TOS028 Public Prayer – The Mass with Patti Brunner for audio: TOS028: Public Prayer – The Mass – Truth of the Spirit (podcast) | Listen Notes
Patti Brunner is the speaker in this episode of Truth of the Spirit as the series on prayer continues. Prayer is communication with the Lord. This series on Prayer-Reaching Out to God is exploring various ways we use prayer to grow closer to God and how prayer can assist us in our faith journey. Now you must see that during Mass God reaches out to you! Heaven comes to earth for the intimate moment of the Consecration and Communion. Also, God is uniquely with you in the readings. How is this prayer? Intertwining our beings –human being and God–joined together in eternity is possible only when both reach toward each other. The words of the Mass, the prayers said by God’s ordained priest on your behalf and the prayers you join together to say each have purpose and meaning.
The Opening Prayer of the Mass: allows you to recognize your place in time and to reach from your life towards God. Penitential Prayer- recognizing the purification of the vessel of your mind and heart –you offer the sacrifice of your choice to remove these sins by admitting them. Then you call upon God’s great mercy—recognizing that you cannot be purified on your own. You cannot be good enough—only by the blood of the Lamb and the Mercy of the Lord can your sins be forgiven. When you pray the Gloria you join your prayer with the angels to worship God. The Gloria prayer recognizes the greatness of the Lord to allow us to be where He is coming down. Our prayer is of Worship and praise. Listen to this episode to become more aware of the prayer aspects of the Mass.
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Prayer is communication with the Lord. This series on Prayer-Reaching Out to God is exploring various ways we use prayer to grow closer to God and how prayer can assist us in our faith journey. Our first two sessions discussed the distinctive, and to some Catholics unfamiliar, prayers of ‘Protection, Deliverance & Cleansing Prayer’ and then the ‘Supernatural Prayer of Tongues’. My topic now turns to a very familiar prayer but one so customary that we can fail to see it for what it is. My focus is liturgy–public prayer, the Eucharistic Celebration of the Mass.
In 1st Timothy chapter 2:1 the Bible says, “First of all, then, I urge that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings be made for all people.” NAB
The Greek word Eucharist is translated as ‘thanksgiving’. The Mass is a prayer of praise and worship to thank God for His many blessings and mercy. I have already mentioned that prayer is “communication” and “reaching out to God.” Now you must see that during Mass God reaches out to you! Heaven comes to earth for the intimate moment of the Consecration and Communion. Also, God is uniquely with you in the readings. How is this prayer? Intertwining our beings –human being and God–joined together in eternity is possible only when both reach toward each other. The words of the Mass, the prayers said by God’s ordained priest on your behalf and the prayers you join together to say each have purpose and meaning.
The Opening Prayer of the Mass: allows you to recognize your place in time and to reach from your life towards God. Penitential Prayer- recognizing the purification of the vessel of your mind and heart –you offer the sacrifice of your choice to remove these sins by admitting them. Then you call upon God’s great mercy—recognizing that you cannot be purified on your own. You cannot be good enough—only by the blood of the Lamb and the Mercy of the Lord can your sins be forgiven. When you pray the Gloria you join your prayer with the angels to worship God. The Gloria prayer recognizes the greatness of the Lord to allow us to be where He is coming down. Our prayer is of Worship and praise.
The General Instruction to the Roman Missal also reminds us that we do have our individual moments to silently pray during the Mass:
“45. Sacred silence also, as part of the celebration, is to be observed at the designated times.54 Its purpose, however, depends on the time it occurs in each part of the celebration. Thus within the Act of Penitence and again after the invitation to pray, all recollect themselves; but at the conclusion of a reading or the homily, all meditate briefly on what they have heard; then after Communion, they praise and pray to God in their hearts.”
–Silently in our hearts.
After the Kyrie and the Gloria, the General Instructions to the Roman Missal says:
“54 Next the priest invites the people to pray. All, together with the priest, observe a brief silence so that they may be conscious of the fact that they are in God’s presence and may formulate their petitions mentally. Then the priest says the prayer which is customarily known as the Collect and through which the character of the celebration is expressed. …The people, uniting themselves to this entreaty, make the prayer their own with the acclamation Amen.”
“56 The Liturgy of the Word is to be celebrated in such a way as to promote meditation, and so any sort of haste that hinders recollection must clearly be avoided. During the Liturgy of the Word, it is also appropriate to include brief periods of silence, accommodated to the gathered assembly, in which, at the prompting of the Holy Spirit, the word of God may be grasped by the heart and a response through prayer may be prepared. …”
The prayer of the scriptures seem passive but our small prayers before and after prepare us to listen then seal in their effect. As the Psalm is sung—our prayer is gathered from the ages full of hope and promise—acknowledging some fulfilment but awaiting their total completion.
After the Gospel and homily, we stand to pray the Credo. We pray boldly what we have been handed down of the truth from generation to generation. This prayer confirms our baptism. This prayer confirms our public witness. We are willing to lay down our lives for this profession. And yet in the midst of this valor we realize that it is a prayer of love. The love the Father has for us that he would send his only beloved son to live and die for us as man—true God, true Man.
We step toward prayer as we offer our meager lives in the offertory. We realize that we are an insignificant fleck of dust. Yet we give who we are, what we are to Jesus, to be taken by Jesus. To be held by Jesus. To be transformed by Jesus. Our priest takes our offering of wine and bread and adds a drop of water. Our humanity [our blood] is 96-98% water. Common! Water covers three-fifths of the earth. We know that thirsting for water can be compared to thirsting for the living Water that gives eternal life. As the priest prepares these gifts we pray that we too will be prepared so as to receive the full benefit of the sacrament that soon shall be ours. That recognition grabs our hearts and we respond with the prayer “Holy! Holy! Holy is the Lord!” “Hosanna in the Highest!”
Roman Missal Formational Materials provided by the Secretariat for the Liturgy of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, 2010, “The Eucharistic Prayer” shares that: “The Eucharistic Prayer or Canon of the Mass is the central prayer of the entire celebration. Most Catholics have been made aware from their earliest days that during the Eucharistic Prayer the bread and wine are transformed into the Body and Blood of Christ. What many Catholics are not aware of, however, is that the Eucharistic Prayer is about more than adoring Christ who becomes present in our midst.
“The Church tells us that liturgy (and the Mass is the highpoint and heart of liturgy) is the action of Christ the priest and His Body, the Church. In the celebration of Mass, during the Eucharistic Prayer, not only does Christ become present, body and blood, soul and divinity, under the forms of bread and wine, but Christ’s saving action, His passion, death and resurrection are once again enacted and offered to the Father by Christ Himself in the person of the priest, and by all present.”
“This is a truth of enormous significance! This action of Christ which brought about our redemption from sin and eternal death, offered once for all on Calvary, becomes present again for us, here and now, in this time and place, so that we can join in Christ’s perfect offering and can ourselves participate in His perfect worship.”
The USCCB tells us to:
“Read carefully any of the Eucharistic Prayers. You will see that that prayer is offered, not to Christ, but to the Father: Father, you are holy indeed …; Father, we bring you these gifts …; Father, we ask you …. It is worship offered to the Father by Christ as it was at the moment of His passion, death and resurrection, but now it is offered through the priest acting in the person of Christ, and it is offered as well by all of us who are part of Christ’s Body, the Church. This is the action of Christ’s Body, the Church at Mass.
“When the priest prays this prayer he prays we bring you these gifts; we ask you …; we offer. That we signifies that all the baptized present at this Eucharistic celebration make this offering in union with Christ, pray this prayer in union with Him. And what is most important, we do not offer Christ alone; we are called to offer ourselves, our lives, our individual efforts to grow more like Christ and our efforts as a community of believers to spread God’s Word and to serve God’s people, to the Father in union with Christ through the hands of the priest. Most wonderful of all, although our offering is in itself imperfect, joined with the offering of Christ it becomes perfect praise and thanksgiving to the Father.
“And so, during the Eucharistic Prayer at Mass, we have more to do than to look forward to the moment of consecration and remain there while the prayer of the priest continues. Before the consecration we join in the prayer of praise and thanksgiving to the Father known as the Preface and affirm that praise and thanksgiving in our singing of the Holy, Holy, Holy.
As the priest prays the invocation asking the Holy Spirit to come, in our hearts we join—Veni Sancte Spiritus that allows us to be one with Jesus. It is for the coming of the Holy Spirit that Jesus suffered on the cross died and rose. It is the forgiveness of sins by Jesus that purifies our souls that they may become temples of the Holy Spirit and so we listen carefully as our priest on our behalf invokes the Holy Spirit to come and make present in what looks like bread and looks like wine to change and become the Body and Blood of our divine Savior.
And then we listen to the ancient prayer as the priest—now in the person of Jesus—takes the bread, blessed it breaks it, and saying the words “This is my body” it is! Our hearts and eyes silently speak “My Lord and My God!”
The USCCB says “Following the Consecration we join together in the Memorial Acclamation which proclaims our common faith in Christ’s real presence and is an acclamation expressing our gratitude to Christ for His wonderful gift of salvation. But then our prayer moves on and we are called to offer Christ, and ourselves with Christ to the Father: ‘We offer to you, Father, this holy and living sacrifice…’ and to pray with the priest that ‘we who are nourished by His Body and Blood may be filled with the Holy Spirit and become one body, one spirit in Christ…’; we then join our prayers with the prayers of the Blessed Virgin Mary and all the saints for our Holy Father the Pope, our bishops and clergy and all God’s people, living and dead. At the conclusion of the Eucharistic Prayer the priest sums up all that has gone before: ‘ Through Him (through Christ), with Him (with Christ), in Him ‘ (in Christ) in the unity of the Holy Spirit, all glory and honor is yours, almighty Father, forever and ever.’ And we who are privileged to make our own offering through, with and in Christ, respond with the most important acclamation of the Mass, the great AMEN by which we profess the action of Christ to be our action as well.”
When the priest takes up a chalice of wine, pause and remember how wine is made. The fruit is taken and then crushed. The fruit is shaken down and then pressed. As the juice is gathered the hulls are cast aside. So, too, our prayers are gathered together in the cup. Our lives are placed in the cup. In our struggles we surrender ourselves to God and He takes our hopes and needs and joins them in the cup with the passion of Christ. The earthly shell that shall turn to dust is crushed so that which joins with the blood of Christ will live forever. Take my blood and drink. The priest prays the words of Jesus. We are thus joined with Christ as we consume the body and blood of Christ.
Through this living body and blood we can also live forever. In fear and trembling we realize what has just occurred. The bread and wine have become the physical divine presence of our Lord and Savior. And so we immediately fall to our knees to pray “Lord I am not worthy to receive You, say but the Word and my soul shall be healed!” This Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world, this sacrifice that removes our sin and redeems us, we pray have mercy on us! Have mercy on us! And then the greatest desire of our hearts—grant us peace!
Our ‘one word prayer’ during the mass, becomes a life changing prayer. Not timidly do we pray this one word. Sometimes we are even encouraged to shout it out by our priest presider. Even the rubrics call it “Great”. What is this one word prayer? “AMEN!” Our prayer, our ‘Amen’ shows the world that we believe. “So be it”, I believe, It is so! This prayer, this little one word prayer is required for the consecration of the bread and wine into the body and blood of Jesus. We say this in unity and only then can we dare to say “Our Father”, this public prayer that Jesus himself taught us to pray. This prayer that we, in turn, teach our children to pray, this prayer that Our Mother Mary calls us to pray at each mystery of the life of her son, is the prayer that gives us final preparation to receive our brother and our God.
As we reach out with our hands or our tongue to receive we repeat, individually, that one word prayer, to again testify that this is the Body and Blood of Christ.
The General Instructions to the Roman Missal says:
“88. When the distribution of Communion is finished, as circumstances suggest, the priest and faithful spend some time praying privately.
“89. To bring to completion the prayer of the People of God, and also to conclude the entire Communion Rite, the priest says the Prayer after Communion, in which he prays for the fruits of the mystery just celebrated.
“In the Mass only one prayer after Communion is said… The people make the prayer their own by the acclamation, Amen.”
I encourage you, dear friends, to pray with the fullness of your mind and heart as you join with the faithful to pray the public prayer of our church, the Eucharistic Celebration of the Mass.
Amen.
References
1 Timothy chapter 2:1 “First of all, then, I urge that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings be made for all people.” NAB
Eucharist is Greek word translated as ‘thanksgiving’
The Introductory Rites
The Entrance, Song
Greeting of the Altar and of the People Gathered Together
The Act of Penitence [Confiteor, or other]
The Kyrie Eleison [Lord Have Mercy]
The Gloria
The Collect
General Instruction to the Roman Missal “45. Sacred silence also, as part of the celebration, is to be observed at the designated times.54 Its purpose, however, depends on the time it occurs in each part of the celebration. Thus within the Act of Penitence and again after the invitation to pray, all recollect themselves; but at the conclusion of a reading or the homily, all meditate briefly on what they have heard; then after Communion, they praise and pray to God in their hearts.”
GIRM “54 Next the priest invites the people to pray. All, together with the priest, observe a brief silence so that they may be conscious of the fact that they are in God’s presence and may formulate their petitions mentally. Then the priest says the prayer which is customarily known as the Collect and through which the character of the celebration is expressed. …The people, uniting themselves to this entreaty, make the prayer their own with the acclamation Amen.”
The Liturgy of the Word
Silence
Lector The Biblical Readings, OT, words of God
The Responsorial Psalm
The Biblical Readings, NT
Alleluia,
Gospel, direct words of Jesus
The Homily
The Profession of Faith [Nicene or Apostles’ Creed]
The Prayer of the Faithful
GIRM “56 The Liturgy of the Word is to be celebrated in such a way as to promote meditation, and so any sort of haste that hinders recollection must clearly be avoided. During the Liturgy of the Word, it is also appropriate to include brief periods of silence, accommodated to the gathered assembly, in which, at the prompting of the Holy Spirit, the word of God may be grasped by the heart and a response through prayer may be prepared. …”
The Eucharistic Prayer USCCB Roman Missal Formational Materials provided by the Secretariat for the Liturgy of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, 2010.. “The Eucharistic Prayer or Canon of the Mass is the central prayer of the entire celebration. Most Catholics have been made aware from their earliest days that during the Eucharistic Prayer the bread and wine are transformed into the Body and Blood of Christ. What many Catholics are not aware of, however, is that the Eucharistic Prayer is about more than adoring Christ who becomes present in our midst.
“The Church tells us that liturgy (and the Mass is the highpoint and heart of liturgy) is the action of Christ the priest and His Body, the Church. In the celebration of Mass, during the Eucharistic Prayer, not only does Christ become present, body and blood, soul and divinity, under the forms of bread and wine, but Christ’s saving action, His passion, death and resurrection are once again enacted and offered to the Father by Christ Himself in the person of the priest, and by all present.”
“This is a truth of enormous significance! This action of Christ which brought about our redemption from sin and eternal death, offered once for all on Calvary, becomes present again for us, here and now, in this time and place; so that we can join in Christ’s perfect offering and can ourselves participate in His perfect worship.”
The Liturgy of the Eucharist
The Preparation of the Altar, collection
The Presentation of the Gifts
The Preparation of the Gifts, washing of hands
“May the Lord accept the sacrifice at your hands for the praise and glory of his name, for our good and the good of all his Church.”
The Prayer over the Offerings
The Eucharistic Prayer, Preface: “we lift them up to the Lord”
“Holy, holy, holy”
The Eucharistic Prayer USCCB “Read carefully any of the Eucharistic Prayers. You will see that that prayer is offered, not to Christ, but to the Father: Father, you are holy indeed …; Father, we bring you these gifts …; Father, we ask you …. It is worship offered to the Father by Christ as it was at the moment of His passion, death and resurrection, but now it is offered through the priest acting in the person of Christ, and it is offered as well by all of us who are part of Christ’s Body, the Church. This is the action of Christ’s Body, the Church at Mass.
“When the priest prays this prayer he prays we bring you these gifts; we ask you …; we offer. That we signifies that all the baptized present at this Eucharistic celebration make this offering in union with Christ, pray this prayer in union with Him. And what is most important, we do not offer Christ alone; we are called to offer ourselves, our lives, our individual efforts to grow more like Christ and our efforts as a community of believers to spread God’s Word and to serve God’s people, to the Father in union with Christ through the hands of the priest. Most wonderful of all, although our offering is in itself imperfect, joined with the offering of Christ it becomes perfect praise and thanksgiving to the Father.
“And so, during the Eucharistic Prayer at Mass, we have more to do than to look forward to the moment of consecration and remain there while the prayer of the priest continues. C and affirm that praise and thanksgiving in our singing of the Holy, Holy, Holy.
Memorial Acclamation “Christ has Died”
Great Amen [final doxology]
The Eucharistic Prayer USCCB. “Following the Consecration we join together in the Memorial Acclamation which proclaims our common faith in Christ’s real presence and is an acclamation expressing our gratitude to Christ for His wonderful gift of salvation. But then our prayer moves on and we are called to offer Christ, and ourselves with Christ to the Father: ‘We offer to you, Father, this holy and living sacrifice…’ and to pray with the priest that ‘we who are nourished by His Body and Blood may be filled with the Holy Spirit and become one body, one spirit in Christ…’; we then join our prayers with the prayers of the Blessed Virgin Mary and all the saints for our Holy Father the Pope, our bishops and clergy and all God’s people, living and dead. At the conclusion of the Eucharistic Prayer the priest sums up all that has gone before: ‘ Through Him (through Christ), with Him (with Christ), in Him ‘ (in Christ) in the unity of the Holy Spirit, all glory and honor is yours, almighty Father, forever and ever.’ And we who are privileged to make our own offering through, with and in Christ, respond with the most important acclamation of the Mass, the great AMEN by which we profess the action of Christ to be our action as well.”
The Communion Rite
The Lord’s Prayer
The Rite of Peace
The Fraction [Breaking of Bread], Lamb of God
“Lord I am not worthy”
Communion song
Silence Physical Union with Christ
GIRM “88. When the distribution of Communion is finished, as circumstances suggest, the priest and faithful spend some time praying privately.
Prayer after communion,
Blessing, Dismissal, song
Recessional Cross, priest leave the assembly
GIRM “89. To bring to completion the prayer of the People of God, and also to conclude the entire Communion Rite, the priest says the Prayer after Communion, in which he prays for the fruits of the mystery just celebrated.
“In the Mass only one prayer after Communion is said,…. The people make the prayer their own by the acclamation, Amen.”
Discussion Questions
- What is your favorite part of the Mass? Why?
- Recall a time that Mass was meaningful for you. Explain or describe why.
- Are you familiar with GIRM–The General Instruction of the Roman Missal? How about “The Eucharistic Prayer”– Roman Missal Formational Materials provided by the Secretariat for the Liturgy of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, 2010. What did you think of the quoted passages used in the talk?
- Consider the various methods of prayer within the Mass. How can you improve entering into prayer during the Mass?
- Comment on this talk.
