Wednesday, September 26, 2012

In the morning Lord, show us thy mercy

To show how truly lovely are traditional Anglican forms of worship, I am posting the general confession taken from Morning Prayer in the Anglican Book of Common Prayer. At certain times during the year, I resort to using Morning and Evening Prayer from the traditional Book of Common Prayer, both of which are considerably longer and more involved than Morning and Evening Prayer as found in the Roman Catholic Liturgy of the Hours:
Almighty and most merciful Father, We have erred and strayed from thy ways like lost sheep, We have followed too much the devices and desires of our own hearts, We have offended against thy holy laws, We have left undone those things which we ought to have done, And we have done those things which we ought not to have done, And there is no health in us: But thou, O Lord, have mercy upon us miserable offenders, Spare thou them, O God, which confess their faults, Restore thou them that are penitent, According to thy promises declared unto mankind in Christ Jesu our Lord: And grant, O most merciful Father, for his sake, That we may hereafter live a godly, righteous, and sober life, To the glory of thy holy Name. Amen.
Since, along with Fridays, Wednesdays are traditionally days observed in a penitential manner, this seemed wholly appropriate to me this morning, apart from this confession really meeting my need this morning as I prayed. Also, today is Yom Kippur, the Jewish Day of Atonement.

To give some idea of the beauty of the Anglican tradition, I am posting the singing of the Nunc Dimittis at Evensong by the King's College Choir-

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