Our series on the new translation of the Missal continues in this issue with a thoughtful expository story on collects and prefaces by Benedictine Father Jeremy Driscoll.

Providentially, his story falls in the publishing cycle that includes the first celebration of the feast day of Blessed Pope John Paul II (Oct. 22). It doesn’t seem like it has been five and a half months since that incredible weekend in Rome in May when Pope Benedict XVI beatified his immediate predecessor. And so the Church will use for the first time the Collect specifically for Masses of thanksgiving for Blessed John Paul.

We hope you will join us in offering thanks on that day for the gift of Blessed Pope John Paul II to the Church.

O God, who are rich in mercy

and who willed that the Blessed John Paul II

should preside as Pope over your universal Church,

grant, we pray, that instructed by his teaching,

we may open our hearts to the saving grace of Christ,

the sole Redeemer of mankind, who lives and reigns

with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.

God bless you!