Using an Ordo Part 3 - Days vs feasts

 

In the last post in this series I looked at the impact of the level of the day on the Office for Sundays and Class IV days.  Today I want to move on to Class III days and feasts. 

Higher level days 

And this seems a good point to note a key distinction, between Class I, II and III ‘days’ of various kinds, and feasts. 

Higher level ‘days’ (as opposed to feasts) basically take two forms.  

First they can mark the fact that a day is part of a special season of the year, such as Advent and Lent, with special seasonal and daily texts associated with it.  During the first part of Advent, for example, weekdays are ‘Class III’, and have antiphons of the Advent week at Prime to None, and their own canticle antiphons for each day.  In the second, more intense part of Advent, the days are Class II, and have a complex mix of texts for the days of the week, date and Advent day. 

The other type of higher level day - things like Vigils, days in the Christmas Octave, Ash Wednesday, and Ember Days - are more eccentric in the way they are marked, so you need to be careful to consult the rubrics in your Diurnal or other book on them. 

Feasts, by contrast, have more set patterns that you can learn and remember. 

Class III feasts – and Advent days 

Consider for example, a Class III feast, of which we had St Clement this week: 

Monday 23 November – St Clement, Class III; St Felicitas, Memorial 

Divinum Officium provides a little more information, on the type of saint, which can be important if you need to draw on the texts of the relevant Common: 

S. Clementis I Papæ et Martyris III. classis 

And the Le Barroux Ordo gives the same information, as usual in more abbreviated form: 

FII 23 S. Clementis I Pp. M. 3cl….Cm. S. Felicitatis M. 

For most Class III feasts:

·       At Matins, the invitatory antiphon, hymn, chapter and versicle are either specific to the feast or taken from the Common; at least one reading and responsory, as well as the collect, will be of the feast;

·       At Lauds and Vespers, the psalms an antiphons are of the day of the week; the chapter, responsory, hymn, versicle, canticle antiphons and collect will be of the feast (or from the relevant Common);

·       At Prime to None the antiphon will be of the feast or from the Common;

·       At Terce to None, the chapter, versicle and collect are of the feast (or taken from the Common).

Advent weekdays basically follow this pattern as well, with antiphons each week (taken from Sunday Lauds) at Prime to None, but the default antiphons at Lauds and Vespers.

There is, however, one exception to the ‘psalms and antiphons of the day of the week’ rule at Lauds and Vespers, namely, where a feast has a specific set of antiphons set out in the sanctorale.  

St Clement is one of the exceptions!