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Apostles St. Peter and St. Andrew are depicted in this icon placed in front of the altar at Immaculate Heart of Mary Church.
January 31, 2019
Tom Burke
For more than a decade neighboring Belmont faith communities Immaculate Heart of Mary Parish and the Greek Orthodox Church of the Holy Cross have come together for prayer. Led on Jan. 24 by Archbishop Salvatore J. Cordileone and Metropolitan Gerasimos of the Greek Orthodox Metropolis of San Francisco their members’ voices rose in prayer once more.
“This prayer service at IHM was solemn vespers celebrating the completion of the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity,” Father Stephen Howell, former pastor of IHM and now pastor of St. Philip the Apostle and vicar general for the Archdiocese of San Francisco, told Catholic San Francisco.
“The fact that Archbishop Cordileone and Metropolitan Gerasimos take the time to be present shows the support at all levels for this prayer for unity.” This is the 13th year that these prayer services joining the two communities have been taking place.
Archbishop Salvatore J. Cordileone presided over the evening prayer for Christian unity Jan. 24 at Immaculate Heart of Mary Church. Greek Orthodox Metropolitan Gerasimos gave the homily.
Metropolitan Gerasimos offered the day’s homily: “This annual observance brings to mind that our Lord and savior called us to be one, to be united to him and to one another as the branches are united to the vine,” he told the assembly that included laity, clergy, religious, and seminarians from St. Patrick’s Seminary and University in Menlo Park.
“We are not celebrating something tonight,” he said, “we are seeking something through our prayer. Tonight we are praying for Christian unity,” a unity he called “a gift of God.”
Opportunities to join in action are many, Metropolitan Gerasimos said noting California’s recent devastating fires have raised discussion of climate change. “Our two churches are now equally talking about the changes facing our environment. Perhaps now is the time for our two communions to cooperate more closely on this issue.”
In his closing sentences Metropolitan Gerasimos asked for prayer with qualifications. “When we pray, let us not pray in platitudes as we often do, but rather let us pray in specifics. Let us pray for the strength to work together to combat injustice and the strength to assist those in need. Let us pray for dialogue between us to continue. And let us pray for a conversion of our heads, hearts and hands so the world may believe in Jesus Christ.”
On April 4, a Lenten prayer service, “The Salutations of the Holy Cross,” Greek Church of the Holy Cross including veneration of a relic of the True Cross.