Preces Quotidianae
A Prayer for Mercy and Grace
The believer asks for God's mercy, salvation through Christ, instruction from the Word, and the Spirit's consolation to the very end.
Your mercy in1 Christ for salvation, your true word for instruction, the grace of your life-giving Spirit for consolation,2 to the very end, and at the end.
The Passion of Christ as Our Healing
Addressing each element of Christ's passion, the soul asks for sanctification, strength, redemption, cleansing, healing, cooling, and hiding, culminating in the peace of God guarding heart and mind.
Soul, sanctify me. Body, strengthen me. Blood, redeem me. Water of Christ, wash me. Bruise, heal me. Sweat, cool me. Wound, hide me. Peace of God✦3 which surpasses all understanding, guard my heart and mind in the knowledge and love of God.4
God's Faithful Visitation of the Fallen
God, in his goodness, does not abandon the fallen human but visits him as a father, granting the promise of the life-giving seed and opening the door of faith.
You did not despise the human being who broke your commandment and fell, nor did you abandon him, Good One, but you visit him5 in many ways, as a devoted Father, granting him your great and precious promise of the life-giving seed, with the door of faith opened to him,✦✦✦✦
Read the original Latin
Misericordia tua in. Christo in salutem, Verax tuum verbum in eruditionem, Gratia vivifici tui Spiritus in consolationem,
ad finem usque et in fine.
Anima ] sanctifica Corpus conforta Sanguis redime Aqua r Christi 4 ablue Livor sana Sudor | refrigera Vulnus | absconde J Pax Dei
quie exsuperat omnem sensum, custodiat cor meum et intelligentiam in cognitione et dilectione Dei.
Qui transgressum preceptionem tuam hominem, et lapsum, Non despexisti, neque dereliquisti, O Bone, Sed visitas. multifariam, utpote pius pater, Concedens ipsi magnam tuam et pretiosam promissionem de vivifico semine, Aperto ipsi ostio fidei,
Scripture echoes
- ↩Phil.4.7 — And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.
- ↩Heb.1.1 — Long ago, in many parts and in many ways, God spoke to the fathers through the prophets; but in these last days he has spoken to us through a Son.
- ↩2Pet.1.4 — Through these he has granted to us his very great and precious promises, so that through them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world because of sinful desire.
- ↩Gen.3.15;Gal.3.16 — I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and her offspring; he shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise his heel. Gal.3.16 — Now the promises were spoken to Abraham and to his seed. It does not say, 'And to your seeds,' as though referring to many, but as to one: 'And to your seed,' which is Christ.
- ↩Acts.14.27 — When they had arrived and gathered the church together, they reported all that God had done with them, and that he had opened a door of faith to the Gentiles.
Notes
- 1 ↩Latin ends mid-phrase after in. Neighboring sentences suggest a likely continuous reading with the next unit (in Christo…), but the supplied sentence break and terminal period leave the object of in incomplete.
- 2 ↩Christo may continue the incomplete in of s1 as in Christo ('in Christ for salvation'); rendered from the supplied sentence alone as the parallel dative/ablative item in a list of means/ends.
- 3 ↩The supplied Latin is heavily corrupted (bracket, lone r, numeral 4, pipe marks, and a stray J). Rendered as the most plausible Passion-instrument petition series: Anima sanctifica; Corpus conforta; Sanguis redime; Aqua [lateris?] Christi ablue; Livor sana; Sudor refrigera; Vulnus absconde; Pax Dei. Object me is implied by the imperative prayer form though not printed in the fragment. Aqua r Christi is taken as Water of Christ (likely Aqua lateris Christi). J before Pax Dei is treated as noise; Pax Dei continues into the next section (Phil 4:7 cadence).
- 4 ↩Source begins mid-clause after previous section’s ‘Pax Dei’ (the peace of God). Reading ‘quie’ as intended ‘quae’ (which), the relative subject of the petition.
- 5 ↩Source preceptionem is almost certainly praeceptionem (commandment/precept); translated on that corrected reading.
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