Prayers for the Feast of St. Jerome, Doctor of Holy Scripture
Updated: Oct 3
St. Jerome (c. 347-420) was a brilliant, fiery scholar who spent most of his life on one great work: translating the Bible into the Latin of ordinary people. At the request of Pope St. Damasus he revised the Latin Gospels, and later, living as a monk in Bethlehem near the cave of the Nativity, he translated most of the Old Testament from the Hebrew. His translation, the Vulgate, nourished the Church for more than a thousand years. He is remembered for the words "Ignorance of the Scriptures is ignorance of Christ."
He died in Bethlehem on September 30, 420, the day the Church keeps his feast. The prayers below are the collect and postcommunion of his Mass in the older Roman Missal. They ask for the grace not only to read God's word but to live it. A fitting way to honor him today is to spend a few minutes with the Gospel of the day.
The Prayer
Let us pray. O God, who in blessed Jerome Thy Confessor wast pleased to provide for Thy Church a most great teacher for the expounding of Holy Writ: grant, we beseech Thee, that, his merits interceding, that which he both by word and work did teach, we, by Thy help, may be able to put into practice. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, Thy Son, who liveth and reigneth with Thee in the unity of the Holy Ghost, God, world without end. Amen. Filled with this heavenly food, we beseech Thee, O Lord, that, blessed Jerome Thy Confessor interceding, we may deserve to obtain the grace of Thy mercy. Through our Lord. Amen.
St. Jerome, pray for us, that we may love the Word of God.
Sources: Collect and Postcommunion of St. Jerome (Sept. 30) from The Roman Missal Adapted to the Use of the Laity (London, c. 1920 edition), checked against the Latin of the Missale Romanum. Public domain.
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