Prepare for Lent according to the ancient wisdom and prayer of the Catholic Church.
Volume 4 of Dom Prosper Guéranger’s monumental The Liturgical Year is devoted to Septuagesima, the traditional season of preparation that leads the faithful from the joy of Christmastide toward the solemn penance of Lent.
Long before Ash Wednesday arrives, the Church begins preparing her children for conversion. During Septuagesima, the liturgy becomes more restrained, the Alleluia disappears, and the faithful are gradually called to turn their attention toward sin, penance, grace, and the necessity of spiritual renewal. Dom Guéranger explains the history and meaning behind these ancient customs and shows how the Church wisely prepares the soul before the full discipline of Lent begins.
Readers will explore:
- The history and development of the Septuagesima season
- The spiritual mystery and purpose of pre-Lent
- Why the Church sets aside the Alleluia during this season
- Traditional practices for preparing for Lent
- Morning and evening prayers
- Guidance for assisting at Mass and receiving Holy Communion
- Vespers and the other prayers of the Church
- Septuagesima Sunday
- Sexagesima Sunday
- Quinquagesima Sunday
- The transition into Ash Wednesday and the beginning of Lent
- Saints and feast days occurring during the season
- The traditional Forty Hours Devotion
Dom Guéranger presents Septuagesima as something far richer than a forgotten historical curiosity. It is a deliberate spiritual preparation—an opportunity to recognize the seriousness of sin, examine one’s life, and become ready to enter Lent with greater purpose.
The season’s progression from Septuagesima to Sexagesima to Quinquagesima steadily draws the faithful toward Ash Wednesday. Through the changing prayers, Scripture readings, and ceremonies of the liturgy, the Church begins forming in the soul the dispositions necessary for fasting, penance, and conversion.
Throughout the volume, Dom Guéranger combines Scripture, Catholic doctrine, Church history, ancient liturgical texts, devotional prayers, and the lives of the saints to reveal the profound spiritual logic behind the Church’s calendar.
The Liturgical Year was written to help Catholics not merely observe the Church’s seasons from the outside, but to enter into them, pray with them, and allow the liturgy to shape their spiritual lives.
Volume 4: Septuagesima is especially valuable for Catholics who want to recover the traditional preparation for Lent and approach Ash Wednesday already spiritually ready for the forty days ahead.
By: Dom Prosper Guéranger, O.S.B.
Translated by: Dom Laurence Shepherd, O.S.B.
Series: The Liturgical Year, Volume 4 of 15
Season: Septuagesima / Pre-Lent
