SAPIENTIATIDE

A MESSAGE FOR SAPIENTIATIDE

We all know, of course, that the last two weeks of Lent are called Passiontide.  Less well known, however, is the season of Sapientiatide, which begins today.  Sapientiatide is the last week of Advent.  It begins always on December 17 and lasts seven days until December 23, the day before Christmas Eve.  In the Divine Office, proper antiphons are said in the Office of the Season, as we approach ever closer to Bethlehem and the day when Jesus Christ is born.

The most important of these proper antiphons is the one chanted at Vespers each day of Sapientiatide, before and after the Magnificat.  These Antiphons are called by various names—the Great Antiphons, or more commonly the “O” Antiphons because all seven begin by addressing our Lord under one of his titles taken from the prophecies of Isaiah and Micah—O Rex Gentium, O Adonai, etc.  The first one, which will be sung at Vespers this evening, begins with the words O Sapientia (O Wisdom), which gives the season of Sapientiatide its name.  The O Antiphons are unique in that they are sung standing, and in full, both before and after the Magnificat, as a sign of the solemnity given to them.

They praise the coming Savior in symbolic language taken from the Old Testament, especially from Ecclesiasticus and the Apocalypse.  Just when they originated is uncertain; they date back at least a thousand years and perhaps even to the sixth century.

The O Antiphons increase the spirit of desire in the soul. They are akin to the wonder in the heart of a child, and parents, by explaining the anthems in simple language, can strengthen childish desire and feed the spirit of wonder and awe in the hearts of little ones as Christmas nears.  It’s one of the Catholic traditions of Advent, like the Advent calendar, and the wreath with its purple and rose-colored candles, far more meaningful than a trip to the mall to see Santa!

The seven O Antiphons are sung in the following order as Christmas approaches:  O Wisdom, O Adonai, O Rod of Jesse, O Key of David, O Day-Spring, O King of Nations, O Emmanuel.  In Latin the seven titles are O Sapientia, O Adonai, O Radix Jesse, O Clavis David, O Oriens, O Rex Gentium, and O Emmanuel, and something else you can point out to your children is that the initial letter of each, when read in reverse order, spell out the Lain words Ero Cras, which mean “Tomorrow, I come.”

O Antiphon for December 17:

O Wisdom, which camest out of the mouth of the Most High, and reachest from one end to another, mightily and sweetly ordering all things: Come and teach us the way of prudence.