Service for Christian Unity,
Thursday, February,10th, 2022
Meditation
Desire and Choice
I have called you friends […] You did not choose me but I chose you. And I appointed you to go and bear fruit, fruit that will last. (John 15:15b-16a)
“I choose you.” The power of choosing someone is possibly the most powerful act of the human experience. I desire you. I choose you. I love you. These are words God is speaking to His Church over and over again. It is an invitation for us to answer the call and respond by living it; learning to love deliberately. The choice to join this Community is a profound choice, a choice to love other people, and to desire to follow this way of life.
We choose one another. Like Jesus has chosen us, we choose to give ourselves to one another in prayer, in service, in support, in forgiveness, in work, in play, in listening. We give ourselves to the task of learning to love one another, receiving each other as a gift from God given at his discretion, not ours. By the grace of God, we choose this way of life in the Community of St Anselm.
Extract from the “Rule of Life” of the Community of St Anselm
Intercessions
Prepared by our brothers and sisters from Lambeth Palace
To be used as appropriate
1 / The Lambeth Conference will take place from the 26th of July to the 8th of August 2022. This conference is one of the four instruments of unity in the Anglican Communion.
Lord, we entrust you all those who will participate in this conference. May your Spirit of unity be at work in their hearts.
2/ Some members of the Community of St Anselm will participate in the 30 days Spiritual Exercises of St Ignatius after Easter this year.
Lord, we pray for them and the other members who will spend time with other religious communities. May this month be a time of greater knowledge of the depth of your love for them.
3/ ‘Church Together in England’ is organising an ecumenical forum in March with the theme “Reconciling Hope: A broken church for a broken world”.
Lord we thank you for the work of this organisation of bringing Christians from different denomination together and we pray for all the speakers of this forum, that all the reflections during this time may increase the desire for reconciliation.