Sunday Hymns

SUNDAY VESPERS HYMNS

I beg you, Son of the living God; you have worked so many miracles; you changed water into wine at Cana to enlighten Israel;
you healed the eyes of the blind,
you restored hearing to deaf ears
and movement to paralysed limbs,
you corrected the stammering tongue,
freed the possessed,
made the lame run like the deer,
raised up the dead,
and taking him by the hand you made Peter walk upon the water, safe from sinking.

You have left us this saying:
“Ask and you will receive,
knock and it will be opened to you.
All that you ask of the Father, in my name,
I too will ask of my Father, that you may have it”.
I ask that I may receive, seek that I may find,
knock that it may be opened to me.
I ask in your name that you will ask your Father and.
he will hear me.
I am ready to pour out my blood,
as a victim, for your name’s sake,
to bear any torment.
You, Lord, are the one who hears and protects me; defend me from the enemy.
May the angel of light protect me,
for you have said, “What you ask of me
with faith in prayer, I will grant” . . .may your Holy Spirit work in me; your will be accomplished in me, that I may be wholly yours all the days of my life.

Eucharist

The first Christian prayer

Father;
May your name be glorified;
Your kingdom come;
Give us day by day,
The bread by which we live;
Forgive us our sins;
As we forgive those who have sinned against us;
And do not allow us to be overcome by temptation.

Luke 11, 2-4

Acts of Peter

Offertory prayer

The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God the Father and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with us all, now and for ever and through the ages! Amen.
Lift up your hearts!
To you, God of Abraham, of Isaac, of Israel, O King of glory! The offering is made to God, the Lord of all things.
- It is right and praiseworthy so to do.
it is right that every tongue should glorify, every voice attest, every creature venerate and celebrate the adorable and glorious name of the most Holy Trinity, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, who created the world in their loving kindness and out of their goodness saved men and granted to mortals eternal benefits. ‘
Thousands upon thousands of heavenly spirits bless and adore you, myriads and myriads of angels, their spirits on fire, sing to your name. With the cherubim and seraphim, they glorify and adore your grandeur saying to each other as they proclaim unceasingly: Holy, Holy, Holy is the Lord of hosts; heaven and earth are filled with his wonderful presence, with the splendour of his greatness.
Hosanna in the highest, hosanna to the Son of David! Blessed is he who comes and who will come with heavenly power in the name of the Lord. Hosanna in the highest.
We affirm your presence, Lord, we, your servants, to whom you have made an immense gift which we cannot possibly repay.
You clothed yourself with our humanity, you came down from heaven with your divinity, you have raised up our littleness, lifted us from our prostration, raised to new life our mortal flesh, pardoned our sins, condoned our debt; you have brought light to our minds, vanquished our enemies, given honour to our poverty. Lord, our God may our song meetly give glory, acknowledgement and adoration to your superabundant grace, now and for ever and through all ages. Amen.

Chaldean liturgy

Prayer to the Divine Master

Be propitious, O Father, Master, to your disciples;
O Father, Guide of Israel, Father and Son who are one: Lord. Grant to those who obey your precepts, to be modelled in your image, and to enjoy, after they have been proved, the goodness of God and not the severity of his judgement.
Grant that we may all live in your peace,
that we may walk in the ways that lead to your city,
resolutely passing over the waters of sin,
sure of the guidance of the Holy Spirit,
your ineffable wisdom.
Grant that day and night, till our last hour,
we may pray in thanksgiving and give thanks in prayer
to the one Father and Son, the Son and the Father;
the Son, the leader and master,
together with the Holy Spirit.
All belongs to the One, in whom is all.
Through him all is one; eternity is his.
We are all his members; all ages are his glory.
To Goodness, to Beauty, to .Wisdom,
To the Just One, all. To him be glory,
now and for all ages.
Amen.

Clement ofAlexandria

Prayer over the people

The hand of the only Son, alive and uncontaminated, the hand which cures all our ills,
which sanctifies and protects, is stretched out over the bowed heads of these people. May the light of the Spirit,
the blessing of heaven, .
the invocation of prophets and apostles
descend upon them.
May it keep their bodies pure in chastity,
their minds intent on study and the knowledge of the mystery. All in union, may they be blessed Father almighty,
through your only Son, Jesus Christ;
through him your glory and omnipotence is known
in the Holy Spirit,
now and for all ages.
Amen.

Serapion of Thmuis

Thanksgiving to Jesus

Lord Jesus, I give you thanks,
not only with the lips and heart,
which often comes to little, but with the spirit, with which I speak to you, question you,
love you, and recognise you.
You are my all, and everything is in you.
In you we live, and move, and have our being.

You are our father of believers, our brother, our all;
and to those who love you, you have promised such things as no one has ever seen or thought of,
no one ever enjoyed.

Make the gift of these things to your humble faithful; you who are God, true and good,
and there is no other besides you.

You are the true God, the true Son of God, to whom be honour and glory and majesty in eternity and for all ages to come.

Gallican Formularies

Prayer to Christ

Jesus, immaculate Lamb,
you are both father and lamb
my brother and my friend; . . .
You are he who is all, and that all is in me;
You are he who is, and nothing exists apart from you.
Take refuge in him, you too, my brothers who will yet believe from the heart;
and when you have understood that only in him will you have life, then you will receive that joy that was promised:
“That which eye has not seen
nor ear heard,
nor has it entered into the heart of man to imagine”.

Grant to us, then, what has been promised.

We praise you, we thank you, we bear witness to you; we, weak mortals, give you glory,
you who alone are God in the flesh, for there is no other, living, reigning, ruling with God our Father in the unity and power of the Holy Spirit our Paraclete,
Glory to you, unceasingly, now and always and unto the endless ages of ages to come.
Amen.

Nativity Matins

Prayer for the Nativity

Jesus Christ, radiant centre of glory,
image of our God, the invisible Father,
revealer of his eternal designs,
prince of peace;
father of the world to come. . .
For our sake he took the likeness of a slave,
becoming flesh in the womb of the Virgin Mary,
without intervention of man;
for our sake, wrapped in swaddling bands
and laid in a manger
adored by the shepherds
and hymned by the angelic powers, who sang:
Glory to God in the heavens
and on earth peace and good to men.
Make us worthy, Lord, to celebrate and to conclude in peace the feast which magnifies the rising of your light,
by avoiding empty words, working with justice, fleeing from the passions and raising up the spirit above earthly goods.
Bless your Church, formed long ago
to be united with yourself through your life giving blood.
Come to the aid of your faithful shepherds,
of the priests and the teachers of your Gospel.
Bless your faithful whose only hope is in your mercy; Christian souls, the sick, those who are tormented in spirit and those who have asked us to pray for them.
Have pity, in your infinite clemency, and preserve us in fitness to receive the future, endless good things.
We celebrate your glorious nativity
with the Father who sent you for our redemption,
with the life-giving Spirit,
now and for ever and through all ages. Amen.

Syriac liturgy

Hymn for the Nativity

Sons of men, do you truly speak of justice? Dwellers on the earth,
do you truly judge with fairness?
We confess with unshakable faith
that God, who was made man
and who was given birth by a Virgin.
Before all time he was begotten.
of an immeasurable Father;
now we adore him who became incarnate
in a Virgin’s womb.
He is the creator of all,
himself remaining invisible and distinct from creation.
So we are able to say:
in you, Lord, is clemency; glory be to you.
O Holy God,
you have deigned to be born, a tiny child, from a Virgin. I
O God, holy and strong,
you have willed to rest in the arms of Mary.
O God, holy and immortal,
you have come to rescue Adam from hell.
O immaculate Virgin, Mother of God, full of grace,
Emmanuel, whom you have carried,
is the fruit of your womb.
In your maternal bosom you have nourished all men.
You are above all praise and all glory.
Hail, Mother of God, joy of the angels.
The fullness of your grace
goes beyond what the prophets foretold.
The Lord is with you,
you have given birth
to the Saviour of the world.

Fragment from an ancient eucharistic liturgy

Christmas prayer

We praise you, Lord Jesus Christ,
God-Saviour of men,
stupendously powerful with the Father;
we praise you, we invoke you, we pray to you; assist us with your pardon, with clemency give us your grace.

Awaken in our hearts desires deserving of fulfillment; suggest to us words that are worthy to be heard; grant that our actions may be worthy of blessing.

We beg you to renew your birth in human nature, penetrating us with your invisible Godhead
as you did in a unique way in Mary
and do now spiritually in the Church.

May you be conceived by our faith,
that a mind untouched by corruption may bring you forth, that the soul, ever confirmed by the power of the Most High, may offer you a dwelling place.

Be not born in us, but reveal yourself in us. Be truly for us the Emmanuel, God with us.

Deign to remain with us, to fight for us. Only so can we conquer.

Mozarabic liturgy