Praying in Advent with USPG, (14): 10 December 2016

Patrick Comerford

We have arrived at the end of the second week of Advent. Throughout this time of preparation for Christ’s coming at Christmas, I am praying each morning and using for my reflections the prayer diary of the Anglican mission agency, USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel).


USPG has also been marking the time around the beginning of Advent, from 25 November to 10 December, as ‘16 Days of Activism Against Gender-Based Violence.’ These 16 days come to an end today.

The USPG Prayer Diary:

Saturday 10 December 2016:

Pray that for the year ahead we might all continue to lobby and campaign for freedom, safety, justice and equality for women and girls.

Readings (Revised Common Lectionary, the Church of Ireland, Holy Communion):

Sirach 48: 1-4, 9-11, or II Kings 2: 9-19; Psalm 80: 1-4, 18-19; Matthew 17: 10-13.

The Collect of the Day:

Father in heaven,
who sent your Son to redeem the world
and will send him again to be our judge:
Give us grace so to imitate him
in the humility and purity of his first coming
that when he comes again,
we may be ready to greet him with joyful love and firm faith;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.

The Advent Collect:

Almighty God,
Give us grace to cast away the works of darkness
and to put on the armour of light
now in the time of this mortal life
in which your Son Jesus Christ came to us in great humility;
that on the last day
when he shall come again in his glorious majesty
to judge the living and the dead,
we may rise to the life immortal;
through him who is alive and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.

Continued tomorrow