What Does The Prayer Really Say?
W D T P R S

The webcam is back up today, after long haitus.  The weather has been awful for a long time.

Here, WDTPRSers, is the Collect from the public consistory held on 24 March during which Pope Benedict XVI created new cardinals.  How about you all taking a crack at it before I do?  Post your versions and comments.   (My line breaks – none in the original)

COLLECT:

Deus, qui in Christi tui testamento ex omnibus gentibus
populum tibi congregare non desinis,
in Spiritu ad unitatem coalescentem,
concede, ut Ecclesia tua,
missioni sibi creditae fidelis,
cum hominum familia iugiter incedat,
et tamquam fermentum et veluti anima societatis humanae in Christo renovandae
et in familiam Dei transformandae semper existat.

I tip my biretta  o{]:¬)   to Mark Shea and his fine blog for the following.  In a good natured way he pointed out a blog which parodies his own. 

Also, he links to a very funny lampoon blog called Lispers in the Woggia.  Do check it out.  Alas, I can’t get an RSS feed to work on the later.

Good satire, as opposed to mere invective, can have a dimension of charity woven through it.  Good satire is crafted to have a corrective impact.  What makes it funny is the fact that it remains rooted in the truth.  So long as charity is kept in mind, satire is not a bad thing. 

COLLECT
Observationis huius annua celebritate laetantes,
quaesumus, Domine,
ut, paschalibus sacramentis inhaerentes,
plenis eorum effectibus gaudeamus.

Today we have a nice parallel of the forms laetantes and inhaerentes and also of paschalibus sacramentis and plenis effectibus.

This was in the Gelasianum Vetus on Saturday of Quinquagesima: Obseruationis huius annua caelebritate laetantes, quaesumus, domine, ut paschalibus actionibus inherentibus plenis eius effectibus gaudeamus.  Notice the word is actio and not sacramentum.  In the Veronese a version is found in the month of July: Obseruationis annuae celebritate gratulantes… ut eorum, quorum actionibus inheremus, plenis effectibus gaudeamus.  Again we have actio.  There was no version of this prayer in the pre-Conciliar Roman Missal.

An observatio, according to Blaise is "observance", particularly of Lent.  In the L&S we go more deeply into the word and find "observance, attention, respect, regard, reverence shown to another" also, "an observance of religious duties, divine worship, religion".  Actio in Blaise is "the celebration of the mysteries, the holy sacrifice".  This is why the Roman Canon with the Preface was called the canon actionis.  However, actio was replaced by the redactors of the Novus Ordo with sacramentum in the plural.  The paring sacramenta paschalia is very Leonine, appearing quite a few times in that great Pope’s sermons.  Antoine Dumas, who reworked Blaise’s original, suggests that this combination would be "paschal mysteries", which seems entirely appropriate.

LITERAL TRANSLATION
Rejoicing in the in the annual celebration of this religious observance,
we pray, O Lord,
that engaging deeply in the paschal mysteries,
we may rejoice in their full effects.

Here "effects" limps a bit for effectus which, in this context, points to the realization of both the Lenten observance and the paschal mysteries in both the sense of the Lent/Easter dying and rising of the Lord and also the sacred action of Holy Mass.  Effectus must be the desired effective outcome of the the preceding. I think we get at this idea adequately with "effects" in English, though we might really need a circumlocution like, "effective outcome", or somewhat more philosophically "efficient realization".

The vocabulary and theme of the prayer seems to sum up something of what has been going on in the previous Collects of the week.  Perhaps the pattern we are seeing is that the Saturday prayer, being the last of the week, ties up the themes of the rest of the week, before moving to the new ideas to be brought forth starting with Sunday, tomorrow.

WDTPRS has been sustaining for years now that "active participation" really means "active receptivity".  For the most part clerics and liturgists misunderstand this term.  I have argued this from documents and from semantic/philological grounds.

Today during the Holy Father’s sermon during the so-called "Mass of the Rings" celebrated on 25 March, the Solemnity of the Annunciation he said this (official trans. with me additions):

From generation to generation, the wonder evoked by this ineffable mystery never ceases. Saint Augustine imagines a dialogue between himself and the Angel of the Annunciation, in which he asks: "Tell me, O Angel, why did this happen in Mary?" The answer, says the Messenger, is contained in the very words of the greeting: "Hail, full of grace" (cf. Sermo 291:6). In fact, the Angel, "appearing to her", does not call her by her earthly name, Mary, but by her divine name, as she has always been seen and characterized by God: "Full of grace – gratia plena", which in the original Greek is kekaritomene, "beloved" (cf. Lk 1:28). Origen observes that no such title had ever been given to a human being, and that it is unparalleled in all of Sacred Scripture (cf. In Lucam 6:7). It is a title expressed in passive form (in forma passiva), but this "passivity" of Mary, who has always been and is for ever "loved" by the Lord, implies her free consent, her personal and original response: in being loved, Mary is fully active (Maria è pienamente attiva), because she accepts with personal generosity (accoglie con personale disponibilità) the wave of God’s love poured out upon her.

The Pope underscores the interior receptivity of Mary.  We logically know from this that the active receptivity of Mary is the perfect model of liturgical participation.