Following the blessing of God: “Christ our God, the existing, is blessed . . .” and the Prayer for Orthdox Christians: “Preserve, O God . . .” the concluding dialogue continues:
“Most Holy Theotokos, save us!” “More honorable than the Cherubim and more glorious beyond compare than the Seraphim, without corruption you gave birth to God the Word, true Theotokos we magnify you!”
The above exchange (a) follows the model first laid down in John chapter 2 at the wedding in Cana in Galilee, by invoking the intercessory aid of the foremost intercessor for the Church in the matter of salvation; (b) alludes to the central tenet of the Orthodox Christian faith by mentioning that she is the Theotokos (“the one who gives birth to God”), and (c) that this birth—the birth of God—was not characterized by the material corruption which pervades all physical life in the fallen world; (d) fulfills her prophecy that “all generations will call me blessed” by magnifying her.
“Glory to Thee, O Christ, our God and our hope, glory to Thee!” “Glory to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit, now and ever and unto ages of ages. Amen.”
Again, the prayer returns to the glorification of God, beginning with Christ, through whom we have come to know the Father and have received the Spirit, and then to the Trinity as a whole.
“Lord, have mercy. Lord have mercy. Lord have mercy. Father bless.”
We return to the words of the Church’s litanies asking (here in threefold, Trinitarian fashion) for God to be merciful, which is to say, to do that which it is his very nature to do, since God is love, and mercy is nothing other than burning, steadfast love of God.