Thursday of the Third Week of Lent
We implore your majesty, O Lord, that, as the feast of our salvation draws ever closer, so we may press forward all the more eagerly towards the worthy celebration of the Paschal Mystery. - Collect (opening) prayer of the day.
Years ago a friend of mine gifted me with a lawn sprinkler in the form of John Paul II outstretching his arms and hands. The water shot through his papal fingertips as he turned this way and that to hydrate the lawn. It was called, “Let us spray.” Obviously it was a play on the invitation of the presider at mass with the words, “Let us pray.”
The collect (meaning “gather together") prayer is often referred to as “the opening prayer.” The collect (pronounced CAH-lect not cuh-LECT) dates back to the 4th century. Its purpose is to “collect” the intentions of the assembly and the focus of our worship into a succinct prayer, supplying us with a sacred vocabulary. That’s why it's rather generalized. The structure is always the same: YOU, WHO, DO, THROUGH. YOU address God. WHO acknowledges something God has done or a characteristic of God. DO is the petition asking God to do something. And always THROUGH Christ our Lord.
Pius Parsch (1884-1954) who greatly influenced the liturgical restorations of Vatican Council II, in his commentary on the collect prayers wrote, “What we read as past history and what we await as future hope merge into a holy now and a holy today in the Mass.” In other words, the God who did and will do is doing right here, right now.
In our collect today, we ask the LORD to renew us once more as we journey to “the feast of our salvation.” We are near the half-way mark of Lent, a good time to reassess. In these three weeks, it is possible that we are a bit out of steam. Like New Year’s resolutions, we may have lost our initial zeal since Ash Wednesday. The collect prayer today invites us to press forward eagerly. Has your Lent gone the way you had hoped?
How can the remaining time of this penitential season (imbued with hope in this Jubilee Holy Year of hope) be enlivened so we may celebrate the Paschal Mystery by “pressing forward more eagerly” towards the great Paschal feast?
This may take various forms – more quiet time, slowing down, taking part in parish opportunities, reading the 2025 Discipleship Challenge regularly, praying the Liturgy of the Hours at St. Anthony’s on Tuesday evenings, signing up for Easter Bible study, etc.
There is still time and today is a good day to assess where things stand.
—Timothy J. Cronin