O God,
you have taught us to keep all your commandments by loving you and our neighbor:
Grant us the grace of your Holy Spirit,
that we may be devoted to you with our whole heart,
and united to one another with pure affection;
through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit,
one God, for ever and ever. Amen.
(BCP 230-1)
Historical introduction:
This Collect, slightly revised, is from the oldest surviving sacramentary (altar book for the priest), the so-called Leonine Sacramentary.[1] This sacramentary, which is now known as the Verona Sacramentary, was attributed to Pope Leo I (died in 461) and contained in a manuscript from the cathedral of Verona that dates from the 7th century.
The Preamble
The Preamble, “O God,” doesn’t provide us with additional information about the one to whom we pray.
The Acknowledgement
The Acknowledgement, “you have taught us to keep all your commandments by loving you and our neighbor,” refers to Matthew 22:35-40, in which Jesus replies to the question about which commandment is the greatest by stating that loving God and neighbor is the foundation for all of biblical teaching. The confession of sin found in Morning and Evening Prayer and the Eucharist uses this same summary: “We have not loved you with our whole heart; we have not loved our neighbors as ourselves” (BCP 79, 116, 360). Our Baptismal Covenant presupposes that love of God motivates our desire to be baptized and our loyalty to Jesus as our Lord and Savior. This liturgy provides us with a short list of specific ways in which we are called to love our neighbors: resisting evil, sharing the Good News of God in Christ, seeking and serving Christ in all persons, striving for justice and peace among all people, and respecting the dignity of every human being (Holy Baptism, BCP 302-306).
The Petition
The Petition, “Grant us the grace of your Holy Spirit,” focuses our attention on the work of the Holy Spirit. In our baptism, we are fully initiated by the Holy Spirit to be members of the Church, Christ’s Body (Holy Baptism, BCP 298). In the Prayers for the Candidates, we pray that those who are baptized will be “filled with God’s holy and life-giving Spirit” (BCP 305). Our life as members of the Church is empowered through the Holy Spirit. With this week’s Collect, it doesn’t matter if you were baptized in the Episcopal Church before our present Prayer Book or were baptized in a different denomination; we are all included in this prayer that connects each of us to our own baptism and, through our own baptism, the Holy Spirit connects us to each other as members of Christ’s Body.
The Aspiration
The Aspiration, “that we may be devoted to you with our whole heart, and united to one another with pure affection,” parallels the second half of the prayer the priest or bishop prays over the newly baptized: “Sustain them, O Lord, in your Holy Spirit. Give them an inquiring and discerning heart, the courage to will and to persevere, a spirit to know and to love you, and the gift of joy and wonder in all your works” (BCP 308). We need the grace of the Holy Spirit to love God with all of our being throughout our lives. In the Prayers for the Candidates, one of the petitions asks that the Holy Spirit teach the newly baptized to “love others” (BCP 305). Being united to one another through baptism is the beginning of the Christian life as family. We need the grace of the Holy Spirit to continue to unite us to each other with pure, tender care on good days and bad.
The Pleading
The Pleading, “through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the
Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen,” reminds us that God is united in life, love, and rule. As we are united in pure affection to God and to each other, we reflect God’s nature.
For your consideration:
This week we pray for grace to live into the two great Commandments. How has God enabled you to live more fully into the two great Commandments since last year? How has God enabled us, as a parish, to love God, each other, and our neighbors better since the last time we prayed this prayer?
O God,
you have taught us to keep all your commandments by loving you and our neighbor:
Grant us the grace of your Holy Spirit,
that we may be devoted to you with our whole heart,
and united to one another with pure affection;
through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit,
one God, for ever and ever. Amen.
(BCP 230-1)
[1] Marion J. Hatchett, Commentary on the American Prayer Book, (New York: Harper Collins, 1995), 188.
© 2021 and 2023 Donna Hawk-Reinhard, edited by Kate McCormick
Want to know more about the Collect format or the underlying spiritual formation goal of this series of meditations? You can find that information here.