Theme: Minding the Gap from Here to Blessedness
Welcome and Music Preparati
Greeting and Gathering Hymn: “We Gather Here to Celebrate”
Welcome and Music Preparati
Greeting and Gathering Hymn: “We Gather Here to Celebrate”
Gathering Prayer
Presider: Let
us pray as we come together to break bread and share our blessings in the names
of God, our Creator – Jesus, our Liberator - and the Holy Spirit, our
Sanctifier. All: Amen Opening Prayer
All: God of life, wholeness and
holiness, you who direct all creation to its complete fulfillment in Jesus, the
Christ - open our hearts to the message of the Gospel so that your peace may
rule in our hearts and your justice guide our lives. Loving God, bless all of us gathered here and
all those of our community who are not with us today. We ask this of you, our brother Jesus, and
our Wisdom Sophia. Amen.
Penitential Rite and
Community Forgiveness
Presider: Creator God, we may not fully open our hearts
to your Spirit living within us and calling us to be a blessed people.
All: Help us to more faithfully understand her message and be your voice
among your people.
Presider: Christ Jesus, grant us the courage we will need
to grow in grace in all we do.
All: Help us to grow in our
understanding and confidence that your word brings peace.
Presider: Holy Spirit, pour out your healing mercy on
us, your People, and all of creation, everywhere.
All: We ask for your love and understanding of the frailty of our human
natures. Help us to extend your forgiving presence in us to all those with whom
we live.
All: (with an outstretched
arm): God, the Father and Mother of mercy, through Jesus’
life, death and resurrection, he bonded the world to you. He sent the Holy Spirit
among us to give us the wisdom to love you - and the strength and compassion to
love one another. Loving God, teach us the
virtues of pardon and peace so that we may – in turn – learn to forgive each
other for our failures to care for one another and for our planet Earth. We ask this of you, our healer and comforter.
Amen.
Glory to God
All:
Glory to God in the highest, and peace to all God’s people on
earth. Creator God, heart of the
universe, we thank you for the breath of the Spirit sustaining everything that
exists, everywhere in the cosmos.
Through the example and teachings of Jesus Christ, you gave us the grace
to know that you are always among us – and that we can experience you in our
brothers and sisters. We give you glory
and praise through Jesus Christ, our brother, and the Holy Spirit, Wisdom. Amen.
Liturgy of the Word
First
reading: Hebrews 7: 23-28 All:
Thanks be to God.
Psalm 18 Responsorial: “I Love You, God, I Love You
God My Strength” #746
Second
reading: 1 John 3: 1-3 All: Thanks be to God.
Gospel
Acclamation: “Alleluia! Raise the Gospel”
#629 (Note the change from our usual one)
Gospel: Matthew
5: 1-12 All: Glory and thanks to our Savior, Jesus the Christ.
Dialog
Homily/Community Reflection
Discussion starter:
In today’s
reading from the first letter of John, we were told who we are (children of
God) and how our life will end up (we will see God as God really is). John added that “it has not been revealed what
we are to become in the future.”
In today’s
gospel, Matthew has drawn up a list of Jesus’ teachings on behaviors that lead
to a blessed life. However, as we all
know, there are gaps between our aspirations or intentions and their outcomes. We acknowledged that those gaps are due to
the “frailty of our human nature” and we asked for forgiveness in our
penitential prayer as we began this liturgy.
That said: how
do we “mind the gap” so that, someday, we can say that we have lived a blessed
life?
Profession of Faith
All: We believe in God, the Creator of
the universe whose divinity infuses all that exists, making everything,
everywhere, sacred. We believe in Jesus, the Christ, who leads us
to the fullness of humanity. Through
him, we become a new people, called beyond the consequences of our brokenness. We believe in the Holy Spirit, the Wisdom who
keeps the Christ-vision present to all those who are searching for meaning and
wholeness in their lives – and the Sustainer who heals and energizes us when our
spirits may grow weary in our journeys. We
say: Amen to courage, to hope, and to truth.
We say: Amen to the partnership and equality of all people of different
genders, races, and faiths. We believe in
a world of justice and peace for everyone, everywhere, with no exceptions. In all of this, we surely believe.
Prayers
of the Community
Presider: We are a people of faith. We believe in the power of prayer. We believe that we send blessing to those who
are struggling and who need to experience hope and healing; to those who are
grieving and need comfort in their loss. We bring the needs of people
throughout the world to our merciful and gracious God. After each
intercession, respond: Compassionate God,
hear our prayers.
Presider: Healing
God, you faithfully listen to our prayers.
We ask you to strengthen us in our caring for one another and in our
works for justice, equality, and peace in a world without violence. As always, we make this prayer in the names of
Jesus, the Christ, and the Holy Spirit, our Wisdom. Amen.
Offertory
Procession “We Are Called” #628
Preparation
of the Gifts
Presider: Blessed are you, gracious God. Through your
goodness we have this bread to offer, grain which earth has given and human
hands have made. It will become for us the bread of life.
All: Blessed be God forever.
Presider: Blessed are you, gracious God. Through your
goodness we have this wine to offer, fruit of the vine and human hands have
made. It will become for us our spiritual drink.
All: Blessed be God forever.
Gathering
of the Gifted:
All are welcome around our family table
ALL: Gracious God, we are united in
this sacrament by our love of Jesus Christ and we are in communion with all,
everywhere, who proclaim your power and mercy to those who are marginalized and
oppressed. May we love tenderly, do
justice, and walk humbly with you. May
we live as prophetic witnesses to the Gospel.
We ask this through Jesus, the Christ.
Amen.
Presider: God dwells in each one of us. All: Namaste!
Presider: Let us give thanks to the Creator and
Sustainer of all that exists.
All: With hearts full of love,
we give God thanks and praise.
Presider: Sacred Spirit, we recognize your presence
among us as we gather at our family table.
All: Fill us with reverence for you,
for one another, and for all your creation.
Presider: Let
us lift up our hearts.
All: We lift them up to the Holy
One, living in us and loving through us.
Eucharistic
Prayer
Voice 1:
Ever present and always caring, loving God, we do well to always and
everywhere give you thanks. In you we
live and move and have our being. Your
Spirit dwelling in us gives us the hope of unending peace and joy with you.
Your gift of the Spirit, who raised Jesus from the dead, is the foretaste and
promise of the paschal feast of heaven. We join together with that community of
saints who have gone before us and now live in the eternal now, as we sing…
ALL:
We are holy, holy, holy X3, we are whole. You are holy…I am holy…we are holy.
Voice 2:
We thank you, God, for the gift of Jesus in history - and the gift of
Jesus in faith. You raised him up from among your people to baptize us in your
Spirit. His life was moved by a vision
of your presence among us. He burned with insight and truth, revealing you in
his life well lived. He showed us,
through his example, not only how we should live, but also for what we may even
die.
Voice 3:
When his time had come, Jesus suffered for what he deeply believed and
taught…his conviction that love is stronger than death...and then, as a model
of this for the ages to come, he opened wide his arms and died. The Spirit, who raised Jesus from the dead,
showed us in this action that life is eternal and love is immortal. She is, for
us, a foretaste of the paschal feast of heaven.
All:
O God, let your Spirit
of life, healing and wholeness come upon
these simple gifts that we have brought from the fields and laid on our table
-- this wheat, gathered and grown and this wine, fruit of the land. May she make them holy, so that they may
become for us the Body and Blood of Jesus.
And so … (With an
outstretched arm) … we remember the gift that Jesus gave us on
the night before he died. He gathered
with his friends to share a final Passover meal. And it was at that supper that he took bread,
said the blessing and, after breaking it, shared it with them saying: take
this, all of you, and eat it. This bread
is you; this bread is me. We are one
body, the presence of God in the world.
Do this in memory of me. [Pause]
In the same way, he took a cup of wine,
said the blessing, and gave it to his friends saying: take this, all of you,
and drink it. This wine is you; this wine
is me. We are one blood, the presence of
God in the world. Do this in memory of
me.
Presider: Jesus,
whom the universe could not contain, is present to us now in this bread. He who
redeemed us and called us by name now meets us in this cup. Let us proclaim this mystery of faith.
All:
Christ has died. Christ is
risen. Christ lives in us and through us
in the world today.
Voice 4:
In memory of Jesus’ life, death and resurrection, we offer you, God,
this life-giving bread, this saving cup.
May all who share this sacred meal be brought together in unity by the
Holy Spirit. And may that Spirit, that
Wisdom, move freely in our lives as well as she did in the life of Jesus.
Voice 5:
God, remember your church throughout the world, help us grow in love,
together with Francis, our Pope, Bridget Mary, our Bishop, and all your People
everywhere - especially those who live on the margins of church and society.
Remember also all those, living and dead, who touched our lives and left their
footprints on our hearts. We remember
especially….(mention names, if you like).
All:
Through Christ, with Christ, and in Christ, in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
all glory and honor is yours, Our Creator God, forever and ever. Amen (sung).
All: Our Father and Mother …….. Amen.
All:
Lord God, we have prayed that your kingdom may come among us. Open our ears to hear it; our hands to serve
it, and our hearts to hold it.
The
Sign of Peace
Presider:
Jesus, you said to your disciples, “My peace I leave you; my peace I give
you.” Look on the faith of those gathered
here today and ….
All: … grant us your peace. O God, following the example of Jesus and
with the strength of the Spirit, help us to spread that peace throughout the
world, to everyone, everywhere, no exceptions. Amen.
Presider: May
the peace of God be always with us, and let us extend that by offering a sign
of peace to one another.
Litany
for the Breaking of Bread
Presider:
Loving God, All: you call us to Spirit-filled service and to live the Gospel
of non-violence for peace and justice. We
will live justly.
Presider:
Loving God, All: you call us to be your presence in the world and to be
bearers of healing and compassion everywhere in your name. We will love tenderly.
Presider:
Loving God, All: you call us to speak truth to power. We will walk humbly with you.
Presider: This is Jesus, who liberates, heals, and
transforms us and our world. All are
invited to partake of this sacred banquet of love. All: We are the Body of Christ.
Pre-Communion Prayer
Presider: God, as we come to share the richness of your table, we cannot forget the
poverty of so many of our brothers and sisters.
Men: We cannot eat
this bread and forget those who are hungry.
O God, your world is one world and we are stewards of its nourishment.
Women:
We cannot drink this wine and forget those who are thirsty. O God, the very earth and its parched people
cry out for justice.
Presider: We cannot hear your words of peace and not
grieve for the world at war.
Communion Hymn “There
is Only Love”
Prayer
of Thanksgiving after Communion
Presider: Eternal God, may this Eucharist in which we
always share Christ’s healing love deepen our oneness with you and our unity
with one another. We ask this in the
name of Jesus, the Christ, and the Spirit, the Wisdom. All: Amen.
Community Prayers of
Gratitude and Announcements
Closing
Prayer
All: May our hearts be glad on our
journey as we dream new dreams and see new visions.
May we all live and work for peace,
justice, and non-violence in our hearts for ourselves and our brothers and
sisters - whoever they are and wherever they are.
May we learn to bless, honor, and hold
in reverence the Earth and one another.
Amen.
Closing
Community Blessing
All: (with an outstretched
arm): May our nurturing God bless us gathered here
and all those in our community – in the name of the Creator, in the name of Jesus
the Christ, and in the name of the Spirit, our Wisdom, as we minister to one
another as the People of God. Amen.
Closing
Community Commisioning and Hymn “A New
Heaven and Earth”
Presiders: As
we leave here in the peace of Christ, let our service continue in all that we
do
All: Thanks be to God. Let it be so!
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