Fr. Z's Blog

COLLECT (1962MR):
Aurem tuam, quaesumus, Domine, precibus nostris accommoda:
et mentis nostrae tenebras, gratia tuae visitationis illustra.

The multi-volume Corpus orationum says this prayer was, with variations, in numerous ancient manuscripts.  The mickle Lewis & Short Dictionary says accommodo means “to fit or adapt one thing to another, to lay, put, or hang on”.  In English “accommodations” are a place suited to our living needs.  An “accommodating” person adjusts his world to suit our exigencies.  In relation to property accommodo means: “to lend it to one for use”. In Classical Latin it is found, as in today’s prayer, with “ears”.  Think of Marc Antony crying out in Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar (III,ii) , “Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears”.  Mens means “the conscience” as well as “a plan, purpose, design, intention”.  Mens points to our heart, mind and soul.

LITERAL VERSION:
O Lord, lend your ear to our prayers, we beseech you, and by the grace of your visitation, illuminate the shadows of our mind.

God is infinite.  Yet it is possible for us to call on a loving God to condescend and adapt to our needs.  Our prayers are bound with God’s eternal self-knowledge, plan and providence.  In the case of God “hearing” us, He knows what we want better than we know it ourselves.  Consider also that the eternal Word, uttered from before time, is in our prayers and good words and deeds, echoing back to the Father.

If we are images of God, especially in our mens, God should be able to hear and recognize Himself in us.  Our neighbor should look at us and hear us and see God reflected.

A second image in the prayer is from the contrast of illumination and darkness.  Christ, the light to our darkness, moral and intellectual, is coming.  With grace He adapts our minds and hearts to receive what is necessary for salvation.  He adapts to us, in His incarnation.  He adapts us to Him by grace.

Rejoice!

Here is the Collect for Saturday of the 2nd Week of Advent.

This prayer has its roots in Rotulus 19 published with the Veronese Sacramentary.  It is also in Gelasian Sacramentary.  It was not in any edition of the Missale Romanum before the Council.

COLLECT:
Oriatur, quaesumus, omnipotens Deus, in cordibus nostris,
splendor gloriae tuae,
ut, omni noctis obscuritate sublata,
filios nos esse lucis Unigeniti tui manifestet adventus.

Unless you get that sublata right in the ablative absolute construction, you may go insance working this out.  There are two verbs which cough up the form sublata.  We turn to the mighty The Lewis & Short Latin Dictionary for insight.  First, there is suffero  (subf- ), sustu­li, sublatum, sufferre (“to carry under, to put or lay under”; “to hold up, bear, support, sustain”).  Then there is tollo, sustuli, sublatum (“to lift or take up, to raise, always with the idea of motion upwards or of removal from a former situation”).  You can see the verbs are related, but the impact they have is entirely different.

LITERAL VERSION:
May the splendor of Your glory arise in our hearts,
Almighty God, we beseech You,
so that once all darkness of night is lifted,
the Coming of Your Only-Begotten may reveal us to be children of the light.

ANOTHER WAY TO DO IT:
Let the splendor of your glory dawn in our hearts,
we pray, almighty God,
that, all shades of the night once scattered,
we may be shown to be children of light
by the advent of your Only-begotten Son.

This time of year we of the Northern hemisphere have the constant reminder of the passing of this world written in to the very rhythm of our day.  Not only do the long nights remind us of this world’s brevity, but they evoke in us a deep longing for the light.

Reflection on our sins must also be a unquieting journey into the darkness we inflict on ourselves and others.

The undying Light is there, however.

Ultimately we need not be afraid.

We have much to do, however, to be children of the light and not the darkness so that God can bring to completion in us what He began in our cooperation.