Sometimes looking at the prayers of pilgrims who have faithfully gone ahead of us gives voice to the unspoken desires and prayer within our hearts. Use them to articulate what you want to offer to God in the new year.
COVENANT PRAYER
I am no longer my own, but Thine. Put me to what Thou wilt, rank me with whom Thou wilt; put me to doing, put me to suffering; let me be employed for Thee or laid aside for Thee, exalted for Thee or brought low for Thee; let me be full, let me be empty; let me have all things, let me have nothing; freely and heartily yield all things to Thy pleasure and disposal.
And now, O glorious and blessed God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, Thou art mine, and I am Thine. So be it. And the covenant, which I have made on earth, let it be ratified in heaven.
Amen.
Source unknown, used by John Wesley in his Covenant Service
SUSCIPE (LATIN, “RECEIVE’)
Take, Lord, and receive all my liberty,
my memory, my understanding,
and my entire will,
All I have and call my own.
You have given all to me.
To you, Lord, I return it.
Everything is yours; do with it what you will.
Give me only your love and your grace,
that is enough for me.
Ignatius Loyola, 1491-1556
PRAYER OF TRUST IN GOD
O Father, I will trust Thee: for all the known and all the unknown good that I have ever had has come from Thee.
Sweet Saviour, I will trust Thee: thy grace is all sufficient for my soul, as mighty as Thy power and as matchless as Thy love.
Blest Spirit, I will trust Thee: how can I ever dare to trust myself, to think, or speak, or act apart from Thee.
O God, my God, my hope and stay, who knowest and orderest all that is best, I know not what to will or do aright; then make me ever love to choose and do Thy will.
Walter Howard Frere, 1863-1938
PRAYER FOR GENEROSITY
Eternal Word, only begotten Son of God,
Teach me true generosity.
Teach me to serve you as you deserve.
To give without counting the cost,
To fight heedless of wounds,
To labour without seeking rest,
To sacrifice myself without thought of any reward,
Save the knowledge that I have done your will. Amen.
Ignatius Loyola, 1491-1556
PRAYER TO SPREAD GOD’S LOVE
Dear Jesus, help us to spread Your fragrance everywhere we go.
Flood our souls with Your Spirit and Life.
Penetrate and possess our whole being so utterly
that our lives may only be a radiance of Yours.
Shine through us and be so in us
that every soul we come in contact with
may feel Your presence in our souls.
Let them look up, and see no longer us, but only Jesus!
Stay with us and then we shall begin to shine as You shine,
so to shine as to be a light to others.
The light, O Jesus, will be all from You; none of it will be ours.
It will be You, shining on others through us.
Let us thus praise You in the way You love best, by shining on those around us.
Let us preach You without preaching, not by words but by example,
by the catching force, the sympathetic influence of what we do,
the evident fullness of the love our hearts bear for You. Amen.
John Henry Newman, 1801-1890
(prayed daily by Mother Teresa’s Missionaries of Charity)
PRAYER OF PERFECT RESIGNATION
My God, I do not know what must come to me today.
But I am certain that nothing can happen to me
that you have not foreseen, decreed, and ordained from all eternity.
That is sufficient for me.
I adore your impenetrable and eternal designs,
to which I submit with all my heart.
I desire, I accept them all, and I unite my sacrifice
to that of Jesus Christ, my divine Saviour.
I ask in his name and through his infinite merits,
patience in my trials, and perfect and entire submission
to all that comes to me by your good pleasure. Amen.
Joseph Pignatelli, 1737-1811