Commontide

Preparation for Personal Prayer

Holy Spirit, breath of God and fire of love, I cannot pray without your aid: Kindle in me the fire of your love, and illumine me with your light; that with a steadfast will and holy thoughts I may approach the Father in spirit and in truth; through Jesus Christ my Lord, who reigns with you and the Father in eternal union. Amen.

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Commontide
Collect
Prayers

Week Starting May 15-21

Proper 2

O Lord, you never fail to support and govern those whom you bring up in your steadfast love and fear: Keep us, we pray, under your continual protection and providence, and give us a perpetual fear and love of your holy Name; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.  Amen.

Sancti nominis tui, Domine, timorem pariter et amorem fac nos habere perpetuum: quia numquam tua gubernatione destituis, quos in soliditate tuae dilectionis instituis.

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Original-language source · public domain

BCP 2019, p. 615

Provenance

Gelasian, c. 5th–7th c.

Draft — AI-assisted research under editorial review.

One of the oldest prayers in regular Anglican use, this collect traces to the ancient Roman liturgy preserved in the 7th-century Gelasian Sacramentary. Cranmer brought it into English in 1549; the 1662 revision gave it the shape it held for three centuries, and the ACNA 2019 text restores the explicit pairing of fear and love that earlier versions had softened.