Embracing my inner Carthusian? An experience praying communally in the middle of the night

I wanted to share with you a recent experience in ministry that was moving to me. 

Let me begin by engaging your imagination. Suppose you leave your house in the dark of night and make your way to your parish, which you find quiet and dimly lit, mostly by candles.

As you settle in to the silence, at the appointed time, all the lights except the candles are extinguished, and for the next hour or more, you pray together with those gathered, sometimes using a small light as you chant Psalms or other canticles from sacred Scripture to simple melodies, sometimes listening in the quiet candlelight and meditating on a reading from the Bible or the church fathers. It is unhurried, peaceful, punctuated by times of silence so that you might listen for the voice of God, both in the divinely inspired words you are praying and in the interior silence of your own heart. 

Would that appeal to you? 

It does to me, and one day I found myself curious to know how common that was, so I asked on Facebook. I was thrilled to learn I was not alone in harboring an inner Carthusian. Quite a number of people found that prospect appealing and wanted to try it. 

So that’s what we did in one of the parishes I serve on the eve of Pentecost. 

The prayer we were praying is from what’s called the Liturgy of the Hours, or the Divine Office, which clergy and religious are obligated to pray, in whole or in part, every day. In fact, at our ordination as deacons, one of the promises we make is to pray this prayer “with and for the People of God.” It’s a prayer I have grown to deeply love, and one I teach as often as I can. 

In the current form of the Divine Office, with the reforms of the Second Vatican Council, there are seven parts to it (called “hours”) that can be prayed in any given day. 

The “hour” we were praying at midnight on Pentecost was Matins, often called the Office of Readings, and its recent history is interesting. Historically, it had a character as a night office of praise. If you have ever watched the movie “Into Great Silence” (which I recommend), when the Carthusian monks the movie follows gather in their chapel in the deep night to pray, Matins is what they’re praying. 

Vatican II, trying to make the Divine Office more accessible to lay people and less demanding on busy clergy, revised Matins so that it could be prayed either in its historical character as a night office or at any hour of the day. Like every hour of the Divine Office, it involves praying with the Psalms, but what distinguishes it is its two rich, long readings, or “lessons,” one from the Bible and another from a spiritual writer. 

For those who want to pray it as a night hour, the church also offers an extended form, called a vigil, with canticles from the Old Testament, a Gospel reading, and an optional homily. 

That’s what we did. 

Around now you may be wondering: Why pray in the middle of the night? What’s the big deal? One answer is that it is in imitation of Jesus, who is recorded in the Gospels as having spent nights in prayer. 

The official instruction for the Liturgy of the Hours suggests it’s good for the spiritual life. “The Fathers and spiritual writers have frequently encouraged the faithful, especially those who practice the contemplative life, to pray at night,” it says. “Such prayer gives expression and stimulus to our hope in the Lord’s return: ‘At midnight the cry went up: See, the bridegroom is coming, go out to meet him’ (Matthew 25:6); ‘Keep watch, then, for you do not know when the master of the house is coming, whether late or at midnight or at cockcrow or in the morning, so that if he comes unexpectedly he may not find you sleeping’ (Mark 13:35-36).” 

Having done it now, one thing I notice is how my conception of it evolved. Initially, I thought in terms of urgent petition, of the need to break out of routine and make a small sacrifice of some sleep as a way of begging God for an outpouring of graces. 

But as I planned and prepared for the liturgy, that changed. After all, in some monasteries this would be routine, and this liturgy has no overt intercessions in the way we have them at Mass or at Lauds and Vespers in the Divine Office. Instead we have verse after verse of Psalms and canticles to pray and long readings to ponder. Many words cross our lips and ears, but it’s a liturgy more about listening than speaking. It’s more quiet presence than big energy. 

Although it was nearly 1 a.m. when we finished, it felt too short. I was simultaneously tired and energized, like I often am after the Easter Vigil, and I struggled to sleep. 

This seems to be a very rare thing to do in a parish, and it’s easy to see why. Even beyond adding another liturgy in the middle of the night, there are, to my knowledge, no ready-made liturgical books a parish can just buy and use for this. There’s a lot to pull together. 

Still, I think there are lessons we can take. A couple of dozen people came out in the dark night for this, and many told me they were moved by it. We didn’t do anything fancy, just simple Psalm tones, but it was beautiful. We took our time, made room for silence, and let the Holy Spirit speak through the liturgy. 

Would it benefit us, from time to time, to pray at night in some form, even individually, or in the form of a holy hour before the Blessed Sacrament? Is there bigger thirst for this kind of simple, quiet, reflective liturgical prayer than we might expect? Might these things not be a remedy for us in an age of noise and distraction and glowing screens? 

Those questions seem to me worth pondering. 

Deacon Kyle Eller is editor of The Northern Cross. Reach him at [email protected]