I arrived at our “Curia Sant’Ambrogio” last year, on Friday the 13th (!) of January, 2017. The Curia is the residence in Rome of the Abbot President of our Subiaco Cassinese Congregation of Benedictines, as well as of his assistants, numbering four monks. We also have two student monks who reside with us while pursuing studies. A little later in 2017 a third student monk arrived, bringing the number of resident monks up to eight. In the summer a ninth monk came to live with us, who works in the Vatican at the Congregation for Religious.
At Sant’Ambrogio we follow the full round of monastic prayers in common, called the Divine Office, Opus Dei or Liturgy of the Hours of the Church. We also celebrate daily Mass together. All of these take place in the small house chapel on the second floor of Sant’Ambrogio. The Blessed Sacrament is reserved in the chapel, a permanent altar is there for celebrating Mass and there is a small choir or seating area for the monks and guests who are often lodging with us.
Our Abbot President Guillermo Leon Arboleda Tamayo, who moved from his monastery in Colombia to Sant’Ambrogio after his election as President in September of 2016, asked me after I arrived in Rome if we could work on singing more of the Divine Office and parts of the Mass each day. I was happy to lend a hand, having done some of this kind of work in my monastery over the past decades.
At Sant’Ambrogio we use a one-volume book in Italian for the Divine Office, published by the Abbey of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary, at Praglia, Italy. The book follows what is called “Schema B,” of the Liturgy of the Hours, that is, a format with distribution of the 150 psalms over the course of one week.
The canonical hours that the Praglia book contains include Vigils, Lauds, Terce, Sext, None, Vespers and Compline. We pray all of these hours together in chapel. Our day begins with Vigils at 5:30 am each morning, and concludes with Compline at about 8:15 pm, once we have finished dishwashing after supper (cena).
When I arrived at Sant’Ambrogio the only singing at the Divine Office was at the end of Compline, when we sing the “Salve Regina” or one of the other songs to the Blessed Mother, often called, “Marian Antiphons,” assigned according to the liturgical season. Otherwise, we recited the Liturgy of the Hours, including the hymns, psalms, canticles, etc. There is nothing wrong with reciting, but monks traditionally chant or sing some, much or all of the Divine Office.
To sing our prayers, said Saint Augustine, is to “pray twice.” While singing doesn’t constitute or guarantee “better prayer,” it has been part and parcel of the monastic routine for many centuries and considered conducive to a prayerful attitude and sound, which simply reciting the prayers tends to lack.
As only two of the residents at Sant’Ambrogio are Italian, and the rest hailing from Colombia, Burkino Faso, France, Vietnam, Brazil, and the United States (yours truly), I concluded with the Abbot President that probably the logical direction was to focus on praying the Office in Italian, since all of us were and are, to one degree or another, learning or perfecting Italian, rather than using the Latin books that are also available for the Liturgy of the Hours. With that in mind, and my own familiarity with Gregorian chant and adapting it to English, we began using melodies from the Gregorian repertoire, with Italian words.
Beginning the Divine Office with, “O God, Come to my assistance, O Lord, make haste to help me,” is now done using a traditional chant melody, with Italian words. I did that adaptation and for the hymns we sing, at Lauds, Sext and Vespers, I located from various sources simple melodies, a number of them incorporating Gregorian chant tunes, with Italian words.
I found in our local “Chinese store,” as it is called, run by immigrants from China, who sell nearly everything in a relatively tiny space, some booklets of clear polyurethane that can neatly hold many pages in “sleeves,” a handy way to place the music we use into one place. These booklets measure 5 ½ inches by 8 ½ inches. As such, we monks only need the Praglia book of the Liturgy of the Hours and the “hymn book” created by us to facilitate the singing with the music and words together.
In addition to most of the hymns at the Office, we sing the canticles from the Gospel, at Lauds (called the Benedictus) and at Vespers (called the Magnificat), using the Gregorian chant modes. We use chant “mode six” at Lauds and “mode eight” at Vespers. These are simple tones that are easy to pick up, able to be applied to the Italian text, and add a dimension of solemnity to our celebrations of the Liturgy of the Hours.
For Mass each day we normally sing the short Entrance Antiphon assigned by the Church for each week or day of the Liturgical Year. These texts are direct quotes from Sacred Scripture, usually the Gospels or the Book of Psalms, and are most often four short lines, easily adapted to a “four-line” psalm tone. These tones are more modern in origin than Gregorian chant melodies, but dignified and melodic nonetheless. The scriptural Entrance antiphons, rather than ancient or modern hymns, are the recommended texts for the beginning of Mass throughout the year.
We regularly sing the Kyrie Eleison (Lord have mercy), at daily Mass, using the traditional Gregorian chant melodies, and when a Gloria is assigned, as on Sundays and Solemnities, we sing one of the Gregorian versions, especially Mass VIII, “of the Angels,” that is fairly simple and familiar to many monks and Catholics in general. We have also adapted the Latin “Ambrosian Gloria IV,” with its distinctive Gregorian chant melody, to the official Italian text.
We also sing the Sanctus (Holy, Holy, Holy) in Latin each day and the Agnus Dei (Lamb of God) in Latin, with one of the traditional Gregorian melodies. Hence, while mostly praying in Italian, we do incorporate some Latin as well, which most of us know to one degree or another, especially those of the sixty years or older age group! The younger brethren learn them pretty quickly.
Perhaps some people imagine that all monks can sing or read music. This is not the case, hence the importance of “keeping things simple” from my point of view. To me that means dignified as well as simple, and thus far, chant or chant-based melodies do that best.
The Abbot President has a good singing voice and he usually leads one side of choir and I the other. As in most monastic settings, we sing from “side to side,” called “antiphonally,” with usually four or more of us on each “side” of our small house chapel.
Fortunately our chapel is conducive for prayer and for our daily celebrations of the Liturgy of the Hours and Holy Mass. We do our best and hopefully glorify the Lord in our efforts, not striving so much for “perfect pitch,” but for pure hearts.
