Commontide

For the Acceptance of Prayer

O Lord our God, accept the fervent prayers of your people; in the multitude of your mercies, look with compassion upon us and all who turn to you for help; for you are gracious, O lover of souls, and to you we give glory, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, now and for ever. Amen.

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Prayer
Prayers

For Congress or a State Legislature

O God, the fountain of wisdom, whose will is good and gracious, and whose law is truth: So guide and bless our Senators and Representatives assembled in Congress, that they may enact laws pleasing in your sight, to the glory of your Name and the welfare of this people; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

BCP 2019, p. 657

Provenance

American Episcopal, merged 1979

Draft — AI-assisted research under editorial review.

An American prayer with roots in the first Episcopal prayer book of 1789, this collect was shaped across two centuries into its present form by the 1979 revision, which merged a colonial-era prayer for Congress with a shorter state-legislature prayer that entered the book in 1928. It asks for legislators who enact just laws, drawing its opening address from the language of Psalm 119.