Embolism (liturgy)

The embolism in Christian liturgy (from Greek ἐμβολισμός, an interpolation) is a short prayer said or sung after the Lord's Prayer. It functions "like a marginal gloss" upon the final petition of the Lord's Prayer (". . . deliver us from evil"), amplifying and elaborating on "the many implications" of that prayer. In the Roman Rite of Mass, the embolism is followed by the doxology or, in the Tridentine Mass (which does not have that doxology), by the Fraction.

According to the 1913 Catholic Encyclopedia, "[t]he embolism may date back to the first centuries, since, under various forms, it is found in all the Occidental and in a great many Oriental, particularly Syrian, Liturgies."

In the Mass of the Roman Rite, as revised in 1969, the priest celebrant says or sings:

Libera nos, quæsumus, Domine, ab omnibus malis, da propitius pacem in diebus nostris, ut, ope misericordiæ tuæ adiuti, et a peccato simus semper liberi, et ab omni perturbatione securi: expectantes beatam spem et adventum Salvatoris nostri Iesu Christi.

The English translation is:

Deliver us, Lord, we pray, from every evil, graciously grant peace in our days, that, by the help of your mercy, we may be always free from sin and safe from all distress, as we await the blessed hope and the coming of our Saviour, Jesus Christ.

A more idiomatic English translation was used before 2011:

Deliver us, Lord, from every evil, and grant us peace in our day. In your mercy keep us free from sin and protect us from all anxiety as we wait in joyful hope for the coming of our Saviour, Jesus Christ.

In the Tridentine form of the Roman Missal the embolism, said inaudibly by the priest except for the final phrase, "Per omnia sæcula sæculorum", is:

Líbera nos, quæsumus Dómine, ab ómnibus malis, prætéritis, præséntibus et futúris: et intercedénte beáta et gloriósa semper Vírgine Dei Genitríce María, cum beátis Apóstolis tuis Petro et Páulo, atque Andréa, et ómnibus Sanctis, da propítius pacem in diébus nostris: ut, ope misericórdiæ tuæ adiúti, et a peccáto simus semper líberi et ab omni perturbatióne secúri. Per eúndem Dóminum nostrum Iesum Christum, Fílium tuum. Qui tecum vivit et regnat in unitáte Spíritus Sancti Deus. Per ómnia sæcula sæculórum.

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