{"id":66737,"date":"2012-12-16T13:45:00","date_gmt":"2012-12-16T11:45:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/basilica.ro\/?p=66737"},"modified":"2016-03-25T21:09:23","modified_gmt":"2016-03-25T19:09:23","slug":"the-holy-eucharist-is-the-foretaste-of-the-kingdom-of-heaven","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/arhiva.basilica.ro\/en\/the-holy-eucharist-is-the-foretaste-of-the-kingdom-of-heaven\/","title":{"rendered":"The Holy Eucharist is the Foretaste of the Kingdom of Heaven"},"content":{"rendered":"

Today, 16 December 2012, the Orthodox Church is on the 28th Sunday after the Pentecost. The Evangelical parable of Saint Luke the Evangelist Apostle, chapter 14: 16-24, presenting the Parable of great dinner<\/strong><\/em>, was read in all churches, during the Divine Liturgy. <\/p>\n

In the sermon delivered in the chapel of the Patriarchal Residence with Saint Gregory the Enlightener as saint patron, His Beatitude Daniel, Patriarch of the Romanian Orthodox Church emphasised the teaching of the Evangelical parable, showing that the invitation that the master of the houses extends to those invited to dinner is very significant<\/em>: “First of all it is an invitation of preference, of priority. The closest ones are invited, the best known ones, those who know somehow the will of the master of the house. According to the interpretation of the Holy Fathers, these ones are the spiritual leaders of the Jewish people, namely the scholars, those who teach the laws. They refuse the invitation to dinner finding various excuses. The second category of invited people is represented by the poor and sick. These ones answered the call of the Saviour and gathered any time He came out in public to preach the Gospel of salvation. This is why he fed crowds of poor people by making the wonder of the multiplication of the bread and fish, and healed lots of sick people. The third category of the invited ones in today’s parable, those staying on the roads and at fences, is represented by the pagans who have winding ways in the history, with no fix target, those with confuse faith, with no precise purpose of salvation. These ones are also invited in the Kingdom of God which they reach converting to the Christian faith, accepting Christ as their ruler and King. Very significant indeed is the way in which or how the first invited ones excuse themselves. But the polite excuse covers, beyond appearances, a selfish existence because every excuse means remaining in a state of seclusion or of existence focused on oneself.”<\/p>\n

“These three types of excuses show three great temptations. It is the temptation of wealth, of pleasure and of selfishness, which even if it is not personal, it becomes a familial selfishness, so that all these hinder man to be sufficiently prepared for the Church and for the dinner of the Master of the House which is the Last supper, namely the Holy Divine Eucharist”, His Beatitude also said.<\/p>\n

His Beatitude Patriarch Daniel has also shown that: “The parable of the Gospel read today shows that the Holy Eucharist, the Last Supper instituted by the Saviour Jesus Christ is the foretaste of the dinner<\/em> in the Kingdom of Heaven, a foretaste of the joy of the eternal life in the Kingdom of the Most Holy Trinity. The Gospel urges us to certain preparation in order to confess our sins more often, to pray more during this period of preparation for the feast of the Nativity of Jesus Christ, our Lord and Saviour. But the parable also urges us to generosity; the same as the master who invited to dinner is a merciful man, so must we become merciful and invite not only those whom we know, but also help the people whom nobody else helps. This is why, during this period presents are given not only within the family, but also, to the poor, old ones, to those lonely or sick. Thus we show that we have a merciful soul similar to that of the Merciful God”. <\/p>\n

Today too, the Orthodox Church remembers the Holy Forerunners, also showed the Patriarch of Romania in his sermon: “The Sunday of the Forerunners focuses first of all on the remembrance of the Holy Forerunners, also showed the Patriarch of Romania in his sermon: “The Sunday of the Forerunners is focused, first of all on the spiritual Fathers of the faith. The right Abraham considered the father of faith<\/em> has also received the promise to be the father of many peoples, namely of the peoples who will believe in Jesus Christ, the Son of God who was made Man for the people’s salvation. This Sunday too is part of our preparation for the holy great feast of the Christmas or the Nativity of the Lord considering the spiritual Fathers of faith as people who prepared the humankind for the reception of Jesus Christ, our Saviour, for the glory of God and the joy of the people”. <\/p>\n

Next Sunday, the Orthodox Church will be on the Sunday before the Nativity of the Lord. <\/p>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Today, 16 December 2012, the Orthodox Church is on the 28th Sunday after the Pentecost. The Evangelical parable of Saint Luke the Evangelist Apostle, chapter 14: 16-24, presenting the Parable of great dinner, was read in all churches, during the Divine Liturgy. In the sermon delivered in the chapel of the Patriarchal Residence with Saint…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":66738,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-66737","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-romanian-patriarchate"],"better_featured_image":{"id":66738,"alt_text":"","caption":"","description":"","media_type":"image","media_details":{"width":640,"height":483,"file":"2012\/12\/the-holy-eucharist-is-the-foretaste.jpg","sizes":{"thumbnail":{"file":"the-holy-eucharist-is-the-foretaste-360x360.jpg","width":360,"height":360,"mime-type":"image\/jpeg","source_url":"https:\/\/arhiva.basilica.ro\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/12\/the-holy-eucharist-is-the-foretaste-360x360.jpg"}},"image_meta":{"aperture":"0","credit":"","camera":"","caption":"","created_timestamp":"0","copyright":"","focal_length":"0","iso":"0","shutter_speed":"0","title":"","orientation":"0","keywords":[]}},"post":66737,"source_url":"https:\/\/arhiva.basilica.ro\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/12\/the-holy-eucharist-is-the-foretaste.jpg"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/arhiva.basilica.ro\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/66737\/"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/arhiva.basilica.ro\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/arhiva.basilica.ro\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post\/"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arhiva.basilica.ro\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2\/"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arhiva.basilica.ro\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments\/?post=66737"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/arhiva.basilica.ro\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/66737\/revisions\/"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arhiva.basilica.ro\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/66738\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/arhiva.basilica.ro\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/?parent=66737"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arhiva.basilica.ro\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories\/?post=66737"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arhiva.basilica.ro\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags\/?post=66737"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}