“Those who Dwell in Darkness and in the Shadow of Death”
These well-known words from the “Benedictus,” which the Church prays each day at Lauds, refer, of course, to all of us, and serve as a salutary recall from distraction and division to gratitude for what we have been gifted and commitment to be bearers of blessing.
This morning, as I prayed them, I thought, with many others, of the passengers and crew of the Continental Connection flight to Buffalo. The story in today’s New York Times captures something of the poignancy:
It was perhaps not the most glamorous of destinations, or the most luxurious of flights: a turboprop plane pushing through wind and snow and fog to an ailing Rust Belt city. But for many of the passengers and crew aboard, it was a journey home, even if only after a day’s work, or a chance to reconnect with friends and family for a long holiday weekend.
And, as in all such disasters, there were tales of bad luck and terrible coincidence, of great life stories and modest love affairs, of long-awaited reunions turned into rituals of grief.
The “Collect” at the end of Lauds for Saturday of the First Week in Ordinary Time sums up the believer’s hope, for ourselves and all who dwell in the shadow of death:
O God, may the light of your risen Son shine in our hearts, so that freed from the darkness of sin, we may come to share the fullness of his glory, through Christ our Lord.
(Note: I base my version of the “Collect” upon the Italian translation which brings out more clearly the Christological foundation of Christian hope. I do not have the Latin original available. If anyone does, I would be interested in which translation shows greater fidelity to the Latin.)
Bob: Here it is:
Corda nostra, quaesumus, Domine, resurrectionis splendor illustret, quo mortis tenebris carere valeamus, et ad claritatem perveniamus aeternam.
Thank you, Joseph. In THIS case I prefer the Italian “dynamic equivalence” :-)!
Father Imbelli:
As often happens, I hit a wrong button and lost what I started a half hour ago. Father Komonchak has supplied what you need. But perhaps this is helpful since I have the three texts on my desk;
Latin –Corda nostra, quaesumus, Domine, resurrectionis splendor illuminet, quo mortis tenebris carere valeamus, et ad claritatem perveniamus aeternam. Per Dominum ….
Italian — Risplenda sempre, O Dio, nei nostri cuore la luce del Figlio tuo risorto, perche’ liberi dalle tenebre del peccato, possiamo giungere alla pienezza della sua gloria. Egli e’ Dio ….
English (ICEL, 1974-1976) — Lord,
free us from the dark night of death.
Let the light of the resurrection
dawn within our hearts
to bring us to the radiance of eternal life.
We ask ….
Ah, and they say that the Italian collects, including those in the Messale, are more literally translated! I realize that this collect is from the Breviary, not the Missal, and that this English text was done a few years later and by a different hand than those who did the”73 English Missal collects. I hold no brief for the ’73 Missal. But, admitting my biases, I believe that the “lost” Missal of 1997 is altogether more worthy, both as a translation and as ENGLISH prayer. Peccato! We’ll never see it now.
Correction: for “cuore” READ “cuori”
I’ll try again — Risplenda sempre, O Dio, nei nostri cuori la luce del Figlio tuo risorto, perche’ liberi dalle tenebre del peccato, possiamo giungere alla pienezza della sua gloria.
And in the Latin, as Father Komonchak correctly has it,
For “illuminet” READ “illustret.
As our tireless Mother (we are eleven) would say somewhere in the course of a particularly trying day: “I should have stood in bed.”
I probably messed up the English too, but then you recall my one-finger typing.
Dear Mr. Page,
I share your grief that the 1997 Missal did not come to fruition … a grief rekindled each Sunday. As you and I work at those four-handed exercises in some obscure corner of Purgatorio, perhaps we can pray (sotto voce, of course) using the still-born texts.
From James Martin’s blog at America, I learned that among the dead was Alison Des Forges, the historian of Africa and the great expert on the dreadful events in Rwanda in 1994. I’d only met her once, when she and her husband were tenants in our house many years ago, but she was an extraordinary woman who did an enormous amount in human rights. Martin’s entry also has a link to the notice by Human Rights Watch, and there is a long obituary of Alison in the Saturday NYT.
http://www.americamagazine.org/blog/entry.cfm?blog_id=2&id=715FADD5-1438-5036-4FE20177AB3B6397
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/14/nyregion/14desforges.html?scp=1&sq=des%20forges&st=cse