Sanctifying Time

In reference to praying the liturgy of the hours, Benedictine scholar Adalbert de Vogue has noted that “…at the heart of the monastic vocation…is to sanctify time by letting ourselves be recalled, indeed disturbed, at short and regular intervals by the service of the divine praise.”

The idea that we can “sanctify time” is new to me. However, humans regularly refer to “killing time” or “wasting time,” so it stands to reason that time also can be honored and made holy. Time itself is actually a human construct, a tool, to help us live productively and communally. We know in the back of our minds that one day we will die—so how can we make holy our span of existence here on earth?

de Vogue suggests that we make time holy when we stop at regular times during the day to offer praise to God. Prayer is certainly a tool for sanctifying time, but very few people can pray 24/7. Perhaps a different way to look at the sanctification of time is to understand, as Paula D’Arcy says, “God comes to us disguised as our very lives.” All time, all of our life, is sanctified because of our union with God through Christ; as Kathy Coffey explains, “…the Holy One holds everything.” The key to understanding the sanctification of time, then, is to increase our awareness of the One who holds everything, including us. Regular prayer is a time-honored way of increasing that awareness. Even better is developing the mindset that God is infused in all things by actively echoing God’s eternal “Yes” to everything we encounter. Then it is not just time but all life that is sanctified.