Point IV. On Causes Excusing from the Recitation of the Hours

The causes excusing from the recitation of the Divine Office are 1º impossibility; 2º charity; 3º dispensation.

93. • I. Impossibility, whether physical or moral, which consists in grave difficulty of reciting the Office. Hence he is excused:

1º Who does not have a Breviary, because, for example, undertaking a journey, he forgot it, or lost it on the journey, with inability to procure another. If, however, through his own fault he forgot or lost it, or threw it away, he sinned gravely ¹, and the omission of the Hours is to be imputed to him. 2º Who labors under a grave illness, for example, fever, pain of the intestines or head; or who justly fears lest grave inconvenience follow from the recitation, etc. Hence he is sufficiently excused who prudently believes or fears that because of the recitation of the Office some notable heaviness of the head, or rawness of the stomach, or weariness of strength, or some other grave inconvenience would thence come upon him. - St. Ligorius, n. 154, note 1.

¹ Better say that this person has sinned gravely or lightly, according as the cause of the omission existed as gravely or lightly culpable.

3º One convalescing from grave illness can be excused for some days at the judgment of a prudent person, until his strength is restored. And this can be admitted even if the sick person already celebrates Mass. - St. Ligorius, ibid., note 2.

4º He also is excused who in time of persecution fears lest from the recitation of the Breviary he be betrayed; likewise he who labors gravely with his eyes, etc. - St. Ligorius, nn. 156 and 157, and others commonly.

II. Charity toward one's neighbor, that is, a grave occupation which cannot be omitted without scandal or notable detriment of the neighbor. Such occupation excuses from the recitation of the Office, because the natural precept of charity prevails over ecclesiastical law. Hence you are excused from the recitation of the Hours, either totally or partially,

1º If at night, about to recite the Office, for example Vespers, you are called immediately to a dying person, and time or convenience for discharging the obligation of the Office does not suffice for you.

2º If the whole day you are occupied in hearing confessions which, because of peculiar circumstances, cannot be deferred, for example, in sacred missions, and especially under their end, when you are about to depart, etc.

3º If you could not omit a sermon without scandal or detriment to reputation, and nevertheless time for preparing it would not suffice if the Office had to be recited.

4º If you are occupied the whole day in settling quarrels, or in assisting the sick, for example, in time of contagious disease, etc. - St. Ligorius, n. 156, and others.

94. • III. Legitimate dispensation, or one conceded by a legitimate Superior.

1º The obligation of reciting the Divine Office, since it is of ecclesiastical law, can be removed by ecclesiastical Superiors.

2º The Pope can validly concede this dispensation in every case, even without cause; but licitly from a reasonable cause, for example, because of excessive occupation, for quieting scruples, etc.

3º A Bishop also can dispense from this law, but not validly without sufficient cause, and only with someone in particular for a time, namely: 1º when there is doubt about moral inability, or about the gravity of a detriment to be feared; 2º when recourse to the Pope is difficult; 3º when the dispensation is sought on account of a cause which frequently recurs, for example, because of infirmity; 4º when the dispensation is sought for a brief time. - Thus St. Ligorius, n. 159. - Recall what was said in the Treatise on Laws, vol. 1, n. 115.

95. Questions. - QUESTION 1º. What must be done in doubt whether infirmity suffices for excusing or not?

Resp. 1º The sick person can commit himself to the judgment of a physician, as is said in Canon Law, ch. Fraternitatis, De frig. et mal.; 2º he can acquiesce in the judgment of the Superior, who in doubt also has power to dispense; 3º he can remit himself to the probable judgment of a prudent man; 4º indeed probably he can also stand by his own judgment, if he himself is able to form such a judgment. - St. Ligorius, n. 154 ².

² ** St. Alphonsus (bk. 4, n. 154) adds these things: If it is only doubtful whether the indisposition reaches so far as to excuse, as above; then, since the law of reciting is in possession and the doubt concerns the exemption, the law must certainly be fulfilled. This holds, however, when it is a pure doubt; otherwise if there is a probable judgment. Tournely, Roncaglia, Elbel, Anacletus, etc. In which you again see that, in the judgment of St. Alphonsus, the principle of possession certainly holds when it is a matter of negative doubt, but not where a probable opinion stands on the other side. See above, Vol. I, the Note to n. 80.

St. Alphonsus adds besides (ibid.): But what if, these things having been premised (namely those which Gury reports in this place), the doubt still persists? It is answered: if the doubt is whether the recitation would gravely harm him, then he is certainly not bound, indeed he cannot recite, because the natural right of preserving health is to be preferred to the precept of the Church, as Viva and the Salmanticenses say with others; unless he did it from love of virtue, the danger of death being excluded, according to what was said in bk. 3, n. 371, with Lugo, the Salmanticenses, Villalobos, etc. But these things are to be understood with discretion: 1. because, if the recitation would in fact gravely harm him, it would perhaps follow that afterwards he would have to be free from reciting for a longer time, which love of virtue ought rather to shun. 2. The citation of bk. 3, n. 371 seems perhaps less to the point. For the question there concerns Monks who by living austerely perhaps incur some loss of a longer life. On which matter Lugo, whom St. Alphonsus cites, has thus (De Iust., disp. 10, n. 32): It is inferred, seventhly, that penances, fasts, and mortifications of the flesh voluntarily undertaken are unlawful only when they would bring a notable hastening of death...; otherwise... it is not unlawful to perform those works, although some shortening of life, not notable, is feared. Now that danger of a harm perhaps to follow little by little differs considerably from the injury which by the very fact will bring grave harm to the one reciting.

QUESTION 2º. To what is a sick person bound, if he is certain that he cannot discharge the whole Office, but doubts whether he is able to recite a part?

Resp. Probably he is bound to nothing. For he is reasonably excused from the whole Office, lest he be distressed by scruples, not knowing how far he can and is bound to recite; indeed such anxiety, as St. Ligorius says, would bring him great harm. - St. Ligorius, n. 154, at the end.

96. • QUESTION 3º. Is one who is in any way impeded from reciting the whole Breviary bound to the part which he can recite?

Resp. Entirely yes. The reason is evident. For the obligation of the Breviary falls on its individual parts, since the thing prescribed is divisible. This is also established from proposition 54 condemned by Innocent XI, which lies thus: "He who cannot recite Matins and Lauds, but can recite the remaining Hours, is bound to nothing, because the greater part draws the lesser to itself." Therefore he who lacks a Breviary, and knows nothing else by memory except Lauds or Compline, is bound under grave obligation to recite those.

QUESTION 4º. Are you bound to recite the Psalms if you have only these before your hands, or know them by memory, with the Lessons and Responsories left aside?

Resp. More probably, yes. The reason is that, since you can recite a notable part of the Office, there is no cause why you should be excused from it. - St. Ligorius, n. 158. - Lacroix, n. 1220. - Sporer, etc. Yet several say that you are bound to nothing, because then the form prescribed by St. Pius V is lacking. Moreover the opinion of these seems sufficiently probable. Nor does the above-cited proposition 54 condemned by Innocent XI stand in the way, because in that proposition there is question of one who can complete entire Hours. - But the following rule is handed down by St. Ligorius and others ³: If you can recite as much as is a little Hour, you are bound under grave obligation to recite it; but if less, you are not obliged to recite anything even under venial obligation, because such a small part, taken separately, is not judged appreciable for the end intended by the law.

³ ** St. Alphonsus had prefaced this rule with these things: "Busembaum with Bonacina, Holzmann with Illsung, and Croix with Laymann and Filliuccius, rightly assign this rule, that if you can recite as much as a little Hour, you are bound under grave obligation to recite it."

But, what you will surely wonder at, neither Busembaum, nor Bonacina, nor Holzmann, nor Illsung, nor Laymann, nor Filliuccius has anything about a rule of this sort. Therefore Croix alone is the one who (Bk. 4, n. 1220) wished to deduce it from Illsung, who again entirely wrongly wished to deduce another rule of his from Laymann. But from Croix this rule flowed into St. Alphonsus, and from the Holy Doctor into Gury, and into Scavini, who (tr. 5, disp. 1, ch. 2, art. 3, § 5, n. 1, in note) wrote: "Behold the rule: if you can recite as much as a little Hour, you are bound under grave obligation."

I said that Illsung wrongly wished to deduce a certain rule of his from Laymann. For after he had stated beforehand (tr. 5, disp. 1, q. 1, art. 6, n. 41) that he who cannot say even an entire Hour is not obliged to say the Psalms, or prayers, or parts of Hours, he adds: "Laymann is still more severe; for he judges that, although Matins is only one Hour, he who could say all its Psalms, but not the Lessons because of lack of a book, would altogether be bound to say them. Hence he says that, provided someone can say only as much as suffices for an omission mortally sinful, as indeed all the Psalms of Matins, exceeding the smallness of the other Hours, would suffice, by this very fact there is an obligation of saying; which also seems true to me." But from this Croix fashioned his rule, reasoning thus: From Laymann and Illsung, someone is obliged to say that whose omission is gravely sinful. But the omission of one little Hour is gravely sinful. Therefore he who can recite as much as one little Hour is bound to this under grave obligation. But Croix indeed drew this inference, not Illsung, who, with the context considered, together with the mark of a more severe opinion attributed to Laymann in comparison with others, seems to be understood of a notable part of one and the same Hour which is omitted. Otherwise it would be inferred that one who knows by memory only two Psalms of Matins, the last two from Lauds, and two from Vespers, is now, as if from the opinion of Illsung, bound under grave obligation to recite these, since they exceed, not merely equal, the measure of one little Hour; which certainly Illsung did not even dream of.

Moreover Croix and Illsung attribute both Croix's rule and Illsung's other rule to Laymann wholly wrongly. For he (Bk. 1, tr. 4, ch. 19, n. 6), after positing this thesis: "If the precept is about an indivisible thing, he who is excused from a substantial part of it is excused from the whole," then subjoins this exception: "Unless the part of the precept which cannot be observed is slight, so that he who observes the remainder is judged morally to fulfill the precept as to substance." But he adds an example also from the Breviary, saying: "It is similar if someone has lost his Breviary, and in the Matins of some feria knows all the Psalms by memory, but does not know the three Lessons with the Responsories, he is obliged to recite the Psalms, because then the part which is omitted is not notable." And from these things indeed Illsung generally inferred that one is obliged to recite the Psalms of Matins, even if someone lacks the Lessons; and further he inferred as if from the mouth of Laymann a certain general principle about the obligation of reciting that whose omission would be gravely sinful. But both of these are vainly ascribed to Laymann. For Laymann immediately follows: "But something else must be said about Matins of nine Lessons, the omission of which is judged notable; wherefore he who cannot recite that part seems to be excused from the whole." Therefore Laymann did not say generally that the Psalms of Matins must be recited if the Lessons are lacking; but he asserted this only concerning the lack of three Lessons in the Matins of a feria. Much less does he generally admit the obligation of reciting that whose omission constitutes grave fault; for is not the omission of the nine Psalms of Matins grave? Yet he excuses from reciting them one who lacks the nine Lessons. Namely, he takes the norm not from the part of the Hour considered in itself, but from its proportion to preserving the substance of the precept, which he says must be measured, not in relation to the whole Office, but in relation to individual Hours. Therefore he subjoins (l.c., n. 7): "If the precept is about a divisible thing, he who is excused from one part must nevertheless observe the other, since in that part the substance of the precept can consist; for example, a priest who for some cause is impeded from reciting Matins is nevertheless bound to recite the little Hours and Vespers, if he can." From these things it is also clear that Bonacina (De Pecc., disp. 2, q. 8, punct. 1, n. 7) did not rightly number Laymann among those who assert that he who cannot recite the greater part of the Divine Office is not bound to the lesser, since otherwise Bonacina had established the same principle as Laymann (l.c., n. 4), namely that he who cannot conveniently fulfill the whole precept is bound to fulfill part, provided it is a notable part and is judged intended by the Superior, provided namely, as Laymann says, that in that part the substance of the precept is preserved. And from these things we are again taught how cautiously allegations are to be trusted, although the authors apud whom they stand may seem more accurate.

97. • QUESTION 5º. Are you bound to employ a companion if you are not able to recite the Hours alone?

Resp. Yes, if you easily find someone whom you can conveniently employ. The reason is, 1º because then there is not inability properly so called; 2º because the precepts of the Church require ordinary diligence for their fulfillment. But no means is more ordinary than to employ in recitation a companion whom perhaps you can easily find. - Thus commonly. - St. Ligorius, n. 158. - Salmanticenses, etc.

QUESTION 6º. Are you bound to employ a companion, with a stipend paid, if you cannot conveniently find another?

Resp. No, according to the common opinion. The reason is that the means is wholly extraordinary, and also is full of inconveniences; whence the Church is not judged to oblige to it. Indeed, if a companion who will recite with you gratis does not promptly occur, you are not bound to seek someone with anxiety and solicitude, because this too would become an extraordinary means. - Thus the Salmanticenses, ch. 3, n. 44. - Suarez, On Religion, tom. 2, bk. 4, ch. 8, n. 12.