnights consist of weeks called "Before" ("Qdham") and "After" ("Wathar"), according to which of the two choirs begins the service. Hence the book of the Divine Office is called "Qdham u wathar", or at full length "Kthawa daqdham wadhwathar", the "Book of Before and After".
The East Syriac liturgical Calendar is unique. The year is divided into periods of about seven weeks each, called "Shawu'i"; these are Advent (called "Subara", "Annunciation"), Epiphany, Lent, Easter, the Apostles, Summer, "Elias and the Cross", "Moses", and the "Dedication" ("Qudash idta"). "Moses" and the "Dedication" have only four weeks each. The Sundays are generally named after the "Shawu'a" in which they occur, "Fourth Sunday of Epiphany", "Second Sunday of the Annunciation ", etc., though sometimes the name changes in the middle of a "Shawu'a". Most of the "Memorials" ("dukhrani"), or saints' days, which have special lections, occur on the Fridays between Christmas and Lent, and are therefore movable feasts; but some, such as Christmas, Theophany, the Dormition, and about thirty smaller days without proper readings, are on fixed days.
There are four shorter fasting periods besides the Great Lent; these are:
The Fast of the Ninevites commemorates the repentance of Nineveh at the preaching of Jonah, and is carefully kept. Those of Mar Zaya and the Virgins are nearly obsolete. The Malabar Rite has largely adopted the Roman Calendar, and several Roman days have been added to that of the Chaldean Catholics. The Chaldean Easter coincides with that of the Eastern Orthodox Church, as the Julian Calendar is used to calculate Easter. The years are numbered, not from the birth of Christ, but from the Seleucid era (year 1 = 311 B.C.).
West Syriac Rite.
The West Syriac Rite, used in India and Syria by the Indian Orthodox and Syriac Orthodox (Jacobites), as well as Syriac Rite Catholics, is in its origin simply the old rite of Antioch in the Syriac language. The translation must have been made very early, evidently before the division in the church over Chalcedon, before the influence of Constantinople over the Antiochian Rite had begun. No doubt as soon as Christian communities arose in the rural areas of Syria the prayers which in the cities (Antioch, Jerusalem, etc.) were said in Greek, were, as a matter of course, translated into Syriac for common use.
In accordance with Psalm 119:164, "Seven times in the day have I praised Thee for Thy judgments, O Righteous One," the Syriac Orthodox Church observes seven services of prayer each day:
The Midnight prayer (Matins) consists of three "qawme" or "watches" (literally "standings"). As in other traditional rites, the ecclesiastical day begins in the evening at sunset with Vespers ("Ramsho"). Today, even in monasteries, the services are grouped together: Vespers and Compline are said together; Matins and Prime are said together; and the Third, Sixth and Ninth Hours are said together; resulting in three times of prayer each day.
The Syriac Orthodox Book of Hours is called the Shehimo, "simple prayer." The "Shehimo" has offices for the canonical hours for each day of the week. Each canonical office begins and ends with a "qawmo", a set of prayers that includes the Lord's Prayer. At the end of the office, the Nicene Creed is recited. The great part of the office consists of lengthy liturgical poems composed for the purpose, similar to the Byzantine odes.
Armenian Rite.
The Daily Services in the Armenian Apostolic Church and the Armenian Catholic Church are made up of nine services. The daily cycle of prayer begins with the Night Service, according to the ancient belief that a new day begins at nightfall.
The Night Service (midnight) Dedicated to the praising of God the Father. Themes of the service are: thanksgiving to God for the blessing of sleep and asking that the remainder of the night pass in peace and tranquility, and that the next day be spent in purity and righteousness.
The Morning Service (dawn) Dedicated to the praising of God the Son. Symbolizes the Resurrection of Christ and his appearance to the Myrrh-bearing Women.
The Sunrise Service (6:00 a.m.) Dedicated to the praising of the Holy Spirit. Symbolizes the appearance to Christ to the disciples after the Resurrection.
The Third Hour (9:00 a.m.) Dedicated to the Holy Spirit. Symbolizes Eve's original tasting the forbidden fruit and eventual liberation from condemnation through Jesus Christ. The service has a profound penitential meaning.
The Sixth Hour (noon) Dedicated to God the Father. Symbolizes Christ's Crucifixion. The prayers at the service ask for God's help towards feeble human nature.
The Ninth Hour (3:00 p.m.) Dedicated to God the Son. Symbolizes Christ's death and liberation of humanity from the power of the Hell.
The Evening Service (before sunset) Dedicated to God the Son. Symbolizes Christ's burial, asks God for a quiet night and a peaceful sleep.
The Peace Service (after sunset) Dedicated to the Holy Spirit. Symbolizes Christ's descent into Hell and liberation of the righteous from torments.
The Rest Service (before retiring for sleep) Dedicated to God the Father. In early times it was the continuation of the Peace Service.
In ancient times all nine services were offered every day, especially in monasteries. At present the following services are conducted in churches daily for the majority of the year:
During Great Lent, all of the services are offered on weekdays (except Saturday and Sunday) according to the following schedule:
The book which contains the hymns which constitute the substance of the musical system of Armenian liturgical chant is the "Sharagnots" (see Armenian Octoechos), a collection of hymns known as "Sharakan". Originally, these hymns were Psalms and biblical Canticles that were chanted during the services, similar to the Byzantine Canon. In addition, the eight modes are applied to the psalms of the Night office, called "ganonaklookh" (Canon head).
Lutheran usage.
Lutheran worship books usually include orders for Morning and Evening Prayer as well as Compline. English-language liturgies published by immigrant Lutheran communities in North America were based at first on the Book of Common Prayer. In recent years, under the impact of the liturgical movement, Lutheran churches have restored the historic form of the Western office. Both "Evangelical Lutheran Worship" published by the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America and the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Canada as well as the "Lutheran Service Book" of the Lutheran Church–Missouri Synod provide daily offices along with a complete psalter.
The Diakonie Neuendettelsau religious institute uses a breviary unique to the order; "", among many other breviaries such as "The Daily Office: Matins and Vespers, Based on Traditional Liturgical Patterns, with Scripture Readings, Hymns, Canticles, Litanies, Collects, and the Psalter, Designed for Private Devotion or Group Worship", are popular in Lutheran usage as well.
Anglican usage.
The daily offices have always had an important place in Anglican spirituality. Until comparatively recently Mattins and Evensong were the principal Sunday services in most Anglican churches, sung to settings by composers both ancient and modern. While Evensong with its musical repertory spanning five centuries continues to play an important role in Anglican worship, the eucharist has replaced Morning Prayer as the principal service on Sunday mornings in most Anglican parishes and cathedrals.
The "Book of Common Prayer", first published in 1549 and revised down the centuries, constitutes the basis of the liturgy for Anglicans and Anglican Use Roman Catholics. All Anglican prayer books provide offices for Morning Prayer (often called Mattins or Matins) and Evening Prayer (colloquially known as Evensong).
The traditional structure of Matins and Evensong in most Anglican prayer books reflects the intention by the reforming Archbishop of Canterbury, Thomas Cranmer, to return to the office's older roots as the daily prayer of parish churches. For this purpose, he eliminated the lesser hours and conflated the medieval offices of Matins and Lauds, incorporating the canticles associated with each: the Benedictus and Te Deum. Similarly, Evening Prayer incorporated both the Magnificat from Vespers and the Nunc Dimittis from Compline. In Cranmer's design, each canticle was preceded by a reading from scripture. This parallelism of two readings, each followed by a canticle, is a distinctive feature of the Anglican daily office. For the sake of simplicity, Cranmer also eliminated responsories and antiphons, although these have been restored in many contemporary Anglican prayer books. Since his time, every edition of the "Book of Common Prayer" has included the complete psalter, usually arranged to be read over the course of a month. One distinctive contribution of Anglican worship is a broad repertory of Anglican Chant settings for the psalms and canticles.
Since the early 20th century, revised editions of the "Book of Common Prayer" or supplemental service books published by Anglican churches have often added offices for midday prayer and Compline. In England and other Anglican provinces, service books now include four offices:
Some prayer books also include a selection of prayers and devotions specifically for family use. The 1979 "Book of Common Prayer of the Episcopal Church in the U.S." also provides an "Order of Worship for the Evening" as a prelude to Evensong with blessings for the lighting of candles and the singing of the ancient Greek lamp-lighting hymn, the Phos Hilaron. In the Church of England, the publication in 2005 of "Daily Prayer", the third volume of "Common Worship", adds "Prayer During the Day" to the services for Morning Prayer, Evening Prayer, and Compline, and adds a selection of antiphons and responsories for the seasons of the Church Year. The 1989 "New Zealand Prayer Book" provides different outlines for Mattins and Evensong on each day of the week, as well as "Midday Prayer," "Night Prayer," and "Family Prayer." In 1995, the Episcopal Church (United States) published the "Contemporary Office Book" in one volume with the complete psalter and all readings from the two-year Daily Office lectionary.
Most Anglican monastic communities use a Daily Office based on the "Book of Common Prayer" or on "Common Worship" but with additional antiphons and devotions. The Order of the Holy Cross and Order of St. Helena published "A Monastic Breviary" (Wilton, Conn.: Morehouse-Barlow) in 1976. The Order of St. Helena published the "St. Helena Breviary" (New York: Church Publishing) in 2006 with a revised psalter eliminating male pronouns in reference to God. The All Saints Sisters of the Poor also use an elaborated version of the Anglican Daily Office. The Society of St. Francis publishes "Celebrating Common Prayer", which has become especially popular for use among Anglicans.
Some Anglo-Catholics use the Anglican Breviary, an adaptation of the Pre-Vatican II Roman Rite and the Sarum Rite in the style of Cranmer's original "Book of Common Prayer", along with supplemental material from other western sources, including a common of Octaves, a common of Holy Women, and other material. It provides for the eight historical offices in one volume, but does not include the Little Office of the Blessed Virgin Mary, which was bound along with many editions of the "Breviarium Romanum". Other Anglo-Catholics use the Roman Catholic "Liturgy of the Hours" (US) or "Divine Office" (UK). Various Anglican adaptations of pre-Vatican II Roman office-books have appeared over the years, among the best known being Canon W. Douglas' translation of the 'Monastic Diurnal' into the idiom of the 'Book of Common Prayer'.
Historically, Anglican clergy have vested in cassock, surplice, and tippet for Morning and Evening Prayer, while bishops wear the rochet and chimere. In some monastic communities and Anglo-Catholic parishes, the officiant wears surplice or alb, stole, and cope when Evensong is celebrated solemnly.
The canons of the Church of England and some other Anglican provinces require clergy to read Morning and Evening Prayer daily, either in public worship or privately. According to Canon C.24, "Every priest having a cure of souls shall provide that, in the absence of reasonable hindrance, Morning and Evening Prayer daily and on appointed days the Litany shall be said in the church, or one of the churches, of which he is the minister." Canon C.26 stipulates that, "Every clerk (cleric) in Holy Orders is under obligation, not being let (prevented) by sickness or some other urgent cause, to say daily the Morning and Evening Prayer..." In other Anglican provinces, the Daily Office is not a canonical obligation but is strongly encouraged.
Methodist usage.
F. W. Macdonald, the biographer of The Rt. Rev. John Fletcher Hurst, stated that Oxford Methodism "with its almost monastic rigors, its living by rule, its canonical hours of prayer, is a fair and noble phase of the many-sided life of the Church of England".
The traditional 1784 Methodist Daily Office is contained in "The Sunday Service of the Methodists", which was written by John Wesley himself. It was consequently updated in the "Book of Offices", published in 1936 in Great Britain, and "The United Methodist Book of Worship", published in 1992 in the United States. Some Methodist religious orders publish the Daily Office to be used for that community, for example, "The Book of Offices and Services of The Order of Saint Luke" contains Morning, Mid-Morning, Noon, Mid-Afternoon, Evening, Compline and Vigil.
Liberal Catholic usage.
The Liberal Catholic Church, and many groups in the Liberal Catholic movement, also use a simple version of the Western canonical hours, said with various scripture reading and collects. According to the "Liturgy of the Liberal Catholic Church," the Scriptures used are generally limited to the readings of the day, and the complete psalter is not incorporated unless at the discretion of the priest presiding, if as a public service, or of the devotee in private use. The Hours of the Liberal Rite consist of: Lauds, Prime, Sext, Vespers, and Complin. Its recitation is not obligatory on Liberal Catholic priests or faithful, according to current directs from the General Episcopal Synod.
Reformed usage.
Some Reformed churches—notably the Presbyterian Church (USA) and the United Church of Christ—have published daily office books adapted from the ancient structure of morning and evening prayer in the Western church, usually revised for the purpose of inclusive language.
"The New Century Psalter", published in 1999 by The Pilgrim Press, includes an inclusive-language revision of the psalms adapted from the New Revised Standard Version of the Bible with refrains and complete orders for Morning and Evening Prayer. Simple family prayers for morning, evening and the close of day are also provided.
"Book of Common Worship Daily Prayer", published in 1994 by Westminster John Knox Press, includes the daily offices from The Book of Common Worship of 1993, the liturgy of the Presbyterian Church USA. In addition to Morning and Evening Prayer there is a complete service for Compline. Its psalter—an inclusive-language revision of the psalter from the 1979 American Book of Common Prayer—also includes a collect for each psalm. Antiphons and litanies are provided for the seasons of the church year. A new "Book of Common Worship Daily Prayer" with expanded content was published in 2018. It adds a service for Mid-Day Prayer. Its new psalter is from Evangelical Lutheran Worship.
Both books are intended for ecumenical use and can be used with any daily lectionary.