Prayer, with a great sweep of wings, rises above all differences and makes it possible for us all to rest together in the Heart of Christ.

It is no good dreaming that there will come first a realization of the unity of minds in Truth and then a union of hearts in Charity. Charity is the herald of Truth. It is clear enough that the unity desired by Christ is an organic unity, such as will grasp and gather into his heart the soul of humanity in its entirety. The unity of Christians will necessarily bring with it a unity of thought, of faith, of creed, since in all Christians it is the unique thought of their one Saviour which will develop itself. But that is the end and not the beginning.

The whole fabric of Christianity must be shaken to its very depths by the universal prayer of Christians: it must experience a supernatural shock which will break down all its prejudices, rectify its false and superficial ideas, cause hearts to grow into one another and finally unite minds in the eternal light of the one Christ. It will be a sort of second Pentecost descending on Christians 'unanimous in prayer'.

Abbé Paul Couturier on the Virgin Mary - Week of Prayer for the Unity of Christians, January 1953

Let all Christians come to their Saviour with an open soul,
attentive to the divine call,
in humble abandonment,
the attitude of the humble Virgin Mary.

Her answer to the angel is the archetype of the creature’s response to its Creator:
‘I am the servant of the Lord.
Let it be done to me as you have said.’

When the disposition of Christian souls is that of the Virgin,
when the answer of the Virgin Mary resounds silently in our souls,
the souls of all Christians,
this immense, silent cry,
guided and dominated by the voice of the Virgin,
will be unfurled before the throne of the Eternal
in a single irresistible supplication.
And once again, by the action of the Holy Spirit,
Unity will come to pass.

Union will be the work of those who pray. May your will produce for its fulfilment a théologie priante - theologia sacra - it will be luminous because it will be full of prayer.

The universal unity as brothers and sisters that is ours in Christ, rooted in or to be realized in Baptism, must find its place in the foundations of humanity as a whole. The spiritual horizon of the Week of Prayer for the Unity of Christians is not merely Christianity, it is the redemption of mankind. The reunion of all Christians is the way that leads to the union of all human beings in Christ.