Getting to the Point

I want to follow up on yesterday’s post with the next part of the Mass commentary. There is a unity between what I wrote about yesterday—the impossibility of receiving the Eucharist in a state of mortal sin—and what comes next in the Mass.

After the Lord’s Prayer, the praying of which signifies the fundamental union with God made possible by Jesus Christ which will be brought to perfection in the rite of communion, comes the ritual Sign of Peace in which we express to those immediately around us some gesture of peace and good will.

This has rich scriptural significance. We can think of the Gospel passage where the Lord tells us to be reconciled with our neighbor before we can offer our gifts on the altar.

The Eucharist not only brings to perfection our union with God, but also brings to perfection our union with one another in the communion of Christ’s Body, the Church. And as we cannot receive communion if we are in a state of mortal sin (and hence not in union with God to start with), so we cannot receive communion if we are not in union with the Catholic Church, either.

This is a painful subject—disunity always is, isn’t it? But we cannot wish painful subjects away. Now there is a difference between these two types of union. The question of being in a state of sin is something only the person can answer—conscience is inviolable, and only God and the soul can make that discernment.

Union with the Church, on the other hand, is a matter of the outer forum, visible to anyone who knows the facts of a situation. If a person has made choices in their life that remove them from communion with the Catholic Church, not only should they themselves not receive the Eucharist, but the pastors of the Church have a duty to inform them of this fact.

So, someone who is simply not Catholic, but belongs to some other religion, or who has left the Church for some other system of belief and way of life. People who have made moral decisions that publicly declare that they are not bound by or under the authority of the Catholic Church in any regard. Couples co-habitating without any form of marriage, or people doing intrinsically evil things in their work lives (the Mafia, for example, or the owner of a strip club). People who not only struggle with a homosexual orientation but who are publicly living as gay men or women in a same-sex relationship. People who have taken a public stand opposing the Church in its moral or dogmatic teachings—politicians, say, advocating laws that directly oppose the moral teachings of the Church.

And yes, (since this is the controversy of the day) people who have not only been divorced but have entered into a second marriage without having gone through the annulment process for their original one. Any one of these people in any of these categories may or may not be in a state of subjective sin—I would never dream of flatly stating that—but they have indeed objectively removed themselves from the communion the Church.

This is painful, yes. We are all free to choose what we will believe and what we will do in our lives. But our choices bear consequences. If I freely choose to, say, write a blog post where I flatly deny some basic matter of Christian doctrine, I am indeed free to do so. But I am not free to do so and then continue to exercise my ministry as a Roman Catholic priest. Freedom yes, but freedom without consequences? No.

So if someone has chosen to reject Catholicism, they may do so. But they really must not present themselves in the communion line, then. Reception of the Eucharist is not only about our union with God; it is also about our union with Christ’s Body on earth, the Church.

It is not a question of having to be some perfect Catholic who gets every answer right on a catechism test and never asks a question or struggles with a doctrine. Of course not. It is a matter of the public and manifest stands we have taken in our words and in our actions.

For example, you can really struggle with the Church’s flat statement that sex outside of marriage is wrong. You can not be at all sure that’s quite correct, and still choose not to move in with your girlfriend because you nonetheless want to live your life as a Catholic. But if you and your girlfriend do move in together, you have made a choice to publicly reject the Catholic faith. See the difference?

And so in the Mass before we go to receive communion we ritually express all this, first in our praying to God as our Father and then turning to one another to express our unity as a body of believers. And only then, in a spirit of deep humility and knowledge of our unworthiness, do we come forward to receive the Holy Eucharist, the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ, at which point the Mass and all it has signified becomes our own mystery, our own life, and we are drawn into it in fullness and in truth.

Let us pray to receive the Eucharist knowing what we are doing and being vigilant to receive it worthily and well, so that it’s fruits may be shown forth in our lives.

It is Thursday, and regular readers of the blog know that means it is Liturgy Day. We are going through the Mass each week here, with an eye to showing how each little bit of the Mass, besides being part of the perfect act of worship of Christ to his Father into which we enter by grace, is also a catechesis on Christian discipleship.

Last time we were here we had finally reached the anaphora, the great Eucharistic Prayer. I am using the Roman Canon (aka Eucharistic Prayer I) on the grounds of its antiquity and the fact that it was for over a millennium the only prayer used in the Latin Church.

As so we come to today’s text, in which we offer the gifts of bread and wine “firstly for your holy catholic Church. Be pleased to grant her peace, to guard, unite and govern her throughout the whole world, together with your servant N. our Pope and N. our Bishop, and all those who, holding to the truth, hand on the catholic and apostolic faith.”

Right away, at the very outset of the prayer (unlike the other anaphoras in use in the Western Church now which place this after the consecration), we acknowledge the presence of the larger Church. We are not simply offering this act of worship and intercession as our little group, St. Whatsit’s parish or wherever we happen to be. ‘Madonna House’, offering its Mass to God.

No! It is the Church, the whole Church, the Church extended throughout the world Who offers this worship to God. And so we begin by praying for this Church, its peace and unity, its conformity to God’s holy will in all regards. Special mention is made of the Pope and of the local ordinary bishop.

This is not simply because these two guys have a really tough job and we should be praying for them. 

That may be true (it certainly is true!), but that’s not exactly why they’re mentioned here. The Pope is the safeguard, if you will, or the great effector of our unity with the Church universal. By our communion with him, we are vouchsafed not simply a unity in charity and spirit with all other Catholics (we can enjoy that kind of unity with all men and women of good will, and hopefully do), but an external visible unity with the entire catholica, the whole Body of Christ in the world. And our unity with our diocesan bishop (in my case, Most Rev. Michael Mulhall), vouchsafes our visible unity as a particular church, a local expression of the Body of Christ in (for me) the diocese of Pembroke, ON.

Well, this matters greatly, in terms of our lives as disciples of Jesus Christ. It is a matter of Catholic faith—a dogmatic non-negotiable—that the Lord Jesus Himself established the Church on earth and constituted it as a hierarchical structure to be governed by the apostles and their successors, with a particular ministry exercised by Peter and his successors. If you truly do not believe the above sentence (as opposed to, say, struggling with it or finding it a hard one to understand or live out, all of which is perfectly normal and fine), I hate to break it to you, but you are actually not Catholic.

Jesus is the Savior of the world, but the means by which He saves us is by gathering us together into a body, into a communion that is not only with Himself but with one another, not only invisible and mystical but a visible union, which necessarily implies structure and organization.

This is why the saying ‘no salvation outside of the Church’ is, in fact, still binding Catholic doctrine. We do understand in our current development of that doctrine that there can be ways of being incorporated into the Church that are invisible and mysterious, but nonetheless membership in the Church is the form of salvation in Christ—he saves us by making us members of His Body, and if we are not members of that Body, we are not saved.

While this is a matter of great mystery for those who are outside the visible confines of the Catholic Church, for those of us who are Catholic, it is perhaps no less mysterious, but at the same time the implications are obvious. We have to safeguard our unity with the Pope and with our local bishop. We have to strive greatly for our own unity of mind with them in matters of faith and morals. I am profoundly aware that this can be a matter of great struggle for many people, but at the very least it should be a struggle we are engaging in.

To simply say, rather casually and flippantly, “Oh, the Pope doesn’t know what he’s talking about! Who cares what he thinks?” is not a Catholic attitude, not in the slightest. To bridle at every statement that comes from the Vatican or from one’s own bishop, to have a reflexive posture of opposition, resentment, rebellion, hostility (truly adolescent in its reactivity) to the men occupying these positions of authority—all of this signals something gravely amiss spiritually in us. All of this seriously impedes our ability to live as disciples of Jesus Christ who establishes His Church on earth in this way, with these structures of authority. 

It is fine to struggle with this teaching or that. It is fine to struggle with the human personalities of the men who occupy the Chair of Peter and the cathedra of the local cathedral. It is fine to wrestle mightily with God and with man, Jacob-like, in our own poor efforts to live as disciples of Jesus Christ.

What is not fine is snark, cynicism, reflexive hostility, hermeneutics of suspicion and flat outright rejection of the teaching authority of the Church. And this is, alas, all too common in the Church today on all sides of the theological spectrum. All of this is many things, but the one thing it is not, is being a disciple of Jesus Christ. So let’s try to be what we are called to be, and understand the centrality of our visible communion in and with the Church in that call.

Hear my cry, O God; listen to my prayer.

From the end of the earth I call to you,

when my heart is faint.

Lead me to the rock that is higher than I;

for you are my refuge, a strong tower against the enemy.

Let me abide in your tent forever,

find refuge under the shelter of your wings.

For you, O God, have heard my vows;

you have given me the heritage of those who fear your name.

Prolong the life of the king;

may his years endure to all generations!

May he be enthroned forever before God;

appoint steadfast love and faithfulness to watch over him!

So I will always sing praises to your name,

as I pay my vows day after day.

Psalm 61

Reflection – A friend and neighbor of mine who is an avid reader of the blog, and particularly of this running series on the psalms, pointed out to me that my commentary on the ‘gloomy 50s’ has missed an important beat.

Namely, that the cry of the psalmist in distress has to be understood as principally (in our Christian reading of it) to refer to the cry of Christ, to the sufferings of Jesus on behalf of all humanity. That while the original and immediate occasion of these psalms’ composition was the suffering of the psalmists’ own lives, now we hear the voice of God Himself, made man in Jesus, in them.

Well, this is profound stuff. And we see the depth of it in the very first line of this psalm: ‘From the end of the earth I call to you’. How can a single individual be crying ‘from the end of the earth’? This implies something bigger than the sufferings of one man. And indeed the Church has read this psalm as referring to Christ, and because of Christ, of His Body on earth, the Church—an expression of the whole Church, which is Christ and is also redeemed humanity, crying out to God.

And in this psalm the cry of distress immediately yields to expressions of intimacy, trust, confidence. This whole business of ‘refuge’ looms large here. And we need to take this to heart, don’t we? Sometimes we can get a bit silly about this notion of seeking refuge, as if strong independent mature adult Christians shouldn’t be looking for such things.

We have to live in the real world! We can’t retreat into our safe space! Down with refuge! Up with going out there and being with the people! And so on and so forth. All of which is fine enough, so long as we know that God Himself has provided us with a refuge, and that in fact we do need said refuge, and it is no part of a real adult faith to eschew it.

That refuge is the Church Herself, but within that refuge we find ourselves delivered into the real refuge which is the Heart of Jesus. His merciful love which carves out for us on earth the only ‘safe space’ we need, and out of which safe space we can indeed traverse the rough waters and fiery passages of life in this world.

Psalm 61 is a really mystical psalm—after this expression of confidence and trust in God Our Refuge, there is all this business of the king and his long life. Again, in the original composition, this would be the actual king in Jerusalem; for us, it is again Christ and His enduring life on earth in the life of the Church.

There are fundamental matters here of good spiritual order, good spiritual foundation and grounding. We live in a world that seems to us to be a dangerous place. Fear and anger are the common lot of the day. Those of us who are Catholic Christians need to safeguard our communion with Christ, with His Church, and from this with one another, to weather the storms of the world as it is.

Great is the Lord and greatly to be praised in the city of our God!

His holy mountain, beautiful in elevation, is the joy of all the earth,

Mount Zion, in the far north, the city of the great King.

Within her citadels God has made himself known as a fortress.

For behold, the kings assembled; they came on together.

As soon as they saw it, they were astounded; they were in panic; they took to flight.

Trembling took hold of them there, anguish as of a woman in labor.

By the east wind you shattered the ships of Tarshish.

As we have heard, so have we seen in the city of the Lord of hosts,

in the city of our God, which God will establish forever.

We have thought on your steadfast love, O God, in the midst of your temple.

As your name, O God, so your praise reaches to the ends of the earth.

Your right hand is filled with righteousness. Let Mount Zion be glad!

Let the daughters of Judah rejoice because of your judgments!

Walk about Zion, go around her, number her towers,

consider well her ramparts, go through her citadels,

That you may tell the next generation that this is God,

our God forever and ever. He will guide us forever.

Psalm 47

Reflection – Well, I’m back, more or less rested up and ready to go for another year. And we’re back on the blog where we left off with the Monday Psalter, at Psalm 47. This is an unusual psalm, taking as its theme the beauty of the city of God Jerusalem, the place where God has chosen to dwell and where His help and guidance, saving love and wisdom comes forth for his people.

For Catholic Christians, there is no question that we apply this psalm to the Church and pray it in that light. It is not a question of substituting Rome for Jerusalem, or even a question of buildings and spires, Gothic architecture or Romanesque, or those sorts of visible realities. These have their proper place; we are a sacramental people and so the outward appearances of things is never just window dressing or something superfluous to the reality. The reality flows through and is expressed through these elements.

But the splendor and beauty of the Church is much deeper and more consequential than the beauty of St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome or Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris. All of these buildings, magnificent treasures and towering human achievements that they are, could be razed tomorrow and the splendor of the Church would be undiminished.

The splendor of the Church lies in that it is where God has chosen to dwell on earth. It is the place where the Incarnation is still occurring, in other words. God became man, assumed to Himself created reality, in Nazareth, was born in Bethlehem, walked the roads of Galilee and Judea, died, rose, and ascended to heaven in Jerusalem.

But his physical presence—the very material, concrete, visible, touchable life of God—is still on earth, and it is on earth precisely in the Church. In the Eucharist par excellence as in the other sacraments, but also in the proclaimed Word, in the ordained minister, in the gathered assembly. Christ continues His life on earth, and He does so through the instrumentality of the Church He founded.

This means that love of the Church is love of Christ. And it means that we have to be very careful how we speak of the Church, how we speak not only of our leaders and their words and deeds but how we speak of one another. There is a presence of Christ flowing through the communion of the Body of Christ—do we acknowledge it? If we do, we probably will moderate our tone when we do have something critical to say, and be quick to acknowledge and praise that which is good and true and beautiful.

We are living in an era, fueled by social media, of intense criticism and negativity, when it is too easy to constantly focus on everything that is not, everything that is wrong, everything that is lousy and shabby and mean and wretched. Our Facebook and Twitter feeds will happily dish up for us a daily menu of things happening in the world and in the Church to be incensed over.

It is vitally important that we take a stand against that, that we choose each day to “Walk about Zion, go around her, number her towers, consider well her ramparts, go through her citadels, that you may tell the next generation that this is God.” For all that is wrong, for all that is simply human and flawed and messy, God dwells here. Take off your shoes, lower your voice, sheathe your sword—this place is holy. Not because we are holy, but because the Holy One has chosen it for his dwelling place.