Martin D. O’Keefe SJ, Oremus: Speaking with God in the Words of the Roman Rite
Oremus is many things. The very invitation to prayer that is contained in the title (‘let us pray’) suggests that this is a prayer book. It is also a tool for study, for meditation, and for reflection. It is a book of original translations. It is a key opening up a door leading to a treasury of riches—a door that may well be closed to many in today’s Church. It is in several senses a labor of love.
In the Roman rite, each day’s Mass contains three prayers the Collect (an invocation of God that brings together the theme of the liturgy with the desires of its congregation of participants), the Prayer over the Gifts, and the Prayer after Communion. Similarly, each Mass also has a Preface (the prayer that introduces the central part of the Eucharistic liturgy), and the Eucharistic Prayer itself. Occasionally, a Mass will be found containing a Sequence (a special hymn that comes before the Alleluia of the Gospel). Virtually all of these are gems of Latin literature, and they are magnificent prayers. Oremus tries to provide, for those who do not read Latin readily, an English version of all of these which will be faithful to the meaning, to the beauty, and to the dignity of the original Latin.
By the very nature of the case, no translation is ever the equal of its original. But in these pages one can glimpse the beauty and power of these prayers. They are a part of every Catholic’s patrimony; this book seeks to make them accessible to those to whom they rightly belong.
paperback 390pp.
Price: £23.00
About $34.59 or €26.92 at the current exchange rates
ISBN: 978 1 880810 28 6
Publisher: Institute of Jesuit Sources
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