After we join with the Angelic Host in proclaiming the Hymn of Victory, we enter into a sequence of prayers which, it is our belief, lead to the true transformation of the gifts of bread and wine into the Body and Blood of Christ. The first in this sequence is the prayer to the Father. It begins with the statement that we offer this sequence of prayers with the “blessed powers” who celebrate with us.

Our first declaration is that God is Holy as a Trinity of Beings. We know that the prayer is directed to the Father because we say: Holy are You and all holy You, and Your only-begotten Son and Your Holy Spirit. In this prayer we then proclaim that we understand and believe that it is the Father Who revealed to us the process of salvation out of love. We pray: “Who so loved Your world that You gave Your only-begotten Son that everyone who believes in Him should not perish, but should have life ever-lasting”.

After acknowledging that it is the Father Who desires us to know the meaning and purpose of life, namely to come to an awareness of our immortality because we share His life, we remember what Jesus, Who is truly God incarnate, did. First of all He came into the world to full the “whole divine plan concerning us.” What is this plan? The plan is that we might undergo personal transformation and become more like Jesus, the true archetype of what humans are called to be.

To be like Jesus means to cultivate His attitudes and habits of mind and the behaviors that flow from His way of thinking and living. We then declare something very important. We declare that Jesus “surrendered Himself for the “life” of the world. His act of surrendering Himself tells us that the way that we can become like Him is to surrender ourselves to the “ways of God” and not the “ways of the world.” The way that Jesus handled the greatest of all of His life’s challenges, namely His suffering and death, tell us how to meet the challenges of our own lives. In suffering and dying the way that He did, He gave us a clear example of how we are called to live life. He returned unconditional love and forgiveness to all how hated Him, unjustly accused Him, betrayed Him and abandoned Him. He did not let the behavior of others change the way that He believed God expected Him to respond to others. He loved His neighbors as Himself.

Think about this!