Coptic Prayers: Prayer for the sick

Coptic icon of St. Mina the Wonderworker, gifted with healing (source)

Offered during matins, the morning prayers in preparation for the Divine Liturgy.

Priest: Again, let us ask God the Almighty, the Father of our Lord God and Savior Jesus Christ. We ask and entreat your goodness, O Lover of Mankind: Remember, O Lord, the sick of your people.

Deacon: Pray for our fathers and brothers who are sick with any sickness, whether in this place or in any place, that Christ our God may grant us, with them, health and healing, and forgive us our sins.

All: Lord, have mercy.

Priest: Visit them with mercy and compassion and heal them. Take away from them, and from us, all sickness and all maladies; the spirit of sickness chase away. Those who have long lain in sickness, raise up and comfort. And those who are afflicted by unclean spirits, set them all free.

Those who are in prisons or dungeons, or those who are in exile or captivity, or those who are held in bitter bondage, O Lord, set them all free and have mercy on them. For You are He Who loosens the bound and uplifts the fallen, the hope of those who are hopeless, the help of those who have no helper, the comfort of the fainthearted, the harbor of those in the storm.

All souls that are distressed or bound, give them mercy, O Lord. Give them rest. Give them coolness. Give them grace. Give them help. Give them salvation. Give them forgiveness of their sins and iniquities.

As for us also, O Lord, the maladies of our souls heal, and those of our bodies, too, cure. O You, the true Physician of our souls and bodies, the Overseer of all flesh, visit us with Your salvation.

All: Lord, have mercy.

Faith of our Fathers: A Colloquium on Orthodoxy for Lutherans

This is some good stuff!!!

You can hear lectures online from some Orthodox academics and clergy, all of them converts from Lutheranism, on various subjects like Augustine and ecclesiology, justification, Scripture, and the Trinity.

B Movie Catechism

EC'ers looking for innovative ways to teach the faith through film might find some great ideas at The B Movie Catechism.





Or not. :)

Emergent Liturgy

The new "Liturgical Service," as they call it, has become the most popular service even among young people. After the "standard" evangelical service at 9:30 a.m., workers decorate the platform with candles, non-specific iconography and other religious-looking items. Fitzgerald wears generic vestments and adopts a more somber manner. He reads from a liturgical book and the congregation responds by reading words on the screens.

"I like the reverence and the mood," says one girl, 16. "It feels more spiritual."

"I like the candles," her friend chimes in.

The effort seems to be working to keep church members from straying elsewhere. In St. Paul, Minn., Family Life Center recently created a liturgical service and says some families have opted to stay rather than try out other churches. Jessica Onstead, 38, was dissatisfied enough last year with the "fluffiness" of evangelical church services that she visited an Orthodox service and liked parts of it. But she was uncomfortable with the "kissing of strangers, genuflecting and standing for an hour during the sermon."

She ended up back at her non-denominational church which had by then added an Orthodox-style service. She now attends ...

Read it ALL.

And a reaction.

Hat Tip to Orthodixie

Coptic prayers: The Morning Prayer

This is one snippet from Prime that I really like. Prime is prayed first thing in the morning.

O the true Light Who gives light to every man coming into the world, You came into the world through Your love for mankind, and all creation rejoiced in Your coming. You saved our father, Adam, from the seduction, and delivered our mother, Eve, from the pangs of death, and gave us the spirit of sonship. Let us, therefore, praise You and bless You saying :

Doxa Patri ke Eioa ke Agio Pnevmati (Glory to the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit)

As the daylight shines upon us, O Christ Our God, the true Light, let the luminous senses and the bright thoughts shine within us, and do not let the darkness of passions hover over us, that mindfully we may praise You with David saying, “My eyes have awakened before the morning watch, that I might meditate on Your sayings." Hear our voices according to your great mercy, and deliver us, O Lord our God, through Your compassion.

sunrise on the Nile (source)