Mass – or liturgy – can sometimes be a real chore to commit
to every week. I am saying this as a Catholic who makes every effort to go to
mass and continually grow in my faith in Christ and in others. It’s tough to
wake up each Sunday morning – or commit to an evening when I am busy – to make
it to mass. However, we do it because each week we are called to hear the Word
of God and join together in communion with other Christians. Taft writes near
the beginning that “liturgy is the salvific relationship between God and us”
because of the sacredness of the liturgy, starting from when Christ consecrated
His body and blood at the Last Supper (Taft 195). While he prefaces that what
he said was incredibly bold, he writes later that the early Church’s liturgical
gatherings of hearing the Word and breaking bread were incredibly special
moments with Our Father and Savior (Taft 197). It is through Christ giving of
Himself that we have been saved. And it is through His Eucharist that we
receive a visible and physical gift of Himself each week to help us, to nourish
us. Mitchell writes that it is because Christ gave of His whole Self on the
Cross, because the Word and Spirit were sent to us, because He evangelized to
us first, that we now have a Sacramental form of Christ (Mitchell 354). I think
about each Sacrament in this case – most of these Sacraments require a Liturgy
(i.e. Matrimony, Holy Orders, Confirmation) in which they are given. Again,
this starts with Christ when He gave of Himself to save us. Now we can be saved
each week at Mass, and in prayer, and in service.
In order to understand anything, or explain, it is part of
my nature as a teacher to categorize or divide each part of my notes to simplify
for my students. It is no different than what many writers – including Mitchell
with his ten rules do – in order categorize how to better understand Christ and
the Church. This blog would be too long if I went through each rule so I’ll
focus on a few. I love Mitchell’s first Rule about how Christ - the main
content, our Salvation – is present in each Sacrament. He also does not define
a Sacrament merely within the ones we know, but also states that it could be
other scared practices such as washing and anointing. These are used in
Baptism, in which now we are part of Christ’s body once we are baptized
(Mitchell 355-356). As I read Rule #5, I realized that this Body we learn
about, that we are part of, is also the system, which contains the Seven
Sacraments. No one Sacrament is by itself. He uses the example of Baptism and
Eucharist: when we are baptized, we are not only being cleansed of our Original
Sin, but we are reborn as members of Christ’s family. In the Eucharist, Christ
died, and then rose again, and His body and blood live as the consecrated bread
and wine we consume at the liturgies (Mitchell 358). Finally Rule #7 states
that the Word and Sacraments must be together. This starts when God gives the
Word, and then sends the Word into flesh as Jesus Christ; the Sacraments are
only the “highest human and ecclesial expression of the word spoken in Church”
(Mitchell 360-361). This is essential
because through the Sacraments we can be on our way to attaining everlasting
Grace as given by Jesus Christ. All of
this starts starts with the Liturgy – it is at the Liturgy we receive the
Sacraments. It is at the Liturgy that we have the opportunity to be saved,
reborn, as Disciples and Members of the Body of Christ.
