"Remember"  

During the Divine Liturgy, after the transubstantiation of the Sacraments, the Church asks God to "remember", to include in His Divine Memory of the world and man, "all who have died in the hope of resurrection to life eternal", "all bishops," priests, Your Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church, all those "who lead a pure and honorable life," this country and its government, the ruling bishop and, as the choir sings in the conclusion of the eucharistic prayer of remembrance, .. everyone and everything."

This expression "everyone and everything" is among those "minor words" which we listen to but do not hear as they elude the fullness of our attention. Yet they are full of profound meaning, particularly in the context of the Bloodless Eucharistic Sacrifice of the Body and the Blood of Christ just offered by the Church.

As we offer our Eucharistic Sacrifice to God, the Church, through the mouth of the priest, says: "Thine own, of Thine own, we offer to Thee, for everyone and for everything." The Bloodless Sacrifice is offered not for individual salvation, albeit spiritual salvation, but for the whole world, for the universe, for the entire mankind. The Bloodless Sacrifice is cosmic in the fullness of its meaning, for the Holy Ghost, descending upon our gifts to God transforms them into God's Holy Gifts to us. And this act, which is a true miracle, embraces God's entire creation, the whole world, the entire mankind with all its generations, past, present and future.

Great power and grace vouchsafed by God to the Church reside in this act. The Church is active, dynamic, actual Divine energy, continually penetrating this world in order to transform it, sanctify It, make it God-like, prepare it for the second coming of Christ, for the last, terrible judgment and for the universal resurrection from the dead. This is what it means to be a member of the Church. It means to be an active conduit of this grace, to be God's collaborators in His unquenchable desire to save the world and man. Hence the name of the most central service of our Church: "Liturgy" in Greek means the "common cause." This is precisely how we should experience the salvation of every man. We are all linked by the "guarantee of the power of good" in this world, the world in which, as Dostoevsky says everyone is guilty of everything and for everything before everyone - which means responsible. What promise, what truly "all-embracing guarantee of the power of good" lies in this thought. Because, if I am responsible for everyone, then ALL are responsible for me. And we no longer need fear the popular wisdom of the saying "man alone in the field is no soldier."

So then, this is the reason for "and everyone and everything." Because by the power of our prayer also, especially the eucharistic prayer, .. everyone" and "everything" are included in the flood of God's grace, rushing, striving, flowing to the eternal Kingdom of God.

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  • Washington, D.C., 20011

Phone  (202) 726-3000

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