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

The Fourth Sunday in Advent

Stir up your power, O Lord, and with great might come among us; and as we are sorely hindered by our sins from running the race that is set before us, let your bountiful grace and mercy speedily help and deliver us; through Jesus Christ our Lord, to whom, with you and the Holy Spirit, be honor and glory, now and for ever. Amen.

Excita, quaesumus, Domine, potentiam tuam, et veni: et magna nobis virtute succurre; ut per auxilium gratiae tuae quod nostra peccata praepediunt, indulgentia tuae propitiationis acceleret.

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Original-language source · public domain

BCP 2019, p. 599

Proper Preface

Preface of Advent

Because you sent your beloved Son to redeem us from sin and death, and to make us heirs in him of everlasting life; that when he shall come again in power and great glory to judge the world, we may without shame or fear rejoice to behold his appearing.

Provenance

Gelasian, c.750

Draft — AI-assisted research under editorial review.

An ancient Advent petition whose Latin root survives in an eighth-century manuscript, reshaped by Thomas Cranmer in 1549 with allusions drawn from Psalm 80 and the Letter to the Hebrews. Its opening cry – "Stir up your power" – has been prayed at the close of Advent in Western Christendom for well over a millennium.