Collect for Ash Wednesday (1928 BCP)

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Collect for Ash Wednesday (1928 BCP) is the collect appointed in the 1928 American Book of Common Prayer for "The first day of Lent, commonly called Ash Wednesday." It opens the Lenten Season with divine mercy, contrition, and inward renewal, and the 1928 rubric makes it the daily Lenten collect after the collect appointed for each day until Palm Sunday.

Text of the Collect

ALMIGHTY and everlasting God, who hatest nothing that thou hast made, and dost forgive the sins of all those who are penitent; Create and make in us new and contrite hearts, that we, worthily lamenting our sins and acknowledging our wretchedness, may obtain of thee, the God of all mercy, perfect remission and forgiveness; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

[1]

The collect begins Lent with God's character before it names human sin. God is addressed as almighty and everlasting, yet also as the Creator who does not hate what he has made and the merciful Judge who forgives the penitent. Its central petition, "Create and make in us new and contrite hearts," treats repentance as grace before it becomes human action. The clauses that follow distinguish the outward lamenting of sins from the inward acknowledgment of wretchedness, and they seek from "the God of all mercy" not partial relief but "perfect remission and forgiveness."

Daily Use in Lent

The 1928 BCP gives this collect an unusual seasonal role:

This Collect is to be said every day in Lent, after the Collect appointed for the day, until Palm Sunday.

[2]

This rule makes Ash Wednesday's collect a daily memorial of the season. It does not replace the Sunday and weekday propers, but follows them, so that each Lenten collect is interpreted under the same prayer for contrition, mercy, and forgiveness. The result is a disciplined pattern: the Church prays repeatedly for repentance without treating repentance as self-produced moral effort.

A modern source catalogue summarizes the same role:

1549 · Memorial throughout Lent

[3]

Historical Background

Francis Procter and Walter Howard Frere locate the Ash Wednesday proper within the older Western lectionary while noting Cranmer's new collect:

The old Epistle and Gospel were retained but a new Collect was provided in 1549.

[4]

They add that the collect was "based to some extent upon the old prayer for blessing the ashes," identifying the Sarum beginning "Omnipotens sempiterne Domine qui misereris omnium et nihil odisti eorum quae fecisti" in their note.[5] The Prayer Book collect therefore carries forward older Ash Wednesday language, but it reshapes the day around penitence, forgiveness, and renewal of heart.

John Henry Blunt gives a similar account and also connects the appointed readings with the ancient lectionary:

The Epistle and Gospel are those of the ancient Lectionary of St. Jerome.

[6]

Clause-by-Clause Reading

The address, "who hatest nothing that thou hast made," is not a sentimental denial of judgment. It grounds penitence in creation and mercy: sinners can return because God remains the Creator and the forgiver of the penitent. The petition "Create and make in us new and contrite hearts" deliberately echoes Psalm 51 and asks God to form the inward repentance that Lent requires.

Melville Scott treats this as the source, not merely the expression, of penitence:

A contrite heart is not natural to us, but must be created and fully formed in us.

[7]

The collect's phrase "worthily lamenting our sins" therefore does not imply that lament earns pardon. It asks that sorrow for sin be made truthful by grace and ordered through Christ. The final petition joins "remission" and "forgiveness," so the prayer seeks both the cancellation of guilt and the restoration of communion with God.

Appointed Epistle

The Epistle appointed with the collect is Joel 2:12-17. It gives the day its summons to inward repentance:

Turn ye even to me, saith the LORD, with all your heart, and with fasting, and with weeping, and with mourning: and rend your heart, and not your garments.

[8]

Joel explains why the collect asks for "new and contrite hearts." Fasting, weeping, and mourning are not rejected, but they must serve the conversion of the heart. The prophet also supplies the collect's confidence in mercy: the Lord is gracious, merciful, slow to anger, and of great kindness.

L. R. Tarsitano reads Joel's call as grace rather than mere religious exertion:

What Joel describes here is "human repentance," a miraculous invitation from God.

[9]

The corporate dimension of Joel is also important. The trumpet, solemn assembly, elders, children, bridegroom, bride, priests, porch, and altar show that Ash Wednesday penitence is not private mood alone. The Church gathers to confess sin and plead God's mercy as a people.

Appointed Gospel

The Gospel appointed with this collect is St. Matthew 6:16-21, where Christ teaches fasting under the Father's eye:

When thou fastest, anoint thine head, and wash thy face; that thou appear not unto men to fast, but unto thy Father which is in secret.

[10]

The Gospel guards Lent against spiritual display. Ash Wednesday names sin openly, but it refuses theatrical penitence. The Father who sees in secret is the same God of all mercy addressed in the collect, so the prayer's inward renewal and the Gospel's hidden fasting belong together.

Scott summarizes the Gospel's warning:

Still greater stress is laid by our Saviour upon inward reality.

[11]

Penitential Office and Psalm 51

The 1928 BCP also provides A Penitential Office for Ash Wednesday (1928 BCP). Its opening rubric allows the office to follow the Litany, to be used with Morning or Evening Prayer, or to stand separately:

On the First Day of Lent, the Office ensuing may be read immediately after the Prayer, We humbly beseech thee, O Father, in the Litany.

[12]

The Penitential Office begins with Psalm 51, the psalm whose language most directly illuminates the collect's plea for a created and contrite heart:

Make me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me.

[13]

The Daily Office reinforces the same note in the Lenten opening sentences:

The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit: a broken and a contrite heart, O God, thou wilt not despise.

[14]

Thus the collect, Epistle, Gospel, Penitential Office, and Morning Prayer sentences form one Prayer Book theology of Lent. The sinner is summoned to turn, but the turning is requested from God. Fasting is commanded, but outward fasting is judged by inward truth. Contrition is necessary, but pardon comes from the God of all mercy through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Anglican Use

For worship and catechesis, this collect gives Lent its grammar. Clergy can use it to teach repentance without despair, fasting without display, and confession without self-justification. Lay readers can use it devotionally each day in Lent as the Prayer Book directs, letting the same words test outward discipline by inward contrition and gospel mercy.

See Also

References

  1. ↑ Collect for Ash Wednesday, in the Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States of America, The Book of Common Prayer, Standard Book accepted in 1928, "The Collects, Epistles, and Gospels," Lenten Season, "The first day of Lent, commonly called Ash Wednesday," p. 124 in the 1930 Standard Book facsimile of the 1928 Book of Common Prayer; Society of Archbishop Justus PDF: 1928 Standard Book PDF. The wording was compared word for word with the local source file sources/justuspropers/ReadingsA.htm, lines 1319-1329, correcting local OCR spacing and punctuation against local PDF extraction tmp/revision-research/collect-for-ash-wednesday/1928-standard-ashwednesday-pypdf.txt, lines 1142-1152.
  2. ↑ Rubric following the Collect for Ash Wednesday, in the Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States of America, The Book of Common Prayer, Standard Book accepted in 1928, "The Collects, Epistles, and Gospels," Lenten Season, p. 124; 1928 Standard Book PDF. Rubric checked against sources/justuspropers/ReadingsA.htm, lines 1340-1345, and local PDF extraction tmp/revision-research/collect-for-ash-wednesday/1928-standard-ashwednesday-pypdf.txt, lines 1153-1154.
  3. ↑ New Every Morning, "Sources of the Seasonal Collects," section IV, "Lent," card for "Ash Wednesday"; Sources of the Seasonal Collects. Quotation checked against local research copy tmp/revision-research/collect-for-ash-wednesday/sources-seasonal-collects.html, lines 523-533.
  4. ↑ Francis Procter and Walter Howard Frere, A New History of the Book of Common Prayer, revised edition (London: Macmillan, 1902), chapter 13, "Collects, Epistles, and Gospels," section on Ash Wednesday; Society of Archbishop Justus transcription: A New History of the Book of Common Prayer, chapter 13. Quotation checked against local research copy tmp/revision-research/collect-for-ash-wednesday/procter-frere-ch13.html, lines 414-420.
  5. ↑ Francis Procter and Walter Howard Frere, A New History of the Book of Common Prayer, revised edition (London: Macmillan, 1902), chapter 13, note 25; A New History of the Book of Common Prayer, chapter 13. Note checked against local research copy tmp/revision-research/collect-for-ash-wednesday/procter-frere-ch13.html, lines 1245-1247.
  6. ↑ John Henry Blunt, ed., The Annotated Book of Common Prayer (London: Rivingtons, 1884), commentary on Ash Wednesday, transcribed at Lectionary Central: Blunt's Commentary. Quotation checked against local research copy tmp/revision-research/collect-for-ash-wednesday/blunt.html, lines 77-84.
  7. ↑ Melville Scott, The Harmony of the Collects, Epistles, and Gospels: A Devotional Exposition of the Continuous Teaching of the Church Throughout the Year (London: S.P.C.K., 1902), "Ash Wednesday"; Lectionary Central transcription: Scott's Commentary. Quotation checked against local research copy tmp/revision-research/collect-for-ash-wednesday/melville-scott.html, lines 112-119.
  8. ↑ Joel 2:12-13, appointed "For the Epistle" on Ash Wednesday in the Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States of America, The Book of Common Prayer, Standard Book accepted in 1928, "The Collects, Epistles, and Gospels," p. 124; 1928 Standard Book PDF. Quotation compared with sources/justuspropers/ReadingsA.htm, lines 1388-1394, and local PDF extraction tmp/revision-research/collect-for-ash-wednesday/1928-standard-ashwednesday-pypdf.txt, lines 1155-1161.
  9. ↑ L. R. Tarsitano, "Repenting," sermon for Ash Wednesday at Saint Andrew's Church, Savannah, March 8, 2000, transcribed at Lectionary Central: Repenting. Quotation checked against local research copy tmp/revision-research/collect-for-ash-wednesday/tarsitano.html, lines 178-185.
  10. ↑ St. Matthew 6:17-18, appointed as the Gospel for Ash Wednesday in the Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States of America, The Book of Common Prayer, Standard Book accepted in 1928, "The Collects, Epistles, and Gospels," p. 125; 1928 Standard Book PDF. Quotation compared with sources/justuspropers/ReadingsA.htm, lines 1405-1417, and local PDF extraction tmp/revision-research/collect-for-ash-wednesday/1928-standard-ashwednesday-pypdf.txt, lines 1173-1186.
  11. ↑ Melville Scott, The Harmony of the Collects, Epistles, and Gospels (London: S.P.C.K., 1902), "Ash Wednesday"; Scott's Commentary. Quotation checked against local research copy tmp/revision-research/collect-for-ash-wednesday/melville-scott.html, lines 93-98.
  12. ↑ Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States of America, The Book of Common Prayer, Standard Book accepted in 1928, "A Penitential Office for Ash Wednesday," opening rubric; Society of Archbishop Justus transcription: Litany and Penitential Office. Quotation checked against local source sources/justus1928/Litany.htm, lines 259-268.
  13. ↑ Psalm 51:10, as printed in the 1928 BCP "A Penitential Office for Ash Wednesday"; Litany and Penitential Office. Quotation checked against local source sources/justus1928/Litany.htm, lines 287-296.
  14. ↑ Psalm 51:17, printed among the Lenten opening sentences for Morning Prayer in the 1928 BCP; Society of Archbishop Justus transcription: Morning Prayer. Quotation checked against local source sources/justus1928/MP.htm, lines 115-124.

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