Commentary on
the Breviary

TERCE

9 o'clock.  The Church wants us to pause briefly during our day's activity and raise our hearts to God; that is the purpose underlying the little hours.  They are a chance to catch our breath, an oasis in our desert wanderings.  It is important that we do not pray them all at once, but whenever possible we should pray them at the corresponding hour of the day as a renewed consecration of the day's work.  The little hours are short, because the day is for work.

The story of salvation has a role to play in Terce: it was the third hour (9:00) when the Holy Ghost came down upon the young Christian community on Pentecost Sunday (Pentecost Terce begins with the hymn Veni Creator).  Quite appropriately , the Church recalls this mystery in the hour of Terce: Terce is thus the "first Confirmation", a strengthening for the conflicts of the day.  Is is a "Come, Holy Ghost" upon the day's work.  The hour's theme is invocation of the Holy Ghost.  The hymns proper to the little hours are a further development of the theme proper to each, and to the corresponding time of day.