Tag: christianity

Annual Report, June 19, 2026

It has been an active year with revisions of some publications and some new publications in development. Also, ACOP’s materials are being used in an expanding circle.

New covers with a unified design were prepared for Prayers from the Ancient Celtic Church, The Antiphonary of Bangor, The New Ancient Collects. In time, the other parchment covered books will have the redesigned covers.

Some minor corrections were made to Prayers Ancient Made Modern, which is my number two seller, second only to Prayers from the Ancient Celtic Church.

Searches and hits on  Sanctus / Holy, Holy, Holy, Kyrie, Eleison / Lord, Have Mercy, Go Forth into the World, Support Us All the day Long, Deliver Us from Every Evil, Martin Luther’s Evening Prayer, and and Agnus Dei / Lamb of God all in the top hits and searches. The devotional booklets The Way of Light (Easter) and The Scriptural Way of the Cross are the top document downloads.

The chief views continue to be from English speaking countries (U.S., U. K., Canada and Australia), but there is growing usage from the Philippines, Jordan, India, Singapore, China, South Africa, and Indonesia!

Links to A Collection of Prayers

WordPress lets me see referrers, that is, other websites that have a link to A Collection of Prayers. After search engines, the biggest referrers are a liturgy website www.liturgies.net, the Christian spirituality website www.christianity.com, followed by individual ministries, churches, and even some denominational websites.

Wartburg Watch often used prayers from A Collection of Prayers in their online worship blog. After Easter, Wartburg Watch discontinued their online worship blog since many churches offer online options.

As mentioned above, some books got new covers with a more uniform style. Prayers Ancient Made Modern received some minor corrections.

My publications have taken a more historic turn:

This year I released a translation of Summary of Christian Teaching for Young People by Veit Dietrich. The Summary… was a significant book in Lutheran history, since it was mentioned in agendas and other works since the time of the Reformation. Strangely, I could find only the first printing. Summary… is well known for the collects that accompany each Sunday’s devotional commentary. They were widely used in Scandinavian churches, and are printed in Evangelical Lutheran Hymnary (1996). To my knowledge, this is the first complete translation of the Summary into English.

The translation of another historic book is in development, The Pomeranian Church Order and Agenda is in the final stages of proofreading. As the word Agenda implies, it was a book for leading worship. It was also a book of church law for the duchy of Pomerania, which set very high standards for churches, pastors, and other church workers. I anticipate a late August 2026 release.

As always, the sale of books pays for the website and supports research.

Beyond This Website, Books and Products

  • The Commission on Worship of the Lutheran Church–Missouri Synod used psalm prayers from two of my books (Sarum and Mozarabic) for a worship conference that focused on psalms. These reproducible sheets may also be available in book form in the future. I will put up a link if and when this appears in book form.
  • Crossway Publishers has released their Sing! hymnal in September 2025, and they used nine prayers from my books as filler for some white spaces in their book.
  • The prayer anthology from Eerdmans, Prayers from the Cloud, includes my translation of the Lorica of St. Fursey.
  • Other devotional publishers have also contacted me about using A Collection of Prayers and some of my books as a source. Congregations of many denominations and individuals have contacted me for permission to use prayers from the website or from my books in works for public or private devotions. I am always happy to share my work–which is what A Collection of Prayers is all about.

May God be glorified and our neighbors edified!

Annual Report, June 21, 2025

Again, I haven’t posted many new prayers in the last year. It has been an active year with publications and with ACOP’s materials being used in an expanding circle.

Searches and hits on Kyrie, Eleison / Lord, Have Mercy, Sanctus / Holy, Holy, Holy, Go Forth into the World, Martin Luther’s Evening Prayer, Support Us All the day Long, and In the Midst of Life We Are in Death, all in the top hits and searches. The devotional booklet The Scriptural Way of the Cross was also in the top ten searches or views.

Because Kyrie, Sanctus and Agnus Dei were some of last year’s top hits, I wrote a series on the Western Rite. That series will be the basis of a chapter on the Western Rite in an upcoming book on worship and faith formation.

The chief views continue to be from English speaking countries (U.S., U. K., Canada and Australia), but there is growing usage from the Philippines, India and South Africa.

Links to A Collection of Prayers

WordPress lets me see referrers, that is, other websites that have a link to A Collection of Prayers. The biggest referrers are the Christian spirituality website www.christianity.com and a liturgy website www.liturgies.net, followed by individual ministries, churches, and even some denominational websites.

The past year was more quiet on A Collection of Prayers because of commitments in my work.

The sale of books pays for the website and supports research. Prayers from the Ancient Celtic Church, Prayers through the Centuries, and The Antiphonary of Bangor were the top sellers in the last year. Prayers Ancient Made Modern is rising in popularity.

In 2024 I published Prayers Ancient Made Modern through Lulu, and also made it available for free in PDF, Word and ePub formats. Because of public domain content, to publish it through Amazon, I had to make it an annotated edition. Footnotes with short biographies of the authors appear the first time that author’s prayers appear in the book. Also, all prayers from Prayers Ancient and Modern have been revised or reworked. This book is getting closer to being my best seller, sometimes equaling the sales of Prayers from the Ancient Celtic Church.

The Praying with the Readings series has been further developed electronically. Purchase of the books through Amazon.com includes directions on how to download files through this website, now including HTML pages of links for direct import of the prayers on my denomination’s web application Christian Worship: Service Builder. No more cutting and pasting!

Beyond This Website, Books and Products

  • The Commission on Worship of the Lutheran Church–Missouri Synod used psalm prayers from two of my books (Sarum and Mozarabic) for a worship conference that focused on psalms. These reproducible sheets may also be available in book form in the future.
  • Crossway Publishers is about to release their Sing! hymnal in September 2025, and they are using nine prayers from my books as filler for some white spaces in their book.
  • An Episcopal monastic movement, anamcharafellowship.net, contacted me about using prayers from my Celtic and Sarum books in their breviary (private publication) as part of their daily devotions and liturgy of hours.
  • I’ve also been contacted by Eerdmans about an upcoming prayer anthology, Prayers from the Cloud, that will also include my translation of the Lorica of St. Fursey.
  • Other devotional publishers have also contacted me about using A Collection of Prayers and some of my books as a source. Congregations of many denominations and individuals have contacted me for permission to use prayers from the website or from my books in works for public or private devotions. I am always happy to share my work–which is what A Collection of Prayers is all about.

May God be glorified and our neighbors edified!