A Prayer Worth Repeating

Do you remember the joke about the Episcopal priest who was asked to give the invocation at the Rotary Club? The President of the club, who was a Baptist, could not resist the urge to take a dig at the Episcopalian’s presumed reluctance to pray extemporaneously: “And now we invite Mr. Thompson, the Rector of St. Mary’s Episcopal Church, to come forward and read one of those pre-written prayers from his prayer book.” But, when the priest stepped to the microphone, he simply began, “Our Father, who art in heaven…”

Some prayers are worth saying over and over. As Episcopalians, we are not afraid to pray extemporaneously, but we recognize the beauty of language and would rather preserve a well-composed prayer by writing it down and saying it again. Often, we come across a prayer that someone else has published and that we like so much that we make it a part of our daily piety. Sometimes, we discover our own turn of phrase that we enjoy repeating for a season. In our prayer book, there are many prayers that we repeat weekly, if not daily, but there is one prayer in particular that, before 1979, we said all the way through Lent but that now we only say for a few days before putting it away until next year.

Almighty and everlasting God, who hatest nothing that thou hast made, and dost forgive the sins of all those who are penitent; Create and make in us new and contrite hearts, that we, worthily lamenting our sins and acknowledging our wretchedness, may obtain of thee, the God of all mercy, perfect remission and forgiveness; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

We say the collect for Ash Wednesday on the first Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, and Saturday of Lent. By the time we get to Sunday, we move on to a new collect. In preparing for my Ash Wednesday sermon, however, I learned that, in all the prayer books before our current one, the rubrics required us to say that collect at every service of the church from Ash Wednesday until Palm Sunday.

That means that, for five and a half weeks, every time you came to church and every time you said the Daily Office on your own, you would encounter those words. It is not my favorite collect, and I would not want to say it every day of the year, but I think considerable good might come from hearing it more often.

What part of that collect do you need to hear again and again? What words or phrases feel burdensome—a part you would rather leave behind? What images draw you in closer to God and help you experience God’s presence in a fuller way? What does it say about God or about you that makes you thankful?

With our current prayer book, we only say that prayer a few times every year, but, all year long, I think about that first line: “you hate nothing you have made.” I say that to myself when I need to remember it. When I encounter a Christian who is using hateful language about human beings with whom they do not agree, I whisper those words to myself. When my job requires me to deal with a difficult, angry, hateful person, I return to those words almost as a mantra. When I feel down because I have missed the mark in a profound way and am struggling to let go of my disappointment, I remind myself that God hates nothing that God has made.

I am also drawn in a strange way to the line about “acknowledging our wretchedness.” I do not hold on to those words in the same way that I do the bit about God hating nothing that God has made, but there is so much spiritual energy contained in that phrase that I cannot ignore it. The word “wretched” seems harsh, brutal, unkind, and unforgiving. It speaks of my nature in a way that makes me uncomfortable. It stings a little bit to use such an exaggerated and negative term about myself and not only about other people. It leaves me bare and exposed before God.

In a sense, however, that is precisely what I need to experience from time to time. Lent is a season for self-examination and repentance. It is a time to stop pretending and be honest with ourselves and with God. Because it is a period of intensive introspection, held alongside our intentional study of and meditation upon God’s word, Lent offers new insights into the depths of our incapacity and the magnitude of God’s love. Our faith teaches us that those two realities are inseparably linked in an inverse relationship. The more we admit our need for God’s help the more we discover that God is eager to save.

I think the part of the Ash Wednesday collect that challenges me the most is the line about God forgiving the sins of all who are penitent. All means all, as we like to say in our church, but the thought of God forgiving the sins of those whose penitence I find inadequate or whose sins I find especially heinous and forgiving them as fully and completely as envisioned by the collect is hard to accept. What about the people I don’t want to forgive? What about the ones I can’t forgive?

Faced with my own spiritual limitations, I like to think about those who came before us, who, for over four hundred years of pre-1979 Anglicanism, prayed the collect for Ash Wednesday every day from the first day of Lent until Holy Week started. I like to think of how a community of people seeking to be faithful is shaped by that practice. I like to marvel at how that collect is not only a reflection of the church’s faith but also a means by which that faith us shaped and strengthened.

 For the next few days, if you say Morning or Evening Prayer, you will include that collect in your prayer. After that, it will be another year before it comes up in our liturgy, but that does not mean you cannot return to it from time to time. If you find yourself having a hard time forgiving someone—either yourself or someone else—consider opening your prayer book to the collect for Ash Wednesday. Pray these words and let the mixture of challenge, comfort, inspiration, and formation shape you and your faith.

Yours faithfully,

Evan D. Garner