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

We continue with our glance at the Super oblata or "Prayer over the gifts" for Masses during Advent.

SUPER OBLATA
Devotionis nostrae tibi, Domine, quaesumus,
hostia iugiter immoletur,
quae et sacri peragat instituta mysterii,
et salutare tuum nobis potenter operetur.

I wrote at length about this prayer in an article for The Wanderer.  An ancient predecessor of today’s “prayer over the gifts” (as ICEL calls it) is in the Gelasian Sacramentary among the Advent prayers and also in the Veronese Sacramentary during the month of September amidst prayers for the fast of the seventh month (Latin septem “seven”).  It survived the centuries and is in the 1962 Missale Romanum as the Secret for the 3rd Sunday of Advent, "Gaudete".  The version in the Novus Ordo is slightly different, substituting potenter for the more ancient mirabiliter.  

From your own copy of the L&S you will learn that immolo means, first and foremost, “to sprinkle a victim with sacrificial meal” (as in grain or cereal) and also “to bring as an offering, to offer, sacrifice, immolate.”    There is more in the article I wrote.  This is just a taste

All Catholics need to know about mysterium.   Early Christian writers lacked vocabulary to express the new spiritual realities they were pondering.  As they struggled to explain to others what they believed both the Greeks and Latins recycled existing words giving them new meanings.  The Greeks (who had a longer philosophical traditional and therefore a ready mine of good vocabulary) came up with some theological terms which early Latin writers later simply borrowed, transliterating them into Latin.  Such is the case with Latin mysterium, which reduplicates Greek mysterion.

Tertullian (+ second quarter of the 3rd century) translated Greek mysterion by means of the Latin sacramentum.  Sacramentum has its root in sacer, which has a religious overtone (like sacerdos “priest” and English “sacred”, etc.).  Sacramentum, in juridical language, was a bond or initiation confirmed by an oath.  That kind of sacramentum referred to initiation into military service and the oath taken by the soldier. 

Sacramentum came to have two streams of connotation.  First, it had baptismal overtones as the pledge and profession of faith made by catechumens when they were baptized and initiated in the Church.  Second, it referred to the content of the faith that had been pledged in regard to the “mysteries” of our salvation, the meaning of the words and deeds of Christ explained in a liturgical context, the liturgical feasts themselves, and the rites of initiation (baptism, confirmation, Eucharist).  St. Augustine (+430) used sacramentum also for marriage, the laying on of hands at ordination, anointing of the sick and reconciliation of penitent sinners.  In ancient liturgical prayer, sacramentum refers not only to the sacrament of the Eucharist, but also to penitential seasons like Lent with their disciplines of penance and fasting.  Penitential practices, when performed by a believer with the proper attitude, are a mysterious affirmation of the sacred bond between us and Christ. 

Let’s us not forget what I wrote about devotio yesterday.  This is an important concept for Advent, it seems.

LITERAL TRANSLATION:
We now beg, O Lord, let there be offered up to You continuously
the sacrificial victim of our devotion,
which may both carry through the actions of the sacred mystery that was instituted,
and mightily effect for us Your salvation.

ICEL (1973 translation of the 1970MR):
Lord,
may the gift we offer in faith and love
be a continual sacrifice in your honor
and truly become our eucharist and our salvation.

I guess, you can’t object to what the ICEL prayer says all in all, except for the fact that it doesn’t translate what the Latin really says.

Notice that ICEL made Latin devotio, that single-minded dedication, into “faith and love.”  They ought to have simply said “devotion”, but that probably sounded too pious and old-fashioned at the time.   It might be that “in your honor” was an attempt to pick up on some aspect of “devotion”.   In the Latin we see nothing resembling in or pro tuo honore.  I could go on, but why bother?  This ICEL prayer is a good example of why we need new liturgical translations prepared according to the mind of the Church as expressed in the guidelines found in the CDWDS’ document Liturgiam authenticam. 

We need to know and hear what the Church wants us to pray and meditate on just like we need air to breathe and food to eat.

Today’s prayer was, as we read above, among those used to admonish people to fast during the seventh month.  We have ancient sermons about this September fast time as well as the Advent fast of the “tenth month” (time was calculated a little differently then because the calendar had little by little drifted and months were inserted.).  For example, we have the wisdom of Pope St. Leo I (+461), nicknamed “the Great”, about the Advent fast:

“What can be more salutary for us than fasting, by the practice of which we draw nearer to God, and, standing fast against the devil, defeat the vices that lead us astray.  For fasting was ever the food of virtue.  From abstinence there arise chaste thoughts, just decisions, salutary counsels.  And through voluntary suffering the flesh dies to the concupiscences, and the spirit waxes strong in virtue.  But as the salvation of our souls is not gained solely by fasting, let us fill up what is wanting in our fasting with almsgiving to the poor.  Let us give to virtue what we take from pleasure.  Let abstinence of those who fast be the dinner of the poor.” 

Another great saint with the nickname “the Great”, St. Basil of Caesarea (+379) hammered home the urgency of Advent almsgiving:

“The command is clear: the hungry person is dying now, the naked person is freezing now, the person in debt is beaten now – and you want to wait until tomorrow?”  

In the ancient Church fasting from good things was closely connected to good works of mercy for the poor, especially almsgiving.

Do not forget this, O Catholic reader.