Prayers

My goal is to create a collection of prayers for different occasions, and I have been composing prayers formally for the past eight years, experimenting with formats and styles. I am starting to bring together notes and files.

Selection from #MorningPrayer compositions: Twitter/X

I was taught as a young Christian – and then again as a new priest – that prayer rises most genuinely from meditation on Scripture. One’s understanding of a text is shone only in living it or praying it. So, for a time, roughly 2020-2024, I set myself a goal to exhibit prayer and interpretation on social media, composing a daily prayer in response to a biblical passage each day within the extreme character limitations of Twitter (then, X, which I have since abandoned). I have gathered the prayers in a large file but never counted them. Some humble prayers below.

4 August 2024

“I slept but my heart was awake.” —Song of Songs 5:2

Give us hearts awake to your presence, Lord, that we never miss the times of your blessing and visitation.

5 November 2022

“And the four living creatures, each of them with six wings, are full of eyes all around and inside. Day and night without ceasing they sing, ‘Holy, holy, holy.’” —Revelation 4.8

Beings beyond our thought praise you, Almighty God. Join our voices to theirs.

4 November 2022

“I counsel you to buy from me gold refined by fire…” —Revelation 3.18

Deliver us, the poor, wretched, and foolish. And bring us to those everlasting treasures, stored up since the foundation of the world.

Collects and blessings

During the same time frame as the Twitter prayers above, I composed hundreds of collects and blessings, mostly for Choral Evensong at St Edmund Hall and Christ Church Cathedral in Oxford or at Jesus College, Cambridge. They respond to the readings of the day, but also to anthem texts. Those below have been chosen more or less at random.

26 February 2025

In our second lesson we heard St Paul writing about his ministry ‘in the priestly service of the Gospel of God,’ ensuring ‘that the offering of the nations may be acceptable’. Let us pray for the Church, for its offering of prayer, and its mission to lift and sanctify human life.

Consecrate your Church, O God, and make it a fit instrument for your service among the nations. By word and deed, by the power of signs, through the Spirit that rests upon it – enliven your Church and make it the dwelling place of your glory, filled with all knowledge, and able to instruct everyone in the way of salvation offered in Christ Jesus. We ask this for the love of your name. Amen.

8 January 2025

In our first lesson from the prophet Joel, God was revealed to us as the generous giftgiver, and mysterious worker of signs: I will pour out my Spirit on all flesh, he said. And I will show portents in the heavens and on the earth, blood and fire and columns of smoke… Let us pray for spiritual insight as we consider God’s work.

Holy Lord, Master and Maker: prepare our hearts for your great and terrible day by granting us a greater share in your Spirit, that in this gift of your own mind and heart, we might ever rejoice in true wisdom and in the highest of joys; through Jesus Christ your Son.

28 December 2024

Word from our psalm, ‘Our eyes wait upon the Lord, until he have mercy upon us’. At the end of this day, let us wait upon God, commending to his safe keeping those whom we love.

O Lord, and lover of souls, whose throne is in heaven, whose footstool is earth, and whose Spirit dwells within the humble: lift from our hearts the burdens of the day, that as we settle this night, we may know your loving mercy with us, in Jesus Christ your Son. Amen.

11 November 2024

In our second lesson that the ‘gifts and calling of God are irrevocable’ and that God’s mercy and goodness are as profound as his unfathomable wisdom. Let us give thanks to God, who has given us all things.

O Lord, all things are from you: we rejoice in them as gifts. All things were made through you and bear your image: we marvel at your likeness. All things were made for you: we gratefully return to you all we receive. Increase in our hearts the love of your name, magnify within them the sense of your mercies, that with gratitude and thanksgiving we might lead lives of wisdom; for the sake of Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

28 July 2024

Words from our anthem Geistliches lied: Let nought afflict you with grief; be calm, as God ordains, and so may my will be content.

Let us pray tonight for that peace God alone can give: the peace that is not shaken by sorrows and troubles, the peace of the heart that can endure all things.

Everlasting God, you stand over our times, and your mercy provides for all we need: grant us your lasting peace, your steadfast peace, your enduring peace, your strong peace of the heart, that no grief may afflict us, no troublesome thought shake us, and no evil change us utterly; for the sake of him who is the same, yesterday today and forever, even Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

[the phrase ‘strong peace’ comes from the meaning of Frideswide’s name, the patron saint of Oxford]

21 Feb 2024

Our Scriptures tonight told tales of disaster, of humanity scattered and divided at Babel, of people fleeing to the mountains in Judea in a time of great suffering. Let us pray for peace and unity among the nations and safety for those in trouble.

God of judgment, who came down to the tower and city of Babel, scattering humanity and dividing our speech: forgive our arrogance and pride, forgive our warlike ways. In your mercy, make us one people, united in common love and respect. Come again to your cities, ruined by war and hatred, and make them havens of peace where no one must flee, where none suffer, where none are deceived; we ask these things in the name of the Son of Man, even Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.  

[on this occasion, we marked the second anniversary of the war in Ukraine]

25 May 2023 

From a liturgy for blessing the boats for St Edmund Hall. Occasion: Summer Eights. There’s a video somewhere on Tiktok, showing me splashing holy water on a bunch of boats down by the Thames.

(I needed a prayer our teams would appreciate and perhaps even find amusing, that would not promise victory, which seemed inappropriate…though I’d note that our women’s teams did very well that year.)

Let us pray.

Lord Jesus Christ, friend of fishermen, Lord of the sea, who walked upon the waves, and brought your disciples safely and speedily to shore. Grant your same blessings to these boats, in which your servants row with all their might.

Make them secure against all disasters, preserve them from the attack of any foe, quicken them in the paths of the river, revealing your glory and power upon the waters. And give to all who row in these boats strength, courage, determination, and all powers of body and mind necessary to complete their work, that they may bring honour to the Hall named after your servant Saint Edmund.

May this boat and all who enter it be blessed by + the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen.

30 April 2022

We heard in the Gospel that ‘When the sabbath was over, Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James, and Salome bought spices, so that they might go and anoint Jesus.’

O God, how gracious you are: the love of your Son drew these holy women to care for his body, broken upon the cross. They did not know he had risen.

Inspire us by their generous example, and open our eyes to see and help those in need: the sick, the lonely, the dying. But as your holy angel met them at the tomb of Jesus, who had risen from the dead, so we pray: draw near to our hearts in our every good work. Remove from us every trace of fear. And bring us in the end from the darkness of the grave to the bright splendour of eternal life, where Christ has gone before.