"This, then is our desert: to live facing despair, but not to consent. To trample it down under hope in the Cross. To wage war against despair unceasingly. That war is our wilderness. If we wage it courageously, we will find Christ at our side. If we cannot face it, we will never find him."
Saturday, 2 March 2013
Now is the healing time decreed
Now is the healing time decreed
for sins of heart, of word or deed,
when we in humble fear record
the wrong that we have done the Lord;
who, alway merciful and good,
has borne so long our wayward mood,
nor cut us off unsparingly
in our so great iniquity.
Therefore with fasting and with prayer,
our secret sorrow we declare;
with all good striving seek his face,
and lowly-hearted plead for grace.
Cleanse us, O Lord, from every stain,
help us the meed of praise to gain,
till with the Angels linked in love
joyful we tread thy courts above.
Father and Son and Spirit blest,
to thee be every prayer addressed,
who art in threefold Name adored,
from age to age, the only Lord.
The mediaeval Lenten office hymn, Ecce tempus idoneum, dating from before the twelfth century, translated for the English Hymnal (1906) by T. A. Lacey.
Sung below by the Choir of Hereford Cathedral
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