The Second Vatican Council reminded us that in order to understand what the Church is, the concept we have to put at the center is communion. The Church is the People of God united in the same faith, with a communion that is a gift of God and a sign for the world.
The Eucharistic prayer is no stranger to this reality, and by celebrating what is most important to the Church, which is the Eucharist, it expresses that communion, and it does so on three levels.
First of all, it reminds us that we are in communion with all the Christian communities scattered throughout the world that are part of the Church, with whom we share the same faith when we celebrate the Eucharist. Our local community is not isolated from the rest of the Church. That is why we name the whole Church and the Pope in our prayers. We are also aware that our local Church is not only the assembly that has gathered to celebrate the Eucharist, and that is why we pray for the diocesan bishop, all the pastors who help him in his task, and all our brothers and sisters who share in the pilgrimage of faith on this earth. Thus, by celebrating the Eucharist, we are in communion with the Universal Church, which goes on pilgrimage to the Father’s house.
But we are also in communion with the deceased, who continue to belong to the ecclesial community, and that is why we remember them in the Eucharist, interceding for them. Communion is not broken by death, and in this way those who have already departed and may need the help of our prayer, by virtue of the communion of saints, are also recipients of our prayer. It is an expression of our communion with the deceased who are purifying their lack of love in the hope of enjoying the fullness of eternal life.
And we lack the third dimension of that communion: that which refers to the Church triumphant, to the saints. If what we do with the deceased is to intercede and ask the saints, who already enjoy the fullness of heaven, we ask them to intercede for us: the Virgin Mary in the first place, the apostles, the martyrs, all the saints… We are in communion with the blessed, we who walk in the hope of eternal beatitude.
And so, every day, in each of the celebrations of the Eucharist, we make communion with the Church. Not only enclosed in the small reality of our parish or our group, but open to the great richness of the mystery of communion that Christ wanted his Church to be, to bring his Word of life to the ends of the earth, until he returns.
Navarro, Ramón, “La Plegaria Eucarística, en el corazón de la celebración”, Diocese of Cartagena, Accessed 1 April 2024, https://diocesisdecartagena.org/formacion/la-plegaria-eucaristica-corazon-la-celebracion/