Book Reviews and More: The Horarium - Philip Kosloski - A Simple Guide to Creating a Daily Prayer Schedule That Will Change Your Life

Friday, 2 December 2016

The Horarium - Philip Kosloski - A Simple Guide to Creating a Daily Prayer Schedule That Will Change Your Life

The Horarium:
A Simple Guide to Creating a Daily Prayer
Schedule That Will Change Your Life
Philip Kosloski
Philip A. Kosloski

This is the third book by Philip Kosloski I have reviewed and the fifth that I have read this year. The first two on prayer, Basic Field Manual for Hearing God's Voice and 3 Methods of Prayer That Will Change Your Life were available from Kindle. The next three: Serviam, Distractions and Horarium are available only through his website. These last three are incredible reads. And each of them is a short succinct guide to growing in different areas of your spiritual life. This one has to do with creating a daily routine, in the seminary called the Horarium. Each of us has the same amount of time we have 7 days a week, 25 hours a day, 168 hours a week and 1440 minutes a day. But many of us do not take advantage of the time we have because we do not have a plan.

Why do some people have amazing prayer lives? Great times of devotion and closeness with God and the saints? And others seem to be very spiritual dry. In part it is intention, and in part it is a plan of life. This book takes the tool of the Horarium, the daily prayer plan.

The chapters in this booklet are:
Introduction:
Do You Feel Like You Have No Time to Pray?
I. The "Horarium:" A Mighty Weapon Against Satan
II. What Mother Teresa, Fulton Sheen,
and J.R.R. Tolkien Have in Common
III. There and Back Again: The Adventure of Prayer
IV. The Secret to Finding Time for Prayer in a Busy World
V. Serviam! Finding the Courage to Pray Every Day
VI.What to Do During Prayer
VII. How to Develop a (Nearly) Unbreakable Habit of Prayer
Appendices
i. Resources on Prayer
ii. Developing a Personal "Horarium" Worksheet

Philip shares his own experience, from leaving high school and being in Seminary and having the structure of his day, devotions, prayers, planned out for him and his spiritual life flourished. When he went home for the summer things began to slide. He stated: "Finding time to pray is not easy outside of seminary life." Later married and with young children. He came to the realization that he needed to create his own prayer schedule his Horarium in order to grow his prayer life. And it is not a set do this at this time. This book knows that there are different kinds of people, night hours and early birds. What the book does is provide tools so you can figure out what will work best for you and then move forward to work on it.

This book has a few things that make it really great. First is Philip's vulnerability, writing from his own experience. Second the exercises that help you work through the teaching and figure out how to apply the teachings. And Third an amazing list of resources if you want to go even further in your learning.

The Horarium can be a compass for your daily life. And this booklet can help you not only grow in your knowledge about what it is but gives you tools and exercises to create this practice and discipline in your own life. As stated this is an awesome read. I highly recommend it. No matter where you are in your spiritual life, we all have room for improvement. And this book will help you achieve that growth.

(Note: this books is part of a series: A Year of Reading Intention - Catholic Reading!)