Friday, July 17, 2009

Collects of Our Lady's Hours

My researches into the Little Office continue unabated, just as I have devoted this week to praying it:
  • At Lauds - Deus, qui de beatæ (Advent Collect of Our Lady, derived from the Liturgy of the Annunciation);
  • At Prime - Deus, qui virginalem (the pre-1950 Collect of the Vigil of the Assumption);
  • At Terce - Deus, qui salutis (Christmastide Collect of Our Lady, derived from the Liturgy of the 1st of January, the Octave of Christmas);
  • At Sext - Concede misericors Deus (Collect used with the Marian anthem Ave Regina cælorum);
  • At None - Famulorum tuorum quæsumus (the pre-1950 Assumption Collect);
  • At Vespers - Concede nos famulos (Collect from the Common of Our Lady);
I still have not, however, established the origin of the Compline Collect Beatæ et gloriosæ...

2 comments:

Patrick Sheridan said...

I'd be interested to find out why the Missal calls them Orationes, whilst in English we say ''Collect.'' Is it something to do with the intentions of the Mass or people, or the prayers in honour of the Feast itself being ''summed up'' or something? A cogent point I reckon...

Joshua said...

According to Jungmann, "Collecta" is a Gallican term (which in the old Missal appears only in certain rubrics; in the latest new Missal, it is the regular term employed), while "Oratio (prima)" is the Roman. Until the Secret, in the original form of the Roman Mass this was the first and only point at which the celebrant himself spoke - all else is reading and singing by others (or, in later developments, private prayers said sotto voce by the priest): hence it was "the oration" of the priest, since it has the character of a public discourse, spoken by the priest in his role of spokesman, mediator, between the people and God. In the Roman liturgy, "collecta" was used to signify an assembly, for the purpose of getting together to set out in a penitential procession as on Station days; later on, with the Roman liturgy taken on in Gaul, the Romano-Frankish fusion admitted the old Gallican term "collecta" to bear the meaning of "oratio" and to signify that the priest as it were collects and sums up the prayerful aspirations of the people: hence "Oremus" before the prayer itself. Walafrid Strabo writes "Collectas dicimus, quia necessarias earum petitiones compendiosa brevitate colligimus i.e. concludimus".