Saturday, September 29, 2007

Sts Michael, Gabriel and Raphael


Saint Michael the Archangel,
defend us in battle.
Be our protection against the wickedness and snares of the devil.
May God rebuke him, we humbly pray;
and do thou, O Prince of the Heavenly Host —
by the Power of God —
cast into hell Satan and all the evil spirits
who prowl about the world seeking the ruin of souls.
Amen.

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

Love this prayer.It is must powerful of prayers and can helps us to see that battle lines are not only hear earth.In the days when our Liturgy can seem so eathrly minded and the mystery of God which we should be taken into has been watered down and at time so has Satan and all his pomps and all his emtpy promises. This is just what Stan wants; no wonder things not only in the world but in Holy Church are in a state. We need to re teach this wonderful Cathoilc prayer.

Dr. Peter H. Wright said...

Thank you, Father, for posting this prayer to St . Michael on the Feast of Michaelmas.

Yes, I totally agree with Anon.

This prayer needs urgently to be re-introduced into the public worship of the Church.

It was always recited by the priest and people after Mass since its introduction by Leo XIII.

I cannot understand how they could so carelessly discard it in the 1960s.

Satan must have been very pleased.
It would have made his job a great deal easier.

Time to bring it back ?
Oh dear, yes.
The sooner the better.

WhiteStoneNameSeeker said...

Why did it get dropped?
(We say it every day at the end of morning rosary in our house-it's one of those favourite prayers of the kids)

Dr. Peter H. Wright said...

That's a very good question from WSNS : WHY ?

All I noticed at the time (c1965) was that they were chopping bits off the "old" Mass :
At the beginning of Mass, they discarded Psalm 42.
At the end of Mass, they discarded the Last Gospel.
After Mass, they discarded the Leonine prayers (including the prayer to St. Michael)

At the same time, they introduced :
The table altar facing the people.
The epistle was read in English by a member of the congregation.
The (seemingly endless) bidding prayers were inserted.
The offertory procession was introduced.
Parts of the Mass were translated into English. Not all at once ! A liitle bit here. A little bit there.

By 1967, the liturgy in most churches resembled the protestant service of Holy Communion.

Why ?

One theory is as good as another, but with hindsight the changes would appear to have been a "softening up" process to prepare people for the Novus Ordo Missal of 1969 and how it was to be celebrated.

And that was the end of the prayer to St. Michael in the public worship of the Church !

In 1968, Pope Paul VI famously complained that "the smoke of Satan" had entered the Church.

Not surprising, really !

Anonymous said...

Yes - it is a beautiful prayer. I'm ashamed to say that I have never heard or read it before since my reception into the Church 42 years ago. And my eldest son is called Michael too. Perhaps we may look forward to more 'unknown' prayers being posted now that Fr Ray has returned to the blogosphere.

Anonymous said...

Dear Saint Mary Magdalen - Brighton UK; I grew up in the sixties raised a Roman Catholic and can remember the very beautiful Latin Mass. I can remember the priest singing parts of the Mass. Also, The Creed was much more beautiful and had beautiful literate words in its content. To this day when I pray 'The Hail Mary' I keep the word amongst in the prayer and refuse to insert among as this is the way that I was taught the prayer. This past week I asked someone to show me how to genuflect. This very elderly woman demonstrated the correct way to genuflect as I had forgotten but my subconscious memory desired to see this beautiful reflection of worship again. I think you will see a resurgence of traditional Roman Catholic worship and tradition again. Sincerely, Melinda Ellison jamesemel@comcast.net

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