At the very end of the day, after the last psalm of Night Prayer, the Church does a tender thing: she turns to Our Lady and sings. These closing songs are the four Marian antiphons — and there is one for each stretch of the year, so that the season itself decides which words a monastery whispers into the dark before sleep.
Alma Redemptoris Mater — Advent to Candlemas
“Loving Mother of the Redeemer.” Sung from the start of Advent until the Presentation on February 2, it greets Mary as the gate of heaven and the star of the sea, marveling that she bore her own Creator. It is a song of waiting and wonder, fit for the weeks before and just after Christmas.
Ave Regina Caelorum — Candlemas to Holy Week
“Hail, Queen of Heaven.” From Candlemas through Lent until the Easter Triduum, the Church hails Mary enthroned in glory and asks her to plead for us with her Son. Its tone is reverent and a little austere, matching the long climb toward the Cross.
The season chooses the song; the song is always to her.on the antiphons
Regina Caeli — Eastertide
“Queen of Heaven, rejoice.” Through the fifty days of Easter the somber antiphons give way to pure joy. Short, exultant, ending in alleluia, the Regina Caeli tells Mary that the Son she bore and watched die has risen — and bids her be glad. In Eastertide it even replaces the Angelus.
Salve Regina — Ordinary Time
“Hail, holy Queen, Mother of mercy.” For the long ordinary weeks after Pentecost — most of the year — the Church sings the most beloved of the four. “To thee do we cry, poor banished children of Eve… mourning and weeping in this valley of tears.” It is the song of pilgrims still on the road, asking their Mother to show them, after this exile, the blessed fruit of her womb.
Why end the day this way
There is something profoundly human in it. Whatever the day held — labor, failure, grief — the Church refuses to close it on her own merits. She ends instead as a child does, with a word to his mother. Pick up the antiphon of the season and make it your own last prayer tonight; you will be joining a chorus that has not fallen silent in a thousand years.
Sources: the four seasonal Marian antiphons of Compline; the Liturgy of the Hours; Alma Redemptoris Mater, Ave Regina Caelorum, Regina Caeli, and Salve Regina.