Let Psalm 66 be said without an
antiphon, drawing it out a little, that all may arrive for Psalm 50, which is
to be said with an Alleluia. After this let two other psalms be said according
to custom. Then let the psalms of praise
follow; then one lesson from the Apostle, the response, the Ambrosian hymn, the
verse, the canticle from the Gospel, the litany, and it is finished.
The
name, ‘Lauds’ comes from the Latin laus
meaning ‘praise’ or ‘glory’. Once the
night is over and the sun has risen, the monks come back to church and sing
another set of psalms. We do it right
after dawn to celebrate the victory of light over darkness—the rising of the
Sun (and the rising of the Son).
Remember that the office of Vigils began with “How many are my foes, O
Lord. How many are rising up against me”
(Psalm 3). But Lauds begins on a
completely different note with Psalm 66: “Shout
for joy to God, all the earth! Sing to
the glory of his name!”
The
sun has risen. The battle against evil
is won.
But
the Rule of Saint Benedict is no feel-good self-help book. No “I’m okay.
You’re okay” here. Sure, Benedict
wants his monks to be happy, but he wants real happiness, not the lollipops-and-glitter
happiness that you see on TV; because there is no true happiness without
penitence. Until we have a really
accurate understanding of our sinfulness, until we recognize the depth of our
unworthiness, we can’t possibly appreciate the miracle of our redemption.
And
this is where guilt comes in. Folks are
always criticizing Christians for their sense of guilt as though it were
something that keeps us repressed and miserable. But I’m not convinced that guilt is such a
bad thing. After all, if you do
something bad, you should feel guilty
about it, just as when you see something evil, you should feel angry about
it. Perhaps our parents’ generation
spent too much time feeling guilty about stuff, but I don’t think that’s our
problem. We may indeed have problems
with low self-esteem (the popularity of reality television suggests as much),
but I have to wonder if that’s because we don’t feel guilty enough. Think about it: why do you feel guilty when
you do something bad? Because you have
done something unworthy of yourself. Get
rid of that guilt, and what do you have?
Someone who does something bad and is okay with it because that’s the
sort of person he is.[1]
At
Lauds (as at Mass), we start off our celebration by first acknowledging our
sinfulness and unworthiness—by coming face-to-face with our guilt—only then can
we start the party. Why? Because we know that all of creation and life
itself is a gift. We doesn’t deserve any
of it, and we doesn’t have to earn it either.
So we sings, “Shout for joy to God, all the earth! Sing to the glory of His name!”
[1]
One proviso: There’s a difference between guilt
(feeling bad for doing a bad thing) and shame (the self-punishment and
self-hatred that comes from obsessing over it).
When you feel guilty, you say to yourself, “I did a bad thing.” When you feel shame, you say to yourself,
“I’m a bad person.” Guilt is a good
thing. Shame—of the sort I’ve
described—is not.
No comments:
Post a Comment