Before Holy Communion

Tzegemariam

Selam everyone!!!

I was wondering what do between the period after confessing and before Holy Communion?

What kind of things should we be doing BEFORE recieving it?

Thanks and May God Bless you all and help you to answer this question.

aidan

I was told by a Russian Orthodox monk that even minutes after our confession we sin so we stand before God as sinners.

(I was also told by an Ethiopian monk that Ethiopian's don't communicate very often!)

Can I share this prayer with you I say from my prayer book before receiving the Mysteries:
 
'Thou has ravished me with longing, O Christ, and and with Thy divine love Thou hast changed me. But burn up with spiritual fire my sins and make me worthy to be filled with delight in Thee, that I may leap for joy, O gracious Lord, and magnify Thy two comings.'

mabsoota

that's a beautiful prayer. see also our prayers here:
http://www.liturgies.net/Liturgies/Other/Agpeya/VariousPrayers.htm

or this has it in more modern english, which i prefer, it's towards the bottom of the page, my favourite is prayer before communion 1:
http://www.copticmp3.com/agpeya-english/

as for repenting, there are loads of times in the liturgy where we repent, and this is enough before taking Holy Communion. ok, if u just slept with yr boyfriend since confession or robbed the shop, u should probably not take communion and go to confession instead, as there may be an underlying sinful tendancy that needs to be brought out into the open. but for usual things, bad thoughts, laziness etc, it should be ok to confess to God during the liturgy.
if u did something like shout at yr parents since confession, u should repent to God and then apologise to them. that is the meaning of the prayer of reconcilliation (u should make sure u get to church before this part!) that u don't just ritually share the 'kiss of peace' but u actually make up with yr friends or anyone who u upset or who upset u.
make God make us all worthy and pray for me too, a sinner.

Tzegemariam

Thanks may God Bless you all,


Anymore advice brfore Holy Communion, i have the Agepeya prayers

Any advice in general?

PLEASE I NEED TO LEARN MORE


a sinner

ilovesaintmark

Leave Church quickly!  It keeps you from being muddled in gossip and in loosing the Grace you received.

mabsoota

she said BEFORE Holy Communion!

so, do u confess like several days before communion or is it a few hours? coz if it's several days, u have to go about yr normal life, just think before anything comes out of yr mouth, 'is it useful? is it true? is it lovely?' (in the same way, during the fast, u think before putting anything in yr mouth).

Tzegemariam

several days!

Sheba

Hello Thanks,

Mabsoota has given you a good advice. Before communion and after confession, there may be sins we commit by thinking, speaking, and/or doing. Confess them to the Lord wherever you are.

However, do not feel like you have to tell each and everything to your preist. Tell those that you believe you need other peoples' advice on.

Whenever you commit a sin in your thought, speech, or action, DO NOT wait until you go to your preist!! Confess it to the LORD. Do not postpone any confession by a second. If you are Ethiopian, I believe every year during the passion week you hear the commentary on Christ's action of spitting the vinegar He was offered by the soldiers while He was on the cross. That represents SPITTING OUT anything inconvenient the moment we realize it has a bad taste to our spirit. If we don't SPIT it the moment we know it is a sour experience and wait until we meet our preist on the weekend, or until he answers our call or until he opens his inox (I bet there are many who do it that way), then, not only are we suffering by a self-imposed feeling of imprisonment by the sin; but we are also showing our contempt to all the spiritual reign of the Holy spirit on earth and are being led by a man-made organizational principle.

If you are Ethiopian, I hope you know the commonly said Ge'ez phrase- 'Abesku Geberku!' our fathers and mothers frequently say when they realize that they have just sinned in thought/speech/deeds. It means 'I sinned! I transgressed!" They usually say it beating their breast or their thighs and stretch their hands up to the sky. They don't wait until a preist comes and the "report" it to him. They SPIT IT OUT! And they do not want to stay with it for one second after they realize they just did  it. It is only if they feel the matter is hard and they need other peoples' advice or if it involves some sacramental procedures (like ointment, prayer of candle, and things like that) or has some implication to receiving the Holy Communion or performing some other sacrament that they go to the preist. Screaming "Abesku geberku" was meant to to practice evaluating their own thoughts/speeches/deeds and raise their consciousness of their own action every moment of their lives. There is no reason you cannot say 'abesku geberku" every moment you realize you just sinned; and you can ask for God's mercy wherever you are. Procedural obstacles are removed by the lord and we are now in the reign of the Holy Spirit. Afterall, christ is in you; you need others to help you see Him. But, you don't need that help forever; you should grow through time spiritually, shoudn't you?

Peace and love!
sheba

peterfarrington

Dear Sheba,

I must take issue with some of the comments you have been making. They do seem rather Protestant, and that makes me wonder which Church you attend.

You have spoken in your last post of the 'man made organisational principle' and this is not the way we should describe the divine ordering of life in the Church. You also suggest that it is up to us to choose whether we ask for a priest's help with some matter. But how are we to know when we need help?

I would say that your words, 'Do not feel like you have to tell each and everything to your priest' are the very opposite of a sound Orthodox spirituality. Indeed the more we grow in grace and in the experience of God it seems to me that the more we realise how much we need the support of a spiritual father.

This does not mean that we should not repent as soon as we are aware that we have sinned. But this does not preclude receiving the absolution from a priest and discussing our spiritual life with our spiritual father.

You also say that we don't need help forever. Again this is not Orthodox. We need more help as we grow in Christ, not less. We are all too easily led into prideful thinking by some small achievement. We are certainly not the best judges of our progress or of our holiness.

We are blessed to receive the gift and grace of the Holy Spirit. But the Holy Spirit does not lead us to neglect the sacraments which have been established by God for our salvation. I would urge us all to make more use of the sacrament of confession not less. It is too easy to fool ourselves that we are becoming perfect. Let us repent every time we sin. This is also necessary. But the sacrament of confession is not the same as repentance and should not be treated as if it were the same and were therefore just an optional extra.

Father Peter

axum

'Abesku Geberku!'

dear sheba
i can't believe you are equating what i quoted above with the holy sacrament of confession .you are absolutely misguided .What is more you seem to misguide others. muttering "omg" after sinning is not confessing .may christ  guide you back to the right way .

geomike

Sheba, I must tell you again, DO NOT KEEP ANY SIN FROM YOUR Father OF CONFESSION. The foc is just a witness before God, he is not the one who will forgive your sins. God on the other hand, He understands what sin you are talking about even if the priest doesn't, as a matter of fact He knows what sins you have committed before you even go to confession. This is not right at all to hide things from your FOC.

May God help us all get the courage to confess every single sin in our hearts.

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