How To: The Daily Office

Clergy commend a variety of spiritual practices and disciplines to our people in Lent. Most of what we suggest is just cribbed directly from the Prayer Book which, in the Ash Wednesday exhortation, urges Christians in this season to engage in “self-examination and repentance…prayer, fasting, and self-denial…[and] reading and meditating on God’s holy Word.” We commend these practices, but we do not always make clear what resources are available to the people of God to pursue them, or explain how those resources are to be used.

I have written before regarding the Daily Office–the fundamental Anglican rhythm of daily Morning and Evening Prayer (supplemented in The Book of Common Prayer 1979 by Noonday Prayer, An Order of Worship for the Evening, and Compline). But a recent good question from a new parishioner made me realize that I have never taken the time to give a step-by-step guide to praying the Daily Office.

In my Dispatch today, I want to walk you through the basic information you need to pray Morning and Evening Prayer, either alone or with others. (In what follows I focus primarily on Morning Prayer, as it has more options and can be a bit more confusing. However, nearly all of what you find below will be relevant to Evening Prayer as well.)

While the services of the Daily Office can be enriched with seasonal variations or emphases, the traditional structure is as follows:

1. Opening Sentence
2. Confession of Sin
3. The Psalter
4. An Old Testament Lesson
5. A Canticle or Hymn of Praise
6. A New Testament Lesson
7. A Canticle or Hymn of Praise
8. The Apostles’ Creed
9. The Lord’s Prayer
10. The Suffrages
11. The Collect of the Day
12. Additional Collects
13. Additional Prayers
14. Closing Sentence

To boil that down even further, the Daily Office is, at its most fundamental,

1. Psalms
2. Scripture
3. Praise
4. Prayer

This basic pattern of daily study and prayer stretches back millennia. It developed first in the Jewish synagogue, and the Acts of the Apostles makes clear that it was maintained by the earliest followers of the risen Jesus. As Christianity spread and the monastic tradition developed, monks and nuns took literally the Psalmist’s words in Psalm 119:164–“Seven times a day do I praise thee, because of thy righteous judgments”–and gathered in their churches for seven short services of scripture and prayer throughout each day and night. At the time of the English Reformation, Archbishop Thomas Cranmer condensed those seven monastic offices into just two for The Book of Common Prayer 1549: Mattins and Evensong, aka Morning Prayer and Evening Prayer.

But enough history. How does one actually pray the Daily Office? 

First, you need two books: a Prayer Book and a Bible. Let’s start with the Prayer Book. As with most of our liturgies, the Daily Office comes in two flavors–Rite I and Rite II. Rite I cleaves pretty closely to Cranmer’s language, reaching back almost 500 years. Rite II ditches “thee” and “thou,” but in its substance follows the historic pattern. Ultimately the version you use is a question of personal preference. I am a Rite I fan myself, but I deeply appreciate the additional canticles (we’ll talk about those in a moment) that are available in Rite II. My personal practice for many years has been to use Rite II in the morning and Rite I in the evening in order to get a balanced diet of both. Some folks vary their use by season.

In the morning, open your Prayer Book to page 37 for Rite I, or page 75 for Rite II. You will find a variety of verses from Scripture appropriate to various seasons of the Church Year. Advent comes first, then Christmas, Epiphany, Lent, Holy Week, Eastertide (through Pentecost), Trinity Sunday, All Saints and other Major Saints’ Days, Occasions of Thanksgiving, and finally “At Any Time,” which we usually call Ordinary Time. These are the Opening Sentences. They begin the service and set the tone for worship. In personal use, they can be helpful to prepare your heart and mind for prayer. But notice that the rubric permits skipping the Opening Sentences altogether and beginning with the versicle “O Lord, open thou our lips.”

After the Opening Sentences comes a Confession. This, too, can be omitted. But it is usually a good thing, whenever we turn to God in prayer, to begin with an acknowledgment of the ways we have failed to follow in His ways, and to ask His forgiveness and aid for amendment of life. When a layperson is leading Morning or Evening Prayer or praying the Office alone, the words of absolution shift from “you” to “us,” i.e. from “grant you absolution” to “grant us absolution.”

The Opening Sentences and the Confession and Absolution are intended to prepare us for the Office proper. That begins on page 42 (Rite I) or page 80 (Rite II) with a versicle and response quotation of Psalm 51:15. The officiant says “O Lord, open thou our lips,” and the people respond “And our mouth shall show forth thy praise.” We ask God to open us–lips, mouths, minds, and hearts–as we approach His Word in both the recitation of the Psalms and the reading of the rest of the Scriptures.

Having been opened and enlivened by the Spirit of God, we offer our praise to the Holy Trinity. This is the first use of the short hymn Gloria Patri–“Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Ghost: as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end. Amen”–which as we shall see is repeated several times in the Office.

An Invitatory is then said before the appointed Psalter portion of the day. This Invitatory is usually Psalm 95 (or a portion of it), or Psalm 100. However, in Eastertide a special Invitatory comprised of various Biblical reflections on the Resurrection of Jesus may be used instead.

Seasonal Antiphons may be said before and after the Invitatory. These correspond with the seasonal Opening Sentences at the beginning of the service, and can help to focus on the meaning of each liturgical season in the course of the regular repetition of Psalm 95 or 100. When used in a corporate setting, the Officiant typically says the first part of the antiphon–e.g. “The Lord is full of compassion and mercy” in Lent–and the people respond with “O come, let us adore him.”

The recitation of Psalms is the core of the Office. Many of these ancient verses are traditionally attributed to King David. They were certainly known and prayed by Jews for generations before being written down, and the Gospels witness to the fact that Jesus often quoted the Psalms.

Medieval monks and nuns endeavored to pray all 150 Psalms each week, arranged in a distinct order and spread across the seven services they prayed daily. Cranmer recognized that such an arrangement was not feasible for ordinary clergy and the laity, and so instead divided the Psalter into a 30-day continuous cycle. In Cranmer’s system between 20 and 50 Psalm verses are said each day morning and evening, and whenever a 31st day crops up the 30th day Psalms are repeated.

If you flip to the Psalter in your Prayer Book–it begins on page 585–you will see “First Day: Morning Prayer” just above Psalm 1, and “First Day: Evening Prayer” just above Psalm 6. This is the same ordering that Cranmer set forth nearly 500 years ago, and the Psalms are still sung this way daily by choirs in cathedrals and churches and prayed this way daily by small groups and individuals. I strongly encourage the use of the 30-day Psalm cycle for both personal and corporate use. Yes, it means a substantial daily diet of Psalms. But that is part of the point of the Office.

Should the 30-day Psalm cycle prove too daunting, there is an alternative selection of Psalms appointed in the Daily Office Lectionary. Let’s turn to that now. Beginning on pages 936 and 937 of the Prayer Book we find Psalms and Scripture readings for Morning and Evening Prayer each day in a two-year cycle. With your Prayer Book lying open, Year One is on the left hand page and Year Two is on the right. If the calendar year ends in an odd number (e.g. 2025), the Year One lectionary readings are used, while in even-numbered years the Year Two readings are used. The only exception to this rule results from the fact that the Church Year actually begins in Advent, and so the Daily Office Lectionary for the coming calendar year is used from the First Sunday of Advent to December 31. So, in Advent 2024 we began using the Year One Daily Office Lectionary readings.

The Daily Office Lectionary Psalms for each morning and evening are listed above the readings, just by their numbers, separated by a small symbol. The numbers to the left are the Psalms for the morning, and the numbers to the right are the Psalms for the evening. The Psalter portion appointed in the Daily Office Lectionary is slightly shorter than the 30-day cycle, but the Psalms do not always follow sequentially.

Whichever pattern for reciting the Psalter one chooses, the Gloria Patri is repeated either after the end of each individual Psalm or at the conclusion of the entire Psalter portion.

While the Psalter is the heart of the Daily Office, Cranmer’s great desire was to encourage both public and private engagement with Scripture each morning and evening. As he makes clear in his Preface to the first Prayer Book, he sought to recover what he understood to be the the historic practice of the Church Fathers who 
“so ordered the matter, that all the whole Bible (or the greatest part thereof) should be read over once in the year, intending thereby, that the Clergy, and especially such as were Ministers of the congregation, should (by often reading, and meditation of God’s word) be stirred up to godliness themselves, and be more able to exhort others by wholesome doctrine, and to confute them that were adversaries to the truth.”

To this end, Cranmer developed a lectionary that began on January 2 (January 1 being the Feast of the Circumcision of Jesus and therefore having special readings appointed) with Genesis 1 as the first lesson at Morning Prayer and Matthew 1 as the second. At Evening Prayer, Genesis 2 was appointed as the first lesson, and Romans 1 as the second. With this pattern, the bulk of the Old Testament was read over the course of the year, and the New Testament was read through thrice.

Although Cranmer did make an effort to avoid less obviously edifying passages–for example, he skips Genesis 10 entirely, as it is a long list of hard-to-pronounce names–his scheme did result in many long and sometimes tedious readings with no connection to the liturgical calendar of the Church. Subsequent revisers of the Prayer Book have therefore taken substantial liberty in updating the Daily Office Lectionary with an eye both to keeping the readings at a manageable length and ensuring that they are seasonally appropriate. Even so, a lesson from the Old Testament is still always the first reading at Morning and Evening Prayer, and a lesson from the New Testament is always the second.

You will notice that the Daily Office Lectionary in The Book of Common Prayer 1979 only includes three lessons for each day: one from the Old Testament, one from Acts or the Epistles, and one from the Gospels. If a congregation or individual prays both Morning and Evening Prayer daily, the rubrics recommend using the Old Testament passage from the alternate year for the first lesson at Evening Prayer. The Cranmerian tradition is for the second lesson at Morning Prayer to be from the Gospels, and the second lesson at Evening Prayer from Acts or the Epistles.

Having discussed the intricacies of the Daily Office Lectionary as it is found in the Prayer Book, I should note that for strictly personal use a different pattern of Scripture reading may be followed. Perhaps you want to attempt Cranmer’s original scheme. Perhaps, at our bishop’s invitation, you are already reading the whole Bible through in a year. Or perhaps you have your own accustomed approach to Scripture study. You could easily utilize your personal practice within the format of Morning or Evening Prayer. But one aspect of the Office lectionaries both traditional or modern that should always be maintained is the deliberate balance of both Old and New Testament readings.

Having read or heard Scripture, we return to the Prayer Book and again praise God with the canticles beginning on page 47 or page 85. The monastic offices included a variety of canticles or hymns of praise to be sung in response to the readings from Scripture. These varied according to the service, the day of the week, and the season. Cranmer retained two canticles for ordinary use at Morning Prayer–the Te Deum, a hymn attributed to Saint Ambrose, and the Benedictus Dominus Deus, a song sung by Zechariah, the father of John the Baptist, in Luke 1:68-79. In Lent, in place of the celebratory Te Deum, Cranmer provided for the saying of the Benedicite Omnia Opera, a hymn found in the Septuagint version of the Book of Daniel. At Evening Prayer, the two unvarying canticles appointed were the Magnificat, or Song of Mary, found in Luke 1:46-55 and the Nunc Dimittis, or Song of Simeon, found in Luke 2:29-32.

These historic canticles are available in the current edition of Morning and Evening Prayer, along with a wide variety of others songs and hymns derived from the Bible. A Table of Suggested Canticles can be found on pages 144 and 145 of the Prayer Book, once again giving both daily and seasonal variations. My personal preference is to vary canticles at Morning Prayer according to the Table, but to retain the traditional use of the Magnificat and the Nunc Dimittis at Evening Prayer. The Gloria Patri is repeated once again after any canticle that does not specifically invoke the Trinity.

After praising God through the canticles, we confess our faith in God through the words of the Apostles’ Creed on page 53 or 96. This daily (or twice daily) recitation of the Baptismal creed reminds us of our call and consecration as God’s people in the world, and places whatever particular passages of Scripture we may have read that day in the wider context of His whole plan of salvation.

Perhaps you have read this far–for which feat you deserve crowns in heaven!–and have been asking yourself, “So when exactly at Morning or Evening Prayer do we actually pray?” Well I am glad you asked. The Creed completed, we begin our prayers.

The Lord’s Prayer is always said at each Office. Rite II includes both the traditional language and modern language versions, and here again a daily or seasonal variation can be helpful. Following the Lord’s Prayer there are Suffrages made up of texts drawn largely from the Psalms. Suffrages B at Morning Prayer comprises the traditional conclusion of the Te Deum rendered in versicle and response form.

After the Lord’s Prayer and Suffrages comes the Collect of the Day. The Collects for the Church Year are found beginning on page 159 for Rite I and on page 211. There are collects for every Sunday in the year, as well as for all major feast and fast days. There are also a number of generic collects to be found in “The Common for Saints,” and thematic or topical collects in “Various Occasions.” At the Daily Office, the collect appointed for the preceding Sunday is generally used as the Collect of the Day, unless the day itself happens to be a major feast.

The rubrics of the current Prayer Book grant the Officiant significant leeway in choosing additional prayers and collects at the Office. The historic practice was to use three collects at both Morning and Evening Prayer. The only requirement of the 1979 Office is that one of the prayers for mission on pages 57-58 or pages 100-101 is to be used whenever the Eucharist does not immediately follow.

Following the appointed collects, a hymn or anthem may be sung and additional prayers may be offered. At Choral Mattins or Evensong, this is the moment the choir offers an appropriate anthem reflecting on the themes of the readings and the day or season. Some people incorporate singing or listening to music into their personal or family practice of the Office. Others prefer to use this time to offer personal prayer requests and concerns.

The Office customarily ends with the General Thanksgiving and/or the Prayer of St. Chrysostom, followed by the concluding versicle and response and a Closing Sentence. As the Prayer of St. Chrysostom remembers that Christ is with us wherever two or three or gathered, it is not generally used when one prays the Office alone. The Closing Sentences are fewer in number and variety than the seasonal variations provided for the Opening Sentences, and yet they too have distinct emphases suitable for different times of the Church Year. I conclude this brief(ish) guide to praying the Office by offering all three:

The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Ghost be with us all, evermore.

May the God of hope fill us with all joy and peace in believing through the power of the Holy Spirit.

Glory to God whose power, working in us, can do infinitely more than we can ask or imagine: Glory to him from generation to generation in the Church, and in Christ Jesus for ever and ever.