"Lord, You have given us grace to offer these common prayers with one heart. You have promised to grant the requests of two or three gathered in Your name. Fulfill now the petitions of Your servants for our benefit, giving us the knowledge of Your truth in this world, and granting us eternal life in the world to come."
+ Inaudible Prayer at the Second Antiphon, Divine Liturgy of St John Chrysostom, Byzantine Rite.
"And make us worthy of the heavenly peace that suits Your divinity and is full of salvation that we may give it to one another in perfect love and that we may greet one another with a holy kiss."
+ Prayer before the Deacon Entreats Congregation to Exchange the Holy Kiss, Divine Liturgy of St Cyril, Coptic Rite.
"Christians should judge no one, neither an open harlot, nor sinners, nor dissolute people, but should look upon all with simplicity of soul and a pure eye. Purity of hear, indeed consists in seeing sinful and weak men and having compassion for them and being merciful."
+ St Macarius the Great
"Two brothers went to the market to sell the things they had made. The first fell in to fornication as soon as he separated from his companion. He met his brother who said to him, 'My brother, let us go to our cells,' but he replied, 'I am not going.'
The other persisted, saying, 'My brother, why not?'
He said, 'Because when you had left me, I fell into fornication.'
His brother, wishing to win him over, said to him, 'The same thing happened to me, too, when you left me; come let us go and do strict penance and God will forgive us.'
They went to tell the old men what had happened to them, and the old men gave them commandments for doing penance. Then one of the brothers did penance for the other as though he had sinned himself.
But God, seeing the affliction he was giving himself for love's sake, made known to one of the old men, after some days, that because of the great love of the brother who had not sinned, he had forgiven the one who had sinned. See what it is to give one's soul for one's brother."
+Lives of the Desert Fathers
"Again I say to you that if two of you agree on earth concerning anything that they ask, it will be done for them by My Father in heaven. For where two or three are gathered together in My name, I am there in the midst of them."
+ Matthew 18:19-20
+ Catholic Epistle, James 3:13 to James 4:6, Liturgy of the Word, Coptic Rite, Readings for the Second Sunday of Baba"Who is wise and understanding among you? Let him show by good conduct that his works are done in the meekness of wisdom. But if you have bitter envy and self-seeking in your hearts, do not boast and lie against the truth. This wisdom does not descend from above, but is earthly, sensual, demonic. For where envy and self-seeking exist, confusion and every evil thing are there. But the wisdom that is from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, willing to yield, full of mercy and good fruits, without partiality and without hypocrisy. Now the fruit of righteousness is sown in peace by those who make peace. Where do wars and fights come from among you? Do they not come from your desires for pleasure that war in your members? You lust and do not have. You murder and covet and cannot obtain. You fight and war. Yet you do not have because you do not ask. You ask and do not receive, because you ask amiss, that you may spend it on your pleasures. Adulterers and adulteresses! Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Whoever therefore wants to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God. Or do you think that the Scripture says in vain, "The Spirit who dwells in us yearns jealously"? But He gives more grace. Therefore He says: "God resists the proud, But gives grace to the humble.""
"Thine own of Thine own we Offer unto Thee, in behalf of all and for all!"
+ From The Divine Liturgy of St John Chrysostom, Byzantine Rite.
On Forgiveness, Kisses of Peace and Unity
"In the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost.
In a secret prayer read by the priest at the beginning of the Liturgy it says, using the words of St John Chrysostom, that if two or three agree together in all things, the grace, the power and the presence of God will be in their midst.
What is it then, what are the words that are so decisive in this prayer? I think it is not that two or three may agree from time to time, when they have a common interest or the same feelings, but that they are prepared to be in agreement, that is in harmony in all things, making the concerns of one the concerns of all; considering the sins of each one as being our own responsibility and not only the responsibility of those who sin; because if we were a true Christian community, how much support, how much help would every member of it receive in the struggle for integrity and life! So it is agreement, harmony in all things that is the precondition of the presence of God with power and grace, with exulting joy and love.
Already in his own time St Paul said, "Alas, there are divisions among you". And these divisions destroy the unity which could be the place where God can act.
We must reflect on this very attentively because we cannot naturally, spontaneously love everyone; we find it very difficult to understand one another; we find it very difficult to bear one another's burdens, to endure each other; we find it almost impossible to consider the sins of one or another person as our own. And yet, if we respond to the shortcomings, the sins, indeed the evil there may be in someone by rejecting that person, we find ourselves separated from God, because God does not reject any one of us. God became one of us at the cost of His incarnation, at the price He paid for love of us; not of the righteous ones - did not He say, "It is only the sick who need a physician, not those who are whole"? He came to share with that very sinner, with that unbearable person whom we reject, with the very people with whom we are at variance; He came to share not only our common humanity, but their destiny, their agony, their struggles. It is not in vain that Isaiah speaking prophetically of Christ, says that the weight of the sin of the whole world was upon Him.
Let us reflect on this, because if we want to become what we are not - a Christian community, a community of people who love one another earnestly, if necessary sacrificially, whose love is prepared to go as far as crucifixion, then we must learn a great deal about our attitude to each other. How can we contemplate the vision of the Cross if we are not prepared to carry one another's burdens, to identify in sympathy and compassion with each other?
How can we face the fact that God in His love gave His life for the lost while we reject those for whom He died, ignore them, would like to rule them out of our life because it would be so easy to live only with those people who are no problem for us? By this rejection we become alien to God, not by any action of His, or of anyone around us, but by our own free choice because we cannot accept those for whom Christ lived and died.
Let us reflect on this, let us conquer everything in us that prevents us from being at one with God, and then through this unity with God let us accept one another even if it be at the cost of our lives. Amen."
+ Metropolitan Anthony Bloom, 1988-03-06 from the Metropolitan Anthony Library sent on October 21, 2012 by sermon@mitras.ru
