Nov
29
2007
0
By Anonymous (not verified)
In talking about the value of Sunday Mass, Pope Benedict XVI recently used a striking phrase. He said Christians are meant to live lives that "take on a Eucharistic form."
That expression jumped off the page, plucking a nerve-end along the way. I was intrigued and challenged.
How was I to understand it? As always, when I need to know my mind, I have to plumb my heart. I do that by writing.
Literary Stylist
"Eucharistic form."
My first observation is that Pope Benedict meant more than just the reception of the Eucharist, though the phrase certainly includes that. Pope Benedict is too much a studious thinker and careful wordsmith to take such an exquisite expression and restrict its meaning. If he had wanted to indicate the reception of Communion and nothing more, he would have worded it that way. I know Pope Benedict as a writer and speaker well enough to think he couldn't be so rhetorically sloppy, which a restricted meaning would imply. I have studied his rhetoric. By his syllables do I know him.
As to the process he employs in drafting the written or spoken word, I don't know (though I'd love to sit down and talk communication theory with him). My guess, though, is that he weights every word the way a jeweler does each part of a watch after he pries off the back and takes it apart so it can be fixed. Pope Benedict's words seem "assembled" in a way that suggests deep study for the purpose of "fixing something." From a literary stylist, what more do you need. From a pastor, what more could you want?
"Eucharistic form."
The two words are familiar. "Eucharist" is the sacrament instituted by Christ to be His living Presence as the Bread of Life. He said in John 6, "Unless you eat my flesh and drink My blood you have no life in you." What is celebrated by Catholic and Orthodox Christians is the "making present" of the Last Supper at which Jesus gave us this mysterious Presence in Eucharist. Consecration is the act by which an ordained priest proclaiming the words of Jesus makes the transubstantiation take place.
The "Form" is the outward sign - that is, the Bread and the Wine that look like bread and wine but, by the words of Consecration, become the Real Presence of Jesus, Body and Blood, Soul and Divinity of Christ (see the Catechism of the Catholic Church, 1357-1419)
When you put the two words together, chemistry happens. From a writer's perspective, I can only look on with admiration and say, "Wow, I wish I had written that."
Go Forth 'to Love and Serve' God
The Second Vatican Council said the sanctification of people in Christ and the glorification of God "are most powerfully achieved" in the Eucharist (Sacrosanctum Concilium, n. 10). The Eucharist consists of bread and wine, consecrated at Mass.
In reference to the Holy Mass, the glossary of the Catechism of the Catholic Church calls Mass "The Eucharist or principal sacramental celebration of the Church, established by Jesus at the Last Supper, in which the mystery of our salvation through participation in the sacrificial death and resurrection of Christ is renewed and accomplished. The Mass renews the paschal sacrifice of Christ as the sacrifice offered by the Church. It is called 'Mass' (from the Latin missa) because of the 'mission' or 'sending' with which the liturgical celebration concludes" (my italics).
It's funny. I never noticed the emphasis the Church places in this definition on the conclusion of Mass, the "sending," in which we are urged to "go forth" in peace, "to love and serve" God. This final line, recited by the priest, is not a throwaway line or a way to remove the awkwardness of saying (though, thankfully, not in these words), "Look, we're done. You can go home now." Rather, it urges us to put our money where our mouth is, to act by loving and serving supreme goodness.
So we have three elements:
1. Eucharist - bread and wine, which are eaten and drunk.
2. Form - the visible shape of something.
3. Mass - with its concluding exhortation to action on behalf of divine goodness.
The sum of these factors is "Eucharistic form."
Seeing and 'Seeing'
By consuming consecrated bread and wine, we internalize them. The Transubstantiated grain and "fruit of the vine" literally become us and we they, as all physical food does. We can physically see someone take a white wafer and eat it or bring a cup to the lips and drink from it. We can also see the spiritual consumption, though in a far different way.
To "see" the indiscernible transformation in the one who eats that bread and drinks that wine, you need to look with the third eye. You can never see or "see" into someone else's soul, and you cannot know how they are receiving the sacraments. Are they going through the motions of a ritual and nothing more, or are they receiving and consuming the "gifts" with focus, awareness and consciousness? The attitude toward reception makes a huge difference, and we can't see or know that for anyone except ourselves - by looking inward. That is how it should be. Participation in the sacraments assigns individual responsibility and cautions us not to judge how anyone else does it.
There is, however, a way to "see" the effect of Communion in someone else, and that is to look at the actions the person takes. If Eucharist is an exercise in free will and not a ritualistic "paint by the numbers," awareness takes hold. A person in this state cannot help but take on the attributes we assign to God: the capacity to love, the ability to have compassion, the willingness to extend mercy, the intelligence to be wise, the centeredness to be "present," the inner strength to be at peace, the maturity and security to share that peace with others. We will see goodness in action. We will move toward the perfection that is our heavenly Father's.
That is what I understand by Pope Benedict's intriguing phrase, "Eucharistic form."
A Fashionable Victory
"Eucharistic form" is a visible fashion that celebrates victory, the victory obtained for us by The Divine Mercy. This triumph is the great "Get out of jail free" card that God lovingly places next to the mountain of accumulated debt accrued by not being perfect as our heavenly Father is perfect, debt that had us thrown in the spiritual hoosegow in the first place.
"Eucharistic form" assumes the actions of one who believes in this victory and who isn't afraid to "get out of jail" (there are many prisoners who come to love the security of their confinement). In this form, the creature tries its best to imitate the Creator through acts of goodness, wisdom and power. This form is a pattern that sees beyond its shape, a visibility that witnesses beyond its testimony, and an action that exceeds its own limits. Understood this way, "Eucharistic form" should make the miraculous mundane and sin saintliness.
From this form of goodness, the heart cannot help but be thankful. A person who is in "Eucharistic form" has one elemental prayer: a prayer of thanks.
"Thank you, God. Thank you, God. Thank you, God." True, it won't win any prize for creativity, but - like snowflakes on a winter's day - each person's "thank you, God" is unique. None like it has ever gone before or will ever go since. Men may laugh at our apparent simplicity, but God marvels at our humble complexity.
"Eucharistic form" has no other purpose than to enlarge itself. The more you try to give it away, the more of it you have. That is the nature of the "unfathomable," self-replicated goodness of the "Eucharistic form" we call The Divine Mercy.
The Discovery of a Lifetime
To discover this in a real way is the discovery of a lifetime. By comparison, Balboa at the Pacific was just another traveler stumbling onto a sandy beach. Edison was a backyard workshop tinkerer who found a way to make the night less dark. The discovery of Eucharistic form dwarfs every other "Eureka!" moment you will ever have. The old life withdraws, and something new takes its place. I shudder to use this cliché because of the simplistic misunderstandings its overuse has caused, but I say it nonetheless: You become "born again." Better yet, let me borrow from Pope Benedict: You take on "Eucharistic form."
You are still the same person but "more" of the same person. You are still who you are, but you become more of "who" you were created to be. You "come back to yourself," ready to finally jettison all the self-created baggage that has kept you from the heights. You laugh at who you used to be. You love who you are. It is called self-forgiveness.
You become the river in the beginning of a poem from the Scottish poet William Soutar (1898-1943). Soutar didn't know it when he wrote this poem (the way adept poets rarely understand all that lies within their verse), but he was writing about the phenomenon of "Eucharistic form" in a poem called "From the Wilderness."
That expression jumped off the page, plucking a nerve-end along the way. I was intrigued and challenged.
How was I to understand it? As always, when I need to know my mind, I have to plumb my heart. I do that by writing.
Literary Stylist
"Eucharistic form."
My first observation is that Pope Benedict meant more than just the reception of the Eucharist, though the phrase certainly includes that. Pope Benedict is too much a studious thinker and careful wordsmith to take such an exquisite expression and restrict its meaning. If he had wanted to indicate the reception of Communion and nothing more, he would have worded it that way. I know Pope Benedict as a writer and speaker well enough to think he couldn't be so rhetorically sloppy, which a restricted meaning would imply. I have studied his rhetoric. By his syllables do I know him.
As to the process he employs in drafting the written or spoken word, I don't know (though I'd love to sit down and talk communication theory with him). My guess, though, is that he weights every word the way a jeweler does each part of a watch after he pries off the back and takes it apart so it can be fixed. Pope Benedict's words seem "assembled" in a way that suggests deep study for the purpose of "fixing something." From a literary stylist, what more do you need. From a pastor, what more could you want?
"Eucharistic form."
The two words are familiar. "Eucharist" is the sacrament instituted by Christ to be His living Presence as the Bread of Life. He said in John 6, "Unless you eat my flesh and drink My blood you have no life in you." What is celebrated by Catholic and Orthodox Christians is the "making present" of the Last Supper at which Jesus gave us this mysterious Presence in Eucharist. Consecration is the act by which an ordained priest proclaiming the words of Jesus makes the transubstantiation take place.
The "Form" is the outward sign - that is, the Bread and the Wine that look like bread and wine but, by the words of Consecration, become the Real Presence of Jesus, Body and Blood, Soul and Divinity of Christ (see the Catechism of the Catholic Church, 1357-1419)
When you put the two words together, chemistry happens. From a writer's perspective, I can only look on with admiration and say, "Wow, I wish I had written that."
Go Forth 'to Love and Serve' God
The Second Vatican Council said the sanctification of people in Christ and the glorification of God "are most powerfully achieved" in the Eucharist (Sacrosanctum Concilium, n. 10). The Eucharist consists of bread and wine, consecrated at Mass.
In reference to the Holy Mass, the glossary of the Catechism of the Catholic Church calls Mass "The Eucharist or principal sacramental celebration of the Church, established by Jesus at the Last Supper, in which the mystery of our salvation through participation in the sacrificial death and resurrection of Christ is renewed and accomplished. The Mass renews the paschal sacrifice of Christ as the sacrifice offered by the Church. It is called 'Mass' (from the Latin missa) because of the 'mission' or 'sending' with which the liturgical celebration concludes" (my italics).
It's funny. I never noticed the emphasis the Church places in this definition on the conclusion of Mass, the "sending," in which we are urged to "go forth" in peace, "to love and serve" God. This final line, recited by the priest, is not a throwaway line or a way to remove the awkwardness of saying (though, thankfully, not in these words), "Look, we're done. You can go home now." Rather, it urges us to put our money where our mouth is, to act by loving and serving supreme goodness.
So we have three elements:
1. Eucharist - bread and wine, which are eaten and drunk.
2. Form - the visible shape of something.
3. Mass - with its concluding exhortation to action on behalf of divine goodness.
The sum of these factors is "Eucharistic form."
Seeing and 'Seeing'
By consuming consecrated bread and wine, we internalize them. The Transubstantiated grain and "fruit of the vine" literally become us and we they, as all physical food does. We can physically see someone take a white wafer and eat it or bring a cup to the lips and drink from it. We can also see the spiritual consumption, though in a far different way.
To "see" the indiscernible transformation in the one who eats that bread and drinks that wine, you need to look with the third eye. You can never see or "see" into someone else's soul, and you cannot know how they are receiving the sacraments. Are they going through the motions of a ritual and nothing more, or are they receiving and consuming the "gifts" with focus, awareness and consciousness? The attitude toward reception makes a huge difference, and we can't see or know that for anyone except ourselves - by looking inward. That is how it should be. Participation in the sacraments assigns individual responsibility and cautions us not to judge how anyone else does it.
There is, however, a way to "see" the effect of Communion in someone else, and that is to look at the actions the person takes. If Eucharist is an exercise in free will and not a ritualistic "paint by the numbers," awareness takes hold. A person in this state cannot help but take on the attributes we assign to God: the capacity to love, the ability to have compassion, the willingness to extend mercy, the intelligence to be wise, the centeredness to be "present," the inner strength to be at peace, the maturity and security to share that peace with others. We will see goodness in action. We will move toward the perfection that is our heavenly Father's.
That is what I understand by Pope Benedict's intriguing phrase, "Eucharistic form."
A Fashionable Victory
"Eucharistic form" is a visible fashion that celebrates victory, the victory obtained for us by The Divine Mercy. This triumph is the great "Get out of jail free" card that God lovingly places next to the mountain of accumulated debt accrued by not being perfect as our heavenly Father is perfect, debt that had us thrown in the spiritual hoosegow in the first place.
"Eucharistic form" assumes the actions of one who believes in this victory and who isn't afraid to "get out of jail" (there are many prisoners who come to love the security of their confinement). In this form, the creature tries its best to imitate the Creator through acts of goodness, wisdom and power. This form is a pattern that sees beyond its shape, a visibility that witnesses beyond its testimony, and an action that exceeds its own limits. Understood this way, "Eucharistic form" should make the miraculous mundane and sin saintliness.
From this form of goodness, the heart cannot help but be thankful. A person who is in "Eucharistic form" has one elemental prayer: a prayer of thanks.
"Thank you, God. Thank you, God. Thank you, God." True, it won't win any prize for creativity, but - like snowflakes on a winter's day - each person's "thank you, God" is unique. None like it has ever gone before or will ever go since. Men may laugh at our apparent simplicity, but God marvels at our humble complexity.
"Eucharistic form" has no other purpose than to enlarge itself. The more you try to give it away, the more of it you have. That is the nature of the "unfathomable," self-replicated goodness of the "Eucharistic form" we call The Divine Mercy.
The Discovery of a Lifetime
To discover this in a real way is the discovery of a lifetime. By comparison, Balboa at the Pacific was just another traveler stumbling onto a sandy beach. Edison was a backyard workshop tinkerer who found a way to make the night less dark. The discovery of Eucharistic form dwarfs every other "Eureka!" moment you will ever have. The old life withdraws, and something new takes its place. I shudder to use this cliché because of the simplistic misunderstandings its overuse has caused, but I say it nonetheless: You become "born again." Better yet, let me borrow from Pope Benedict: You take on "Eucharistic form."
You are still the same person but "more" of the same person. You are still who you are, but you become more of "who" you were created to be. You "come back to yourself," ready to finally jettison all the self-created baggage that has kept you from the heights. You laugh at who you used to be. You love who you are. It is called self-forgiveness.
You become the river in the beginning of a poem from the Scottish poet William Soutar (1898-1943). Soutar didn't know it when he wrote this poem (the way adept poets rarely understand all that lies within their verse), but he was writing about the phenomenon of "Eucharistic form" in a poem called "From the Wilderness."
He who was a river into the wilderness
Is now come back from misery to bless
The hounding spirit.
He who was rich and now so seeming poor
Owns an inheritance which was not his before -
Even his self.
This was the gift from the dark hour which thrust
Him forth to solitude;
Which laid him in a grave while yet the dust
Was under him; while yet the blood
Watered the withering march 'twixt sense and sand.
He knew the hour of nothingness when the hand
Is empty, and empty is the heart;
And the intelligence, with its keen dart
Of reasonable speech, slays its own pride.
'Twas thus he died;
Suffering his solitary hour beyond the world of men:
And it was thus, alone, he found the flower
Of his own self;
Which yet had been only a flower of stone
Had he not brought it back into the world again.
"Eucharistic form" is finding "the flower of [your] own self," the core of clear truth in Jesus' puzzling pronouncement that he who tries to save his life will lose it - and vice versa.
The river comes back from its misery to "bless/The hounding spirit." You stand redeemed.
Dan Valenti writes for numerous publications of the Marians of the Immaculate Conception, both in print and online. He is the author of "Dan Valenti's Journal" for this website.
mMIN
