Abstract: Prin dragostea lui Iisus Hristos se fundamentează între cei vii şi cei adormiţi o legătură pe care moartea nu o poate desface. Legătura vie a iubirii uneşte pe toţi membrii Bisericii lui Hristos, pe cei ai Bisericii luptătoare cu cei ai Bisericii cereşti, precum şi cu locuitorii iadului care n-au pierdut speranţa Împărăţiei cerurilor. În virtutea acestei comuniuni, cei vii au o serie de datorii faţă de cei adormiţi: să se roage pentru ei şi să facă fapte de milostenie, pentru că dacă nu iubim pe morţi, nu iubim nici pe Domnul care iubeşte pe repausaţi ca membri vii ai Bisericii Sale. Cei vii au datoria de a se ruga pentru cei adormiţi, pentru că rugăciunile noastre aduc folos celor adormiţi.
Cuvinte-cheie: grija pentru cei morți, cultul și spiritualitatea ortodoxă, legătura dintre cei vii și adormiți, rugăciunile pentru cei adormiți, slujbele funebre, viața veșnică
Summary: The communion between the members of the struggling Church and those of the triumphant Church is spiritually achieved, by the prayers that we elevate, for the Lord to forgive their sins and give them the eternal rest. The basis of the communion between the alive and the dead is Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ’s love makes fundamental a connection between the alive and those fallen asleep, that death cannot unbide. The living connection of love joins together all the members of Christ’s Church, those belonging to the struggling Church to those belonging to the heavenly Church as well as to the inhabitants of hell, who did not lose hope for the heavenly Kingdom. By virtue of this communion, the alive perform some obligations for those fallen asleep: to pray for them and to make deeds of charity, because if we do not love the dead, we do not love the Lord Who loves those that have taken rest, as living members of His Church. The alive have a duty to pray for those fallen asleep, because our prayers are for the good of the departed, as shown in the numerous scriptural fragments presented in this study. The most ancient written sources of the Tradition of our Church are presented, that refer to the commemoration of those fallen asleep, such as variants of the Anaphora in the primary liturgies (the clementine Liturgy, Saint Mark’s Liturgy), the writings of the apostolic fathers – Polycarp, bishop of Smyrna, Epiphanius of Salamis, Joseph the Roman, Origen and Athanasius –, the witnesses of the Holy Fathers and Church Writers – Basil the Great, John Chrysostomos, Cyprian of Carthage, Makarios of Alexandria, Dionysius the Areopagite –, the liturgical poetry of the Saints hymnographers – John of Damascus, Theodore the Studite, Joseph the Studite, Theophanes Graptos, Germanos and Philotheos, patriarchs of Constantinople –, which went into the composition of the funeral offices, being in use event today, aiming at the evolution of the forms of expression of the care for the dead and the christian religious life, from antiquity to the present. Through the prayers that the Church makes for those fallen sleep, there is the possibility that they who have fewer sins and live in hell, to come to the lower stages of paradise before the last judgement. Always through the prayers of the Church, those on the inferior stages of paradise can go up, because they enter into a more active communion with Christ.
