Clunkiness

This Sunday's Prayer over the Offerings has already occurred in last Tuesday's Mass, and will occur another five times before Advent is over. It is an example of what many people call a 'clunky' text:

Be pleased, O Lord, with our humble prayers and offerings,

and, since we have no merits to plead our cause,

come, we pray, to our rescue

with the protection of your mercy.

As often happens, this 'clunky' feeling is due to the order of the words. Move two parentheses ('O Lord' and 'we pray') and you have a much smoother text: 

Be pleased with our humble prayers and offerings,

O Lord, we pray, 

and, since we have no merits to plead our cause,

come to our rescue

with the protection of your mercy.

The altered text is an example of what I like to call the 'Morecambe Missal' in memory of the great comedian Eric Morecambe who, when accused by conductor Andre Prévin of playing the wrong notes on his piano, naughtily replied that he was playing the right notes, but in a different order.