Prayer Book of Unity presented in Lviv

In order to revive the prayer life so that all readers will discover the joy and depth of communication with God - this is the main objective of the new Prayer Book, which was presented on October 5 at the Philosophical and Theological Faculty of UCU.

Presenting this edition, its compiler, the priest of the UOC, Andriy Dudchenko, said that when they were working on it, they pondered what mood the prayers create. And they came to the conclusion that the theme of repentance, self-denial was predominant. Instead, in the New Testament, the positive motives of joy, forgiveness, and trust are often heard. In the sermons, they seldom cite the biblical words that we are “friends of Christ", not just “slaves of the Lord”. And the feeling of weakness, guilt creates a negative feeling.

The new prayer book should create a positive mood from prayer, expand the world view of the believer through familiarity with the riches of the Orthodox prayer tradition, in particular, with the practice of prayer of the Greek Church.

Another task of the publication is to unite believers in prayer for the unity of Ukrainian Orthodoxy. It is from this prayer that it begins.

Father Andriy drew attention to the fact that in addition to the approved in the XVII century. the prayer rule, they have attracted modern prayers made for various contemporary needs: for Ukraine and the Ukrainian people, during the invasion of the enemies, for the Holodomor victims and repressions, the prayers of Fr Alexander Men. "The prayer book represents the living tradition of prayer - tribute and the modernity,”the priest said.

This live approach to the conclusion of the prayer book also was pointed out by Fr. Vasyl Rudeiko, a UCU teacher, employee of the Liturgical Commission of the UGCC. Thus, the prayer from the clerical sphere becomes close to a simple believer. “The prayer book shows a living Church that can create new prayers,” notes Fr. Basil. He also commended the artwork of the book - because it used 100 original illustrations by Oleksiy Chekal, as well as the quality of translations of psalms into modern language.

Other participants of the presentation also talked the most about the quality of the translation into the modern language of the prayer books. Teacher of the Lviv Orthodox Theological Academy of the UOC-KP, Fr Nazariy Lozynskyy recalled the popularity of prayers in the Church Slavonic language in Halychyna. He drew attention to the need for the unification of prayers to be one text for different denominations.

He was supported by Andriy Shkrabyuk, translator and liturgist, who, in his practice, retains some of the Old Slavonic terms that were acquired by people. He also cited an example of Melchites, where Greek Catholics and Orthodox Christians have the same liturgical texts.

The head of the All-Ukrainian Fellowship of the Holy Apostle Andrew the First-Called of the UAOC, Taras Dmytryc introduced fraternal prayer books that have been released over the past 30 years, where the Ukrainian and popular version of the Church Slavonic was used.

Rector of the Open Orthodox University Fr. George Kovalenko called to make an audio version of the Prayer Book and to create its electronic version.

The head of the liturgical center "Tradition", hieromonk Luka Mykhailovych, called the presented Prayer Book to be very evangelical in spirit.

Yevhen Avramchuk, involved in the publication of the Prayer Book, told about the launch of an inter-confessional online store, which will be called the “Unified Church”. The project received a blessing from the Primate of the UOC-KP, UAOC and the UGCC. “We have to know each other through the books of everyone,” the publisher believes.

At the end of the presentation Fr. Andriy Dudchenko told about the creative team working on the publication, and invited to visit the project site “Prayer Book”.