Seventh in a Series

I very much like the way that Eugene Kennedy discusses and explains the sacraments in “Would You Like to Be a Catholic?” (St. Anthony Messenger Press).

His insights, both as a psychologist and as a believer, into human nature illuminate his treatment of the sacraments.

At the beginning of his reflections, Kennedy quotes the great Catholic theologian, Karl Rahner, whose thought has been an enormous influence in the post-Vatican II Church. Rahner claimed that there was one fundamental mystery that had two aspects to it, the mystery that is the being of God and the mystery of that God’s saving presence in human history.

Rahner believed that this mystery is expressed in three mutually implicated doctrines of the faith: the Trinity, the Incarnation and the doctrine of grace. Kennedy builds his treatment of the sacraments on Rahner’s insistence that God is present in human history. Kennedy writes:

“The sacraments are not incidentals of history like Plymouth Rock or the Pantheon, but signs of God’s presence and action in history itself: they are not the insignia, passwords or secret handshakes and ceremonies of progressively graded membership in a thousand fraternal organizations. They are not dues-free membership in some exclusive club but a way of life, the dynamic symbols of God’s effulgence in our human condition and of our utterly free access to God through the intervention in history of Jesus Christ. Jesus in His humanity is the first sacrament and His Church the next in this web of divine energy tapped by the individual sacraments that are fitted so perfectly to our human lives. Our best insights into them as living and transforming experiences derives from the very human family life to whose most sacred moments they are linked and whose significance they underscore and enlarge.”

God’s presence in history and in our lives is a dynamic presence. The God Who is present is Infinite Love and we are invited to enter into relationship with Unlimited Love. If we try to figure out why God would want to enter into personal love relationship with us, we will find ourselves confronted with mystery. The best reason that great minds have offered is simply that this is what Infinite Love does – Love wants to share. Amazing as it seems, God wants to have a love relationship with me. Everyone in the world can make a similar claim.

I love Kennedy’s description of the sacraments as symbols of God’s total involvement in our lives and I love his phrase a “ web of divine energy.” We are surrounded by God and the sacraments are effective signs of the Divine Presence. They remind us that we have free access to God because of the intervention of Jesus Christ. As followers of Jesus, we do not believe in some distant god who is rarely accessible to us. Our God has become one of us! Our God shares in every aspect of our humanity except our sinfulness. Our God has even experienced human death, that experience which greatly frightens most of us. By embracing His death as His Father’s will, Jesus has changed the meaning of death. Instead of the end of human life ,death has become a passageway to a new way of living.

I believe that Kennedy’s description of the sacraments as “living and transforming experiences” touches on something extremely important for the Catholic who receives the sacraments regularly. On Sunday mornings at the celebration of the Eucharist, I frequently warn parishioners about allowing the Eucharistic celebration to become routine. This is a great danger for those of us who regularly participate in the Eucharist. Without even realizing that we have allowed this to happen, the celebration of the Eucharist can become a routine, not an important, powerful, personal expression of our faith and commitment but a lackluster ritual that does not change us. I know as celebrant I have to prevent this from happening to me. In as many ways as I can conceive, I want to remind myself of just what is happening when I celebrate the Eucharist. I want my faith to be so deep that it colors everything I do as the celebrant.

The experience of the Eucharist ought to be a transforming experience. If it is not, if I am not changed by the celebration, it cannot be the fault of Christ. The Eucharistic prayer of Christ is perfect. There is nothing lacking in it. In it, Christ offers himself to the Father. We are supposed to offer ourselves with him. If we do this action intelligently, sincerely and devoutly, we will be changed.