The Head of the UGCC to the seminarians: "Calling you to the priesthood, God puts in your hands the greatest gift the Church - the Eucharist"

Monday, 15 June 2015, 16:46
On 14 June the Head and the Father of the UGCC led the Pontifical Divine Liturgy in the Patriarchal Cathedral of the Resurrection of Christ in Kyiv within the Pilgrimage of the seminarians of the UGCC seminaries from all over Ukraine.

With the Major Archbishop of the UGCC coserved Bishop Volodymyr (Viytyshyn), Metropolitan of Ivano-Frankivsk and Bishop Josyph (Milian), Bishop of the Kyiv Archeparchy.

Preaching, the Head of the Church said that word of God’s chosenness runs through all the books of Scripture. "From the beginning, in order to prepare man to the fullness of salvation in Christ, God chooses people, with whom He makes the Testament. This Old Testament people the Lord has chosen as a holy nation in which the fullness of God's truth has to be manifested, the light of His law, upon which the fullness of God's blessings will rest"- He said.

Similarly, Jesus chose first apostles, entering into their daily work routine life. "He comes to the beach, where they worked as fishermen, and there, on the basis of their personal life situation makes them chosen by God. In this way He called them to a special apostolic mission, making them "fishers of people", - said the Preacher.

Preparing apostles to this new ministry, the Lord makes them members of a new mission for choosing a man, God adds Him to His personal action - "to teach and preach the Gospel and heal away all sickness among the people". "The Lord calls to this mission very strange people. For example, the apostle Peter, according to his intellectual level was the weakest among all students, but the Lord makes him the rock upon which the Church was being built"- He said. Explaining the method of choice of Christ's disciples, the Apostle Paul taught: "God hath chosen the foolish things of this world to confound the wise. He chose the weak of the world to shame the strong". For the power of God is manifested in weakness.

The Head of the Church recalled that the day the Church celebrates the feast of the Eucharist - solemn worship to the Body and Blood of the Lord. The Preacher convinced that each of us became God’s chosen during our christening. "We became chosen by God people in the time of our christening, in the time of Prince Volodymyr the Great, - He continued - However, our special mission, which calls us to our chosenness - is holiness". But you cannot fulfil this mission without the sacrament of the Eucharist. Because the Holy Communion it is the goal and the top of Christian life. Without it there is no Church, no true spiritual life. The Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church survived thanks to the fact that in prisons and concentration camps priests daily accomplished the Divine Liturgy.

We can grow in our chosenness when we get God’s food: "Each of you is called, as once the apostles, to follow God's call to holiness, which He gives us in the sacrament of the Eucharist".

Addressing the audience of seminarians, the Head f the UGCC said:"God chose you because He loves you and personally prepared. Calling you to the priesthood, He will put into your hands this greatest gift of His Church, for you will be the ministers of the sacrament of the Eucharist. Use this gift yourselves every day and as ministers, you have to feed with it the entire Church".

After the Liturgy, His Beatitude Sviatoslav gave the present seminarians the leaflet of the pilgrim.

The celebration was ended by sanctification of water in the Dnipro and the restoration of baptismal vows.

UGCC Department of Information

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