PRAYING WITHOUT CEASING

 
Dominican Nuns               Bronx, New York

 

 

Chanting the Divine Office in choir.

Liturgical Prayer

The nuns gather in their choir seven times a day to chant the full Divine Office, offering praise, thanksgiving, and intercession to the Lord Jesus. The Mass, celebrated daily at the monastery, is the high point of their day, and the center from which all their prayer and activity flows.
 
The sisters keep turns during the day and night by their Perpetual Adoration of Our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament

 

Private Prayer

At intervals during the day, there are times for meditation, prayer, and lectio divina, the slow pondering of the Lord's Word in scripture, so that the sister may know the Lord not only in the "Breaking of the Bread," the Holy Eucharist, but also in the Holy Scriptures. It was said of St. Dominic that he always carried the Gospel of St. Matthew with him wherever he went. The daughter of St. Dominic loves and cherishes the Scriptures in the same way.

Sr. Mary of Jesus ponders God's Word in the choir.

Study

"Dominicans should love to study and study to love."  For the Dominican nun the discipline of study brings her to a greater knowledge of God and of the truths of the faith. It is both mind and heart-expanding, Beyond individual study projects, the community invites lecturers for classes on various subjects of interest to the nuns, particularly theology and Dominican life.

 

Sr. Anna consults a Biblical commentary in the monastery's well-stocked library.