Latest updates...slow going

It has been several months since my last update, and for that I apologize. I've had a number of things come up which have slowed work. I'll explain a little more in detail later.

BUT! I have made significant progress. First, the revisions to the Common of Saints are complete. There still may be a few things to do, but I'm confident that it will be much easier to use now, especially for III class feasts.

I can't recall if this was done in my last edition, but I've got most of the bugs worked out of the latin hyphenation. It's probably not even close to perfect, but it should be a LOT better. It's also working well enough now to fully justify the text, so I personally think that looks much better.

I've made some significant changes to the way the hymns appear. The first line of each strophe now begins with a slightly enlarged red letter, helping to denote the break a little better. I've also changed the font size, so they aren't quite so tiny any more.

Speaking of font size, I've bumped the whole thing up just a bit. It's not a huge jump, and it still probably won't be big enough for some; but it's now about the same size of most of my old breviaries.

Now on to the Proper of Saints. Work has gone slowly, mainly because of some of the feasts I've encountered. The most tedious was the feast of Christ the King, which is a relatively new feast. As such, there are no public-domain English translations of the hymns for that feast. I have endeavoured to do my own translations. They are not perfect, and there are some strophes I intend to change at some point...but it's better than nothing. This alone took considerable time.

Okay, so the bottom line is that the Proper of Saints is now complete from mid August until the beginning of February, and also a large part of July. So all in all, I think that I've completed just under 8 months.

Right now I'm working on another major project: The hymns for the Feast of the Assumption were changed in 1950, and so I've got two more hymns to translate! I have just about finished the "rough" literal translations, and then I'll need to do the poetic translations which incorporate rhyme and meter. This of course takes time. So...the next update may be a while!

Work is continuing

I posted an update on the main page a week or so ago, but wanted to elaborate a little bit. I've been doing some major "overhauls" to my files, trying to make it a little better overall, and a lot more usable. Here's a few of the things I've been doing:

- Adding page numbers to references (i.e. it now says something like "Psalms as in Sunday Lauds I, p.533")
- Trying to improve consistency (i.e. how rubrics are worded, general structure in the commons and propers)
- Lots and lots of error correction
- Work on English translations
- Work on Latin hyphenation
- Lots of work on Common of Saints
- Working on Hymn Structure

Some of this is still very much in progress. The Common of Saints thing is big, so here's a little more on that: Obviously there are a lot of 3rd class feasts, which almost always use one common or another. Right now the commons are rather difficult to use, with references to the Little Chapter in I Vespers, etc. I'm trying to eliminate some of this by not having nearly as many references.

Also, since I Vespers is rarely used, I'm rearranging things a bit. I think it was in the pre-55 breviary that you would normally say I Vespers more often than II Vespers, but when the simple/double ranking of feasts was changed to the 1/2/3 class feast ranking, I Vespers became something that only happened on Sundays and I class feasts. As such, in the Common of Saints, I'm making I Vespers as concise as possible, and putting references to II Vespers etc. This will hopefully be more conducive to ease of use.

For those who have downloaded the PDF on the main page recently, there was an error in it which was causing blank pages to be inserted in between every page in the Office of the Dead. I've fixed that now.

So that's about it for now. Once I get through with this round of revisions to the Common of Saints, I'll start working on the Proper of Saints again. The reason for revising the commons first is because I'm also standardizing translations and such, and so many of the versicles and antiphons in the Propers will need to be updated once I'm done with that.

Sorry it's been so long since I posted an update...thanks for your continued prayers!

Proper of Seasons completed!!!

Finally the day has come: The Proper of Seasons is complete--aside from proofing and error checking. Any help in this regard is greatly appreciated. I've started work on the Proper of Saints. To keep things simple, I've just started at the beginning of the Liturgical Year (in the case of the Proper of Seasons, Nov 29), and I'm working my way through sequentially. I've completed all entries through the end of December. My great hope is to have the Proper of Seasons completed in the next 2-3 months.

A couple of notes: I've had to change the layout in order to accommodate the Proper of Saints. This means moving the Proper of Seasons in front of the Ordinary. The new order is as follows:

Proper of Seasons,
Ordinary,
Psalter,
Proper of Saints,
Common of Saints.

The other major change I've had to make is the removal of the Matins psalms. Unfortunately, Lulu has a page limit of 740. This is only a temporary fix: even after removing the Matins psalms, the new version is at 730 pages, with only one month of the Proper of Saints. My current plan is to do a professional printing once everything is done. More on this as time progresses.

Updates coming soon

It's been a while since I've posted any updates, and it will be a bit longer before I upload a new version. But I at least wanted to let everyone know that there is an update coming!

I've finished updating all of Advent and Christmas, and I'm getting ready to start on Epiphany. The day is rapidly approaching when the Proper of Seasons will be complete!

Unfortunately, the day is also fast approaching when I'm going to hit the page limit for Lulu. This means that I won't be able to fit everything in one volume. My plan is to go back to having two versions: the Breviarium and the Psalterium. A brief description:

The Breviarium will go back to being a true "Diurnal," meaning I'll be removing the matins psalms from it. This should be enough to make room for all of the Proper of Seasons.

The Psalterium will be the same as it was: It will contain: All of the Ordinary, including the Ordinaries for the various seasons; the complete Psalter, including the Matins psalms; the common of Saints; the Office of the Dead; and the various appendices.

Just to let you all know, I am also pursuing a professional printing which would include all of the content. It will most likely be a paperback, but will be printed on "bible paper," and the paper cover is supposed to have the texture and feel of leather. There is a minimum quantity to have the printing done (about 2500 copies), and the price drops dramatically with increased quantities...so please spread the word! (For a minimum print run, the per copy cost will be somewhere in the $18-20 range, and if the quantities are increased to about 5000, the per-copy cost drops to under $15)

Office of the Dead added

I've just posted a new revision, the most notable update being the addition of the Office of the Dead. I made the decision to include the complete hour of Matins for this particular Office; it seemed like the thing to do. I've made one concession to save space: the psalms for Matins are referenced, with page numbers to their location in the psalter, but they are not reprinted in place.

I've also gone through and made a number of corrections and fixes:
-The psalm "titles" are now accented
-fixed a number of spelling errors
-added a section in the Ordinary for Lauds to make it a little clearer when Lauds II is used (this was a point of confusion for some of my friends who've been praying the office).
-added the penitential psalms before the litany of the saints (thanks PaulG!) I may be changing these to reference the psalm locations; haven't decided for sure.
-and many others...

I'll be adding the complementary psalmody also, again by referencing page numbers of the psalms in the psalter.

Oh, and I am working on the rest of the Proper of Seasons...

Update Posted April 4th (Friday)

I've just posted an update, and here's the highlights of what's included:

The Proper of Seasons is now complete from the beginning of Lent through the 24th and last Sunday after Pentecost. **Note** Advent through Septuagesima is not included. This, as well as the Office for the Dead, will be my next task.

I've also done some major work on the Hymns. I have reviewed All of the Hymns in the Ordinary, Psalter, and Commons of Saints, and have attempted to find the "best" English translations for the hymns. I've added a reference line at the bottom of the hymns giving the name of the translator.

Just a quick note, A friend caught a typo in the prayer associated with the Marian Antiphon III at the end of Compline. "gladdness" should be "gladness". I apologize, but I caught this error after made the PDF's and uploaded them, and I didn't have time to redo everything. I've fixed it in my source files, and it'll get updated with the next round of revisions. Sorry for any inconvenience.

As always, please let me know if you find any typos or errors, and I'll fix them as quickly as possible!

Proper of Seasons complete through end of Liturgical Year

I had a marathon session today, and I've completed all of the time following Pentecost! As of this posting, I haven't had the opportunity to update the books on the website. I'm hoping to do that tomorrow. In the mean time, please feel free to look at the latest additions at the following link.

As an added bonus, the above link is a PDF file which is in color (red rubrics).

From here, I'll be working on the Office for the Dead, followed by Advent, Christmas and Epiphany. Some of you will remember that I've already done most of this, but I had some issues with the English translation I was using at the time. Since most of this just needs to be updated, it shouldn't take too long to have the entire Proper of Seasons done! Once it is, I'll start work on the Proper of Saints.

As always, if you see any typos, or have any suggestions, please let me know.