We continue our project of looking at the Post communions of Lent:
Tuesday – 2nd Week of Lent
POST COMMUNION (2002MR):
Sacrae, nobis, quaesumus, Domine, mensae refectio,
et piae conversationis augmentum,
et tuae propitiationis
continuum praestet auxilium.
You find this is the 8th c. L.Sac. Engolismensis: Sacrae nobis quaesumus Domine mensae libatio et piae conuersationis augmentum et tuae propitiationis continuum praestet auxilium.
We saw once before that the snipper-pasters of Bugnini’s Consilium changed the more ancient libatio to refectio. This refectio has been a common element of our Lenten ferial prayers.
Pius, when applied to God indicates his mercy, but when applied to man it describes our "dutifulness". Conversatio is not just "conversation", but rather "manner and conduct of life". You find it fairly often in a monastic spiritual context. Propitiatio in its fundamental meaning meanings and "an appeasing, atonement, propitiation". The dictionary of liturgical Latin Blaise also gives us a view of the word as "favor". This makes sense. God has been appeased and rendered favorable again towards us sinners by the propitiatory actions Christ fulfilled on the Cross. Propitiatio was also in the Collect. Auxilium has both a military and a medium overtone, as not just "help" but "an antidote, remedy, in the most extended sense of the word".
Continuus, a, um is really interesting. In the first place it is "a joining, connecting with something, or hanging together, in space or time, uninterrupted, continuous". Thus is also designates an act that in time immediately follows something, "immediately, forthwith, directly, without delay". It therefore can mean not just "continuously" but also "speedily, without interval".
SLAVISHLY LITERAL VERSION:
Let the refreshing of the sacred table be for us, O Lord, we beseech You,
both an increase of our dutiful manner of life,
and the continual/speedy help of
Your propitious favor.
How are you going to handle continuum here? Come up with your own, smooth and flawless version.
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Sacrae, nobis, quaesumus, Domine, mensae refectio,
et piae conversationis augmentum,
et tuae propitiationis
continuum praestet auxilium.
May the refreshment of your sacred table, we beg, O Lord,
both the sustenance of upright conduct,
and the secured aid of atonement, stand before us.
I am almost tempted to use “restoration” for refectio (re+facio); I am using “secured” for continuum from contineo “to secure, sustain, maintain”.
“We saw once before that the snipper-pasters of Bugnini’s Consilium changed the more ancient libatio to refectio. This refectio has been a common element of our Lenten ferial prayers.”
Fr. Z, it’s enlightening and depressing to read these insights of yours. Why did the people who APPROVED these changes let them be made? (Did they read the new prayers or not? And if they read them, did the make the same observations you do?)
Here’s my translation attempt:
We beseech You, O Lord,
that the refreshment of this sacred banquet
may bring about both the strengthening of our life of devotion,
and the unfailing aid of Your gracious favor.
I might even be tempted to render the last two clauses as: “may bring about the strengthening of our life of devotion BY the unfailing aid of Your gracious favor”.
But I’m no Latin student.