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
Collects

The Third Sunday in Lent

Heavenly Father, you have made us for yourself, and our hearts are restless until they rest in you: Look with compassion upon the heartfelt desires of your servants, and purify our disordered affections, that we may behold your eternal glory in the face of Christ Jesus; who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.  Amen.

tu excitas, ut laudare te delectet, quia fecisti nos ad te et inquietum est cor nostrum, donec requiescat in te.

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Original-language source · public domain

BCP 2019, p. 606

Proper Preface

Preface of Lent

You bid your faithful people cleanse their hearts, and prepare with joy for the Paschal feast; that, fervent in prayer and in works of mercy, and renewed by your Word and Sacraments, they may come to the fullness of grace which you have prepared for those who love you.

Provenance

ACNA 2019

Draft — AI-assisted research under editorial review.

This prayer opens with one of the most famous sentences in all of Christian literature: Augustine of Hippo's declaration, from the opening page of his Confessions (around AD 401), that God made us for himself and our hearts will be restless until they rest in him. The collect was newly composed for the ACNA Book of Common Prayer in 2019, drawing that Augustinian opening together with a petition adapted from the English Reformation prayer tradition, and asking God to purify our disordered affections.