We have a Danish ancestor, originating in Buffalo, New York, and she has studied music in a famous college, Williamsville. English, internship at Harvard in Buffalo, Master of Development in Music, and a PhD in Anthropological Studies from Harvard University in Europe. Many other things, not to say them all, but many other conjugations here about the sister unit. Finally she ends, she goes music, theater, literature, and liturgy. And now she's also going to yoga tour. The calf-shoulder yoga introduced to the sister unit. Thank you, Father James, and thank you to everyone who has offered hospitality and for the invitation, and also to Diane, who's probably still in the bathroom working on things for the reception.

[01:05]

It is with a really deep sense of gratitude that I stand here before you today, delighted to have been honored by the invitation to give this annual Genesis Linden Memorial Lecture here at Mouth Savior Monastery. It seems like it's a little, there's a little bit of an echo. The list of previous lecturers includes both teachers and colleagues of mine, including the recently deceased Reverend Jerome Hall SJ, who is from the area here in Elmira. Can you turn it down? of this event. It is indeed good to be here with you on this fourth Sunday of Easter, since the season of the great 50 days of Easter is, in a special way, a season for reflecting on the Eucharist.

[02:15]

Since the time of the ancient church, Easter was a time of mystic goja. That is the time when the newly baptized reflected on the rites of the Easter vigil, especially the Eucharist, as a way of unpacking the sacred mysteries by which they had been brought into the body of Christ. This practice continues today. Among worshiping communities that welcome new members about three weeks ago in the church. My hope is that in some small way, in some small way, my reflections this afternoon will enable all of us to deepen our understanding and our appreciation of the mystery of Christ's presence in the Eucharist and our participation in that mystery. I'm the oldest of six children. When I was in the fifth grade, my father started taking home movies. Now for the camcorder, that device had not been invented yet, but with a movie camera that had four powerful lights that blinded you in the process of taking the movie.

[03:30]

Some of you may have had similar experience. Just about every major holiday, such as Christmas, Easter, Mother's and Father's Day, First Communions, Confirmations, and birthdays, were all recorded on film by my dad. These movies have now been digitalized on DVD. Every once in a while, when we're all together, we sit down and view several of them for old time's sake. Last time, in the middle of our viewing, I suddenly exclaimed, It looks like all we do is eat. Every movie had us at the table sharing a meal or having birthday cake. And then it struck me like a thunderbolt. Of course, there is endless movie footage of us eating. That is how we became who we are. Over time, by sharing meals on occasions both large and small,

[04:31]

Each of us gradually became a person whose identity was forged as a member of the Kabiki family. And the identity of the family was also forged as a group of persons who shared a common life together. That is what happens when we gather around the table for Eucharist. Over time, our identity as Christians and as Christian communities is shaped by what we do together when we celebrate Eucharist. We become the one body of Christ. When the Second Vatican Council highlighted the Church's belief in the manifold presence of Christ in Article 7 of the Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy, It articulated an aspect of Eucharistic faith that had been forgotten or de-emphasized in the liturgy and in popular piety over several centuries, at least within Roman Catholics, of course.

[05:38]

This is what the article says. Quote, to accomplish so great a work, Christ is always present in his church. especially in liturgical celebrations. He is present in the sacrifice of the mass, in the person of his minister, and most of all, in the Eucharistic species. By his power, he is present in the sacraments, so that when anyone baptizes, it is really Christ himself who baptizes. He is present in his word, since it is he himself who speaks when the holy scriptures are read in church. Lastly, he is present when the church prays and sings. For he has promised, where two or three are gathered in my name, there am I in their midst. Matthew 18, 20. So, through this statement, the council reminded us that belief in the presence of Christ in bread and wine is part of a much richer and broader tradition

[06:44]

that speaks of the medical presence of Christ, the risen Christ, in the assembly that gathers for worship. What I would like to speak about this afternoon is that larger tradition that Vatican II wished to raise up and reinvigorate within the life of the church. The human experience of gathering for worship is an opportunity to encounter the risen Lord in the midst of the assembly. Nevertheless, both post-modern cultural currents and some of our contemporary liturgical practice pose challenges and opportunities for apprehending this aspect of sacramentality. Cultivating a sacramental worldview and celebrating liturgical symbols well, particularly those symbols that highlight the unity of the assembly as the one body of Christ,

[07:45]

are important strategies for promoting an awareness of Christ's presence in the gathered assembly. Such awareness is essential for fruitful participation in the sacramental life of the church, for living the Christian life, and for building ecumenical understanding regarding belief in the real presence of Christ in the church. Indeed, this theological principle is fundamental to how the people of God, that is, those who belong to the universal priesthood of the faithful of Jesus Christ, understand themselves as church. Let us begin then by taking a brief look at how post-modern cultural currents might impact a community's ability to recognize the presence of Christ in its midst when they gather for worship. While many of us may be familiar with the characteristics of post-modernity as they have been articulated by artists, theologians, philosophers, and other scholars, allow me to highlight some of those characteristics that are pertinent to our topic.

[09:02]

Postmodernism rejects the modern mindset that views the human person as an autonomous, rational subject. It likewise rejects modernity's sanguine assessment of human knowing and naive belief in the inevitability of human progress. The events of 9-11, and the current financial crisis have affirmed these postmodern convictions in undeniable ways. Mounting threats of terrorism, and now even piracy, despite the escalation of strategies for war and homeland defense, highlight the fragility of security, freedom, and peace. Rational management of the planet not to mention of the financial institutions, appears to be a colossal failure.

[10:08]

Spending billions of dollars has failed to bring order and certainty to a time of chaos and unspeakable human suffering across the globe. On the positive side, however, the failure of the intellect to solve our problems has resulted in the re-emergence of appreciation for emotions and intuition as valid avenues for arriving at truth. Integration is favored over analysis, and the universe is viewed not as mechanistic and dualistic, but as historical, relational, personal, and participatory. These are all the dynamics found in good worship. As a result, we can expect that worship may once again be viewed as a location for religious insight and the expression of religious belief.

[11:10]

The type of knowing that occurs in worship is neither rational nor scientific. Those are values of the modern approach. Rather, because it is symbolic activity, Worship is primarily non-discursive and exhibited. These are values of the postmodern approach. In other words, meaning is not asserted by propositions, but exhibited or manifested in the interplay of liturgical symbols. The Easter vigil is a perfect example. By means of such simple elements of creation as water, fire, oil, bread, wine, human beings are drawn into ritual behaviors that enable them to engage in sacred commerce with God. It is a fundamental belief, it is this fundamental belief that God can be experienced this way that provides the foundation for the notion

[12:16]

of sacramentality. I have the good fortune of sometimes spending time at Cape Cod with a sister friend of mine whose brother owns a house in Bishan. One of our vacation rituals is to get up before dawn and drive a few short miles to the beach to watch the sunrise. Oftentimes, the fog or thick clouds prevent us from seeing the event for which we sacrificed precious sleep. Nevertheless, each morning we join the locals and the tourists who come to the beach, often bracing in the wind, clutching their coffee cups and waiting in silence. Everyone's attention is fixed on the ocean's horizon, in eager expectation of the first glimpse of the rising sun. When on a clear day it finally appears, a palpable experience of awe and wonder can be read in the faces and the bodies of those who, especially in the summer months, have ventured out very early.

[13:33]

to witness this daily drama of promise and hope. Perhaps many of these dawn seekers rarely darken the threshold of a church. Yet in this simple ritual of rising early and heading out to the water, they are drawn into an experience that opens them to an awareness of the holy or the sacred. Many might call this an experience of creation's innate sacramentality. Simply stated, sacramentality can be described as having one's eyes and ears attuned to the intonations of a benevolent God, inviting us into a transforming relationship. It requires an openness of the imagination to being surprised by the presence of God in the mundane. Ordinary created realities serve as symbols or windows into the divine.

[14:42]

A sacramental perspective enables us to view the world as the locus where God reveals God's self to us and where we respond to that revelation. It can be difficult to perceive the absent presence of God in human life and subsequently in worship without this ability to see the sacred within ordinary human existence. A former professor of mine, Father Kenneth Irwin, insists that the notion of sacramentality must be retrieved. So he's assuming we're losing it. must be retrieved if sacraments are to survive as meaningful events in the contemporary world. Since sacramentality is a particular way of seeing the world and looking at life, it provides the framework for not only the way we live in the world and with each other, but also for the celebration of sacred rituals.

[15:48]

A sacramental imagination involves a profound awareness that the invisible divine presence is disclosed through visible created realities. Furthermore, it takes seriously those everyday experiences the church appropriates to celebrate its life in God through the liturgy. This includes bearing light, washing, eating, drinking, and anointing. Built on a sacramental worldview, liturgy and sacraments mediate the divine in the human. The notion of sacramentality, however, is not limited to an experience of God's presence. No matter how much the sacred is perceived as presence, no revelation of God can ever be total or complete, that is, from the side of the world, of the brain. So, alongside the experience of God's presence, there is also the experience of God's absence.

[16:58]

This revelation of God's hiddenness is also a dimension of Saturn's eternity. By emphasizing how God is discoverable in the here and now, Sacramentality also invites us to yearn for the fullness of God's presence, a fullness that can only be attained in eternity. This is part of the, fancy word, eschatological dimension of sacramentality. In other words, while the created world offers glimpses, only glimpses, of God's loving presence to those who have the eyes to see, This experience is balanced by a longing for what can only be realized when God is encountered face to face. The experience of God's absence, however, is nonetheless a positive rather than a negative experience in that it serves as a promise that what is dimly seen in the present is but a shadow of what will be revealed

[18:11]

for when the need for sacraments shall cease. The postmodern imagination, it's more comfortable than the modern with the juxtapositioning of opposites such as presence and absence. As a result, an openness to the experience of the already not yet of God's presence may be more readily perceived as authentic. in our postmodern process. It is the sacramental imagination that makes it possible to perceive the sacramentality of the universe, the whole universe. However, while Carol Rahner speaks of sacrament within the larger context of quote, the infinitude of the world permeated by God. it's a wonderful phrase, the infinitude of the world permeated by God, unquote. Another theologian, Louise Marie Chauvet, speaks more tentatively of the world we live in and experience through human perception as possibly a sacramental place of history.

[19:27]

That is, while the possibility exists, that the world may be perceived in this way, there is no guarantee that such an experience will be either automatic or universal. Nevertheless, there are moments in life in which a person can experience our notality. And it is only because there are such moments that it is possible to speak meaningfully about a person, a church, or a ritual as sacramental. Another essential element for perceiving the sacramentality of life is the cultivation of contemplative openness. Godfrey Cardinal de Niels of Belgium acknowledges the challenges of maintaining a posture of contemplative openness in this postmodern age and his comments on worship in the contemporary milieu.

[20:34]

To highlight the fundamental quality of liturgical activity, de Niels refers to participants in the liturgy, and that includes all of us, I presume. both individually and collectively as homo liturgicus. So in addition to being homo sapiens, we are also homo liturgicus. The fundamental attitude is one of receptivity and readiness to listen. It is an attitude that Pardini called contemplating, an attitude so alien to the homo father while they're the workers, the workaholic perhaps, in many of us. Daniel's reflection highlights the fact that it is the body, both individually and collectively, that is the location for the experience of the presence of God.

[21:39]

Chauvet highlights the importance of bodiliness when he explained that the human being does not have a body, but is body. So according to Chauvet, we are body. The human being as corporeal, according to Chauvet, is the place where the triple body, social, ancestral, and cosmic, is symbolically joined. So all of these intersect. in the human person, in the human person and his body. Furthermore, the liturgy is for Chauvet, quote, the powerful pedagogy where we learn to consent to the presence of the absence of God who obliges us to give him a body in the world. Let me say this again. It's such a wonderful statement. He says the liturgy is the powerful pedagogy where we learn to consent to the presence of the absence of God, who obliges us to give him a body in the world.

[22:45]

The notion of sacramentality involves an appreciation of the significance of creation, particularly embodiment in communicating God's presence in the world. This aspect, after all, is the basis of the mystery of the incarnation and Christian faith in Jesus Christ as the Word made flesh. Thus the privileged event of the Incarnation, as well as every other sacramental event, is an occasion of disclosure that can be interpersonal and revelatory because it assumes bodilyness. For us today, the possibility or the banner of being receptive or open to a unique event of disclosure is necessarily affected by the postmodern context in which the event is experienced. In other words, our perceptivity, our receptivity, our openness to God's presence in our own bodies and in the bodilyness of our postmodern world

[23:55]

is influenced by a mindset, and we talked about that earlier, that has lost confidence in the rational and prefers, once again, non-rational ways of knowing. Recall that Article 7 of Vatican II's Constitution on Sacred Liturgy located one of the manifold presences of the risen Christ in the assembly gathered for worship. So it doesn't count when they're gathered for bingo. This belief provides the basis for speaking of the sacramentality of the gathering assembly. Let's look at what those terms mean. First of all, assembly. The General Instruction on the Roman Missal describes the introductory rite of the Mass as having a character of a beginning, introduction, and preparation. That's Article 46. The purpose of the rites, the introductory rites, is to ensure that the faithful who come together as one establish communion and dispose themselves to listen to God's word and to celebrate the Eucharist.

[25:03]

So the purpose of the entrance rite is to foster unity for those who have gathered. GERMS, that's the acronym for the General Instruction on the Role of the Self, has nothing to do other things that are of concern these days. GERMS' emphasis on unity serves to highlight the very nature of the act of gathering. Our effort to gather is a response, sometimes we think we've decided, it is a response to an invitation that God gestures to humankind through the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Baptism enables us to respond to God's invitation by plunging us into the paschal mystery. So by entering into the dying and the rising of Christ, we respond to Christ's self-gift with our own self-gift. Furthermore, baptism authorizes us to do Eucharist.

[26:05]

since it is through baptism that we receive Christ's mandate to do this in remembrance of me. It is ultimately baptism, therefore, that gathers us to do Eucharist as the one body of Christ. Thus, our act of gathering enables us to become mindful again of who we really are, the body of Christ the church gathered in the word to give thanks and praise and share the bread of life and the cup of salvation. Now this focus on who we are leads to a consideration of who it is who really does the liturgy. In calling for the full active and conscious participation of the assembly as the primary goal of the liturgy reform, The Council highlights the priestly nature of the liturgical assembly. When we gather, or more accurately, when by the power of the Spirit we are gathered, Christ is present in the Church in order to incorporate us more fully into the Paschal Mystery.

[27:22]

This is what makes us assembly. This means that we as a gathered community, led by the presider, the priest, do the liturgy, or do the Eucharist. Furthermore, this gathered liturgical community is recognized in its local particularity as the body of Christ, and therefore as an instance of the Church. Christ's presence is sacramentalized by means of a mutual presence which the assembly offers to each other. In other words, when we gather, we are the body of Christ for each other and for the world. Belief in the presence of the risen Lord in the church is the basis for our belief in the presence of Christ in the gathering assembly. Such 20th-century theologians as Harold Rahner, Edward Schielebeck, and Piotr Schoenberg have all contributed to an understanding of the Church as sacrament, the Church as sacrament, and therefore as the primary location of Christ's presence in the world.

[28:37]

For Rahner, this presence of Christ in the church necessarily precedes the presence of Christ in the Eucharistic species, comes before it. Schielebeck speaks of the essential bond between the real presence of Christ in the Eucharist and his real presence as risen Lord living in the church. Schonenberg reiterates this perspective when he insists that only when we plumb the depth of the mystery of Christ's presence in the community, will we discover the meaning of the real presence in the sacred species. Like Stilbecks, Sonnenberg stresses the importance of seeing the presence of Christ in the sacred species in relationship to his presence both in the word and in the community. There is, of course, only one real presence of Christ, albeit in many modes.

[29:40]

What we forget, however, is that the real presence in the Eucharistic species is not an end in itself. As Schembeck reminds us, Christ's gift of himself is not ultimately directed toward the bread and wine, but toward the community. This contemporary emphasis on the presence of Christ in the church is a retrieval of a belief by the early church that was gradually obscured in the medieval period. How did this happen? In the course of the Middle Ages, there occurred a gradual separation between the community on one hand and the gifts of bread and wine on the other. The community's earlier consciousness of itself as the body of Christ diminished as its consciousness of the presence of Christ as an object on the altar increased.

[30:42]

This development was also accompanied by a loss of symbolic consciousness. The controversies over whether Christ is truly present in the elements resulted from both a loss of consciousness of the community as the locus of the presence of Christ, and also a loss of consciousness, of symbolic consciousness, that understood the presence of Christ in the elements as sacramental. So, you know, there are these medieval legends about bathing hosts. You don't need faith then. Such a dichotomy did not exist in the patristic period, as it's clear from the writings of Augustine, especially sermons 229 and 272. I will not read them. In sermon 272, Augustine asks his congregation, how can bread be his body and the cup or what the cup contains? How can it be his blood?

[31:44]

This is Augustine's answer. Quote, The reason these things, brothers and sisters, are called sacraments is that in them one thing is seen, another is understood. What can be seen has a bodily appearance. What is to be understood provides spiritual fruit. So if you want to understand the body of Christ, listen to the apostle, he's talking about Paul, telling the faithful, quote, are the body of Christ and its members, 1 Corinthians 12, 27. So, it is you that are the body of Christ and its members. It's the mystery meaning you that has been placed on the Lord's table. What you receive is the mystery that means you. It is what you are, that it is to what you are that you reply, amen. And so by replying, you express your consent.

[32:45]

What you hear, you see, is the body of Christ. And you answer, Amen. So, be a member of the body of Christ in order to make that Amen true." In other words, Augustine reasons that if his listeners want to understand the Eucharist as sacrament, they must begin by understanding themselves as the body of Christ. Later in the sermon, Augustine sums up his theology with the often quoted quotation or exhortation, be what you can see and receive what you ought. In Servant 229, Augustine similarly focuses on the church and the body of Christ, but this time he has the added emphasis of unity. Quoting the Apostle Paul again, Augustine says, one loaf, one body, is what we being many are. We all know the song.

[33:49]

1 Corinthians 10, 17. He unpacks the verse by explaining, however many loaves may be placed there, it's one loaf. However many loaves there may be on Christ's altars throughout the world, it's one loaf. But what does it mean, one loaf? He, that is Paul, explained very briefly, one body is what we, being many, are. This is the body of Christ about which the apostle says while addressing the church. Quote, but you are the body of Christ and his members. 1 Corinthians 12, 27. What you receive is what you yourselves are, thanks to the grace by which you have been redeemed. You add your signature to this when you answer, Amen. What you see here is the sacrament of unity. Unquote.

[34:50]

Here, Dustin highlights the unity of the church. His perspective is different from later medieval emphasis on the real presence of Christ under the form of consecrated bread and wine. What happened was that gradually the presence of Christ in the gifts of bread and wine was separated from the presence of Christ in the community. In the patristic period, that is in Augustine's time, the primary emphasis was not on the Eucharistic presence per se, but on the purpose of that presence, the presence of Christ in the community. Eventually, the medieval gathered assembly came to perceive Christ's presence solely, that's the problem, solely in the consecrated bread and wine. As a result, The Eucharist came to be adored, but not eaten. People didn't go to communion. Such distortions in the church's belief and practice can arise when multiple modes of Christ's presence, that is, assembly, bread, wine, presider, words, sacraments, are not understood in proper relationship to each other.

[36:04]

Eventually, And unfortunately, dichotomy was set up between symbol and reality that impoverished medieval appreciation of the power of symbols to mediate reality. The result was that something was considered either real or symbolic. Augustine would have said real and symbolic. Such a development had particularly negative implications for liturgical and sacramental practice. Since as ritual activity, worship is built up on the complexions of symbols that interact in order to communicate meaning. So when we gather for worship, we are engaging in ritual behavior that involves the interplay of multiple symbols. The dynamism of the interplay of symbols can perhaps be more readily understood by comparing it with the fundamental principle of quantum physics.

[37:10]

Now, don't, don't want to say that. This is really basic. Nothing, nothing crazy about it. Quantum physics describes the universe as a place where everything is interconnected or interrelated. Connections are realized by energy concentrated in bundles called quanta. that flow throughout all of reality. Indeed, this energy is the primary essence of reality. It is an astounding and fresh way to look at the cosmos. The notion that all reality is interdependent and that its relatedness is accomplished by means of the flow of energy provides an apt metaphor for understanding the symbolic activity that occurs in the liturgy. Like bundles of energy described in quantum physics, liturgical symbols interact with each other, transferring and increasing energy, shedding light and unfolding meaning.

[38:20]

All the elements of the liturgy. bread, wine, cup, water, fire, book, vesture, altar, crucifix, and all the gestures, processing, bowing, eating, drinking, signing, singing, and sprinkling, and all the environmental elements such as color, texture, art, architecture, light and darkness, sound, silence, all of these can be said to make up the complexes of symbols that constitute the liturgy. Each symbol, to continue the quantum metaphor, bombards the others, thereby releasing energy and enriching their meaning. It is therefore to the way we celebrate symbols, I suggest, that we need to look if we are to discover how our liturgies might better mediate the assembly's perception of itself as the presence of Christ. Coming back to one of my favorite theologians, Louise Marie Chauvet built his sacramental theology on the Greek understanding of symboli, which is the word for symbol, when he asserts that symbols negotiate identity and relationships.

[39:39]

This is basic. Symbols negotiate identity and relationships. This insight helps us to understand why liturgy vows sometimes erupt over a small change in the way a symbol is used. The small change may actually be perceived as a direct threat to our identity as Catholics or our understanding of the church to which we have given our lives. That is also why the way symbols are celebrated, that is handled, is also important. How we celebrate them can either mediate or obscure the awareness of the assembly as the body of Christ. Earlier I mentioned that because it is symbolizing activity, the Eucharist's meaning is not asserted, but exhibited. Liturgy is not about propositions, but about confessing or exhibiting faith.

[40:41]

In other words, by means of a variety of ritual actions, the glory of God, the faith of the assembly, the unity of the assembly, the yearning of the assembly for the presence of Christ are confessed and manifested or exhibited. Another example may elucidate the point. We exhibit the meaning of Easter through fire, water, gesture, color, music, proclamations, storytelling, et cetera. The primary purpose of the Easter Vigil is not to tell the story of the resurrection to people who don't already know it, but to allow those who do believe to express or manifest or exhibit that belief. So the Paschal mystery is danced out, sung out, sat out in silence or lied out liturgically with ideas playing a secondary role. In this way, ritual operates in the exhibited mode.

[41:46]

Even so, the recognition of the assembly as gathered and as the presence of Christ does not normally occur spontaneously or automatically. Rather, through faithful and authentic repetition over time, the symbolizing activity of the liturgy can enable the assembly to build their identity by building their world, a world of faith and commitment to God and to each other. If we, as the Gathered Assembly, are going to be able to perceive ourselves as the presence of Christ when we gather for worship, we need to work at two things. The first is promoting and nurturing the sacramental imagination in our lives and in the lives of our communities. The second is encouraging and taking greater care in the way symbols of the liturgy are celebrated or handled.

[42:49]

This includes a multitude of symbols that interact with each other within the symbolizing activity we call worship. Lastly, the presence of Christ that we celebrate when we gather for worship is an anticipatory presence that foreshadows the universal transformation of all of humankind and the entire cosmos into Christ. And just as it is true that the presence of Christ in the bread and wine that Christ's presence in the bread and wine is directed not toward the bread and wine, but toward the members of the church. So it is true that Christ's presence among us is directed beyond the members of the church to the entire world. We are not called to be the body of Christ so that we can glory in God's election of us as his dwelling place.

[43:53]

Rather, our call to unity is meant to be a witness to the unity and love of God that is being poured out for the life of the entire world. Thus, the impulse to gather for worship, from the first efforts of individuals to come together in a simple worship space, to the final gathering at the feast of the Lamb, is a movement toward unity. This unity toward which our longing and our expectation of encounter with Christ propels us, begins with a gathering of a small circle of believers, but eventually finds its fulfillment in reaching out to embrace all of humankind. So the circle of the gathered community becomes the circle of the whole of humanity that ultimately becomes one with all the cosmos.

[44:55]

Finally, like the bundles of energy in quantum. The love of the three persons of the Trinity gathers us up into the loving relationship of the three divine persons, inviting us all into the divine dance. Thank you. It seems to be speaking in very idealistic terms, and I don't feel worthy of all you had to say today. It's very uplifting. But I just don't, that's too much for me, that attitude. Okay, well, thank you for saying that. Because that would be a typical response of all of us, I think.

[45:59]

You know, before we go to communion, we say, Lord, I'm not worthy. But toward the end, I said something about the fact that this isn't automatic, it happens over time. In other words, part of our motivation as Christians is that over time we become gradually transformed into Christ. That's what our calling is. That's what we commit ourselves to in baptism. And so it's our vocation. But when we look out in our congregations, You know, we look out at this motley crew of people who drive us crazy sometimes, you know. I talk about that in my book, actually, that, you know, this is, I'm not talking about a perfect world where everybody's a saint, you know, and even saints are very difficult to live with. But this is our vocation. And the whole reason, when Christ ascended into heaven and sent the Spirit on the church, and told us to do Eucharist in memory of Him. He was doing that so that we would be His presence in the world.

[47:03]

That's part of this consenting to the absence of the presence of God. In other words, He is using our bodies now to be present in the world because He is no longer physically present here as He was at one time. And so it is mind-boggling, you're right. And we could spend our entire life meditating on that idea. And we will continue, no matter what, to feel unworthy. But it happens to be our vocation to be the body of Christ in the world. That's what we accept when we accept baptism. And you know, when the priest or the Eucharistic minister holds up the body of Christ and says, body of Christ, remember I said everything is symbolic. And symbols have many layers of meaning. So that little phrase, It says a lot. One thing it's saying, it's proclaiming that this bread is the body of Christ. However, the person should look at you and say, body of Christ. It's kind of like an address to you.

[48:05]

You are the body of Christ. It's also a challenge to you. Be, as the Gospel would say, be more the body of Christ. Be what you see, that horse that you see, and become what you receive. So if we accept the fact that we are baptized and if we continue to receive the Eucharist and participate in the Eucharist, then we have signed on to this. I'd say that we also respond, Amen. Right. Once you say Amen, you've signed on. Right. I think what sometimes, like after listening to a lot of what you said, what brings on a certain amount of fear or anxiety is the fact that we always feel as Christians as to we are the ones who have to do this. Whereas Christ is the one who is doing this.

[49:09]

So as you said, we are called to be assembled. But the unity of what is happening there is Christ. Right, exactly. And we just have to be open. Exactly. Thank you. Exactly. You brought up at the very beginning about your family's situation, eating at home, and using that as a way of explaining Eucharist and our Sunday celebration. I can think of the movie Moonstruck, which was a very powerful movie. The scene was the kitchen for Italian families. I'm thinking also how how we can explain what we do from the time we leave our homes to the time we leave to gather people, that's exactly what we do at home.

[50:09]

For example, if you're having a special occasion or a Saturday night dinner, the first thing you got to do is to invite people. And then when the person comes to your home, you don't just say, quick, let's eat and get out of here. You sit them down. You have conversation. It's the warm-up. You know, maybe getting into some serious discussions or whatever the case may be. And then eventually it leads to setting the table, getting things ready. I don't think anybody comes to the house without eating. You know, there's no McDonald's when you have the real celebration with family. And they just sit and share a meal. And again, the kitchen scene is very, very key. And what does that mean within our home situation? We become a family, we become a community, we become neighbors, in that sense. And then when all is said and done, eventually we leave. And I find doing something like this, or presenting what the Eucharist is to young children,

[51:16]

so that they can identify exactly what happens in their homes to what we do on Sunday, par excellence, of course. It is something I think we need to get across to a lot of people. Because we're still dealing with Catholics today in 2009, who don't know, what's the mass going to do with my life? So, I mean, again, you know, we can get into very heavy theology here, which I think, you know, is there. But, you know, it brought me back to what you said at the very beginning. You had the pictures. What did you see? We eat as a family. You know, some good movies, I'm most struck, eat as a family. And I think that we can think of that, you know, within our own situation. And we need to explain what the youth is all about to kids. This might be a good beginning. Yes, good. Thank you. Since you're talking about movies, I need to mention another movie. I call this movie a Eucharistic parable. Many of you may have seen it.

[52:19]

It's called The Beth's Feast. Oh, yes. Yes. And once you really think of it that way, you know, maybe the first time you watch it, you don't think about it until gradually it may dawn on you. But to me, that is the most wonderful Eucharistic parable. you know, of a movie. So where there's a real transformation at the table. Well, great, we have another comment or question. Yes? And I thought you said at the end, too, you're referring to the Trinity as the taking up in this diamond. I think there is a theological term for it. Could you tell me? I recall you said, I threw several terms and I, so I didn't throw that one. Yes. I was going to defend the medieval world view a little bit. It's not as it is. I know a lot of things can be defined as postmodern today. And I didn't say it was very sacramental. so much so that there weren't seven sacraments, almost everything was sacramental in the worldview of many medieval people.

[53:40]

But I understand the split that you say took place between seeing the Eucharist, back at the time again, the Eucharist rather than the example. Well, however, that idea of multiple sacraments, weighing more than seven, and of course it took the church a long time to decide what the seven were. You know, today we have to define and designate everything, but, you know, they were kind of comfortable without doing that. But that idea of, you know, many, many, many things considered sacraments goes all the way back to Augustine. So that would be, you know, fourth, fifth century. Yes? Would you talk a little about your work with students, the young people you teach? and whether, in fact, they embody what you call a sacramental imagination. I'd love to hear about your work with them. Well, I teach at Barnum University, and I teach both graduates and undergraduates.

[54:43]

And I would say that working with the undergraduates is a very challenging thing to do. A lot of you may be professors here in the room. And actually, although it is a Catholic and Jesuit college, I have students in my class who have had no formal religious training. And many times it happens because parents are of two different religions and they say, well, we're going to let the children decide when they get to be adults. And then nothing happens. So I would say that I try exploring that in a couple of my classes. I always try to come up with the idea of symbol. and talk to them about what simple means. I have a class called Great Christian Hymns where we talk about studying theology in context. And so I'll take them to the big university church and we talk about these kinds of things and how they work.

[55:46]

But I always try to get down to their level of experience. So I usually say, for example, when I talk about, try to explain to them what is exhibitive versus what is assertive, you know. I'll say to them, well, you know, this young man loves this lovely young woman, and he wants to let her know. And he could write up an essay on why he loves her, or he could just kiss her. And the kiss is exhibitive, and the essay would be the propositional, assertive kind of thing. I says, what do you think makes more sense? You know, so they, you know, so you have to kind of figure out how to communicate with them, so I try to do that. I also, with my freshmen, I use the movie Chocolat as a way of explaining to them what salvation and transformation is, you know.

[56:47]

And, you know, take a look in the confessional in the church versus the talk of the tree as the confessional where people are listened to and pour out their souls. So, you know, we do that kind of thing. I'm constantly trying to get new ideas for ways of speaking to 20-somethings. But it is a challenging thing. But it's wonderful when you see the bright light going on that they go, oh, yeah, I get it. Yes. Following on that idea, I work at a school for kids in trouble. Ritual is critically important to teenagers, to people who use drugs, drink, cut. Ritual is something which they are keenly aware of. I should add here that one of my former students graduated last year from Fordham University with a degree in sacramental music. But she, like others, were very interested in ritual.

[57:53]

I think one of the things that the church has to worry about is becoming too utilitarian so that the rituals, with the idea of trying to become more open and trying to bring more people to the liturgy, the mysticism of the symbolic world evaporates. Because the kids Really, the symbolism and the ritual of getting high is directed to getting high. And to paraphrase C.S. Lewis from The Great Divorce, he talks about, in one of his scenarios, the artist who was trying to come into heaven is an impressionist artist, and the the person who is his guide says we don't need your paints here because you see you're trying to capture the light but the light is here so you don't need to paint the light anymore it's here and I think that sometimes we focus on symbolism

[58:56]

And we forget that the symbolism is the reality. It's the reality that the kids who are getting high are looking for. Yes, you're very right. One of the things I do in one of my classes is they have two field assignments. Well, in the other class there's only one. But they have to go to a Vespers. they go, Vespers, what's that? You know, and a lot of them are Catholics who say that. So I send them to that, we talk about the imagery of light with Vespers, and then they have to go to the Eucharist and do a paper on that. So I do agree with you, and then they come back, I even had some students this semester who went to the Easter Vigil, which is, you know, for them, a pretty long commitment of time, and the University takes two hours and 45 minutes. And they came back and they said they loved it. Yes. So you're right. Thank you for that. It's my experience too. Any more questions?

[60:02]

I don't think so. My father, James, has a copy of my book, which has a wonderful picture on it that one of our sisters, who is an artist, did for me. And it's kind of symbolic, too. It's like the cosmic dance. And there are a few of them floating around here. Yeah, if anybody wants to purchase a book, they can get right here. So anyway, thank you very much for coming. It was just a privilege to be here. Thank you. Thank you very much. Of course, here would be a place where you would see symbols celebrated well. I've not been here for the Easter vigil, but I mean, the procession wouldn't cross, the space, the attentiveness to the space, to the light,

[61:10]

the reverence with which communion is distributed. Even something like the way communion is distributed is a symbolic gesture that has a certain amount of beauty to it. I'm thinking of communities where, for example, the gestures are so small and the church is so big that you can't even see it, you know, or the Now one thing I did kind of like here that everybody has, a lot of people have kind of collapsed with is when we had, I think it was for the funeral because there were so many people, there was one cup on the altar for the consecration. And now what a lot of people are doing because of this problem about the crafts I forgot if they said flagon in the documents, so I heard pastors say, well we don't use flagons, we use carats.

[62:16]

But there's something about having one beautiful cup to emphasize the unity that I think is really important. And that we did yesterday. I don't remember what happened today. Once I saw it yesterday, I wasn't paying attention against it today. We had one call, but that actually didn't happen. Of course, that's the way we always used to do it, and I think that that really emphasizes the unity, that it's all coming from one. Another thing, and again, this happens here, we all stand. Sometimes it's very difficult when you go, especially if there's a large kind of celebration group. You know, you've got 30 priests and they're all standing in front sharing the Eucharistic prayer and then the rest of us kneel. So when you have, there's an issue here of the problem with, I do discuss these things in very specific details in my book. I talk about music, I talk about postures.

[63:21]

But so, when you have some of the group kneeling and some of the group standing, there's a lack of unity because the primary purpose of the posture is supposed to be unity. Now, of course, that doesn't account for people who have disabilities who can't do what everybody else is doing. That's understood. Or let's say, for example, if you have... I'm thinking about it. Besides that. Well, so for Easter time, I'll tell you, because a lot of you, I don't know if you come here for Mass every Sunday, or if you belong to liturgy groups at parishes in the city or whatever, that The Easter time is a time for standing. That was always a tradition in the church. That's why in an Easter time, if you recite the Angelus, you don't kneel, you stand up someday. So there are some kinds of things like postures, where we're not all together, or the way we use multiple symbols, you know, too many crucifixes in the altar space, or where you have this sense that

[64:26]

the community is not really part of the group so when you have like for example here a chapel in the octagon where everybody is in a circle that immediately creates a sense of unity so that is a very positive thing and of course a lot of times these things happen and we aren't even aware of it but we know that we experience it when we experience it even if you can't put your finger on it Or, you know, we have those beautiful great books and everybody gets one. So you can have the sense that even those of us who are not members of the monastery are part of the worshipping group because we are given the things that we need to pray with the community. Then you have things like Copeland. where there's taking advantage of what's going on in creation. There's an attentiveness to the movement of light and darkness. And so then we go down into the crypt and pray to Mary.

[65:33]

Now, you know, in some other place, even the Ledge Sanctuary's there, the community might just do that up above. But it becomes a kind of actual processional movement where you are doing this. And so the more you can get, and that goes along with children too and young people, the more you can get them involved in the doing, the more wonderful it is in terms of their experience of the ritual as something that they have ownership of and that they participated. One year, one of my former students who then got ordained as a priest, I used to work at a seminary, invited me to do tese for them. they had the cross, it was actually a cross, not a crucifix, in the church for Good Friday. Good Friday night, he had like all these teenagers pick up this huge cross and carry these lanterns, I don't know what the technical term is, where they had the fire, and they processed from the church through the entire parking lot to the school gym, which they had set up, carrying this cross and then doing it as a service.

[66:45]

This kind of thing that involves students in ritual is wonderful. They love, as was already mentioned, they love it. But it's doing things well, like a big cross, having a full procession, using beautiful vestures. All of these things are really important. Decorating the entire church, not just the sanctuary, because the action happens everywhere. So, but, you know, I've only been here a couple days and I've always just kind of assumed everything is wonderful. I mean, the bowing, the, you know, the use of the body here, where we stand up and bow, where we process and move downstairs, everything is, it's done with grace and with a sufficient movement and effort. You know, it's not these little tiny efforts where, you know, you see, a sign of a cross that looks like it's swanning flies or something.

[67:48]

Anyway, I think I'll end with that. Thank you. who I got in a cart and came up here. I've never been to a mass up here. And I was... We have a monastery and we ring bells and things like that, but I was so impressed when Brother Whoever came out right there in front of the altar and unlatched the bell rope and began to ring the bell right in the midst of the assembly. Oh, I was... I had goosebumps. Really goosebumps. I loved it. And I think that's another example of... out in a vestibule situation somewhere where nobody saw, you'd hear the bell, but you wouldn't actually see the physical ringing of it.

[68:52]

I loved it. I loved it. That's another sensation. It's about the art, too. Right. And just another thought that I had as I was listening. Easter vigil should begin in the dark. It does. It does. I know it does here. I know it does here because it's like early morning, right? Because some churches will start it at 7.30 or 7, you know, and you're missing the whole first part with the darkness and the candlelight. You're missing it. That's an example of what I meant by celebrating symbols well. We need to celebrate the darkness. And then we celebrate the candle, the Easter candle. So sometimes there's such simple things. But in the end, they do make such a difference. Yes?

[69:54]

Will you talk a little about music and situations in which music can be an obstacle? Yes. I'll be happy to. That's one of my main interests. Music, one of the big roles of music should be that it enables the congregation to worship and enables the congregation to have a sense of unity, but also enables the congregation to celebrate and do what it needs to do. Now, going back to symbols, I'll start with this example. One time I went to an ordination in another diocese, not to be mentioned by name. And there were a huge number of priests concelebrating, since it was an ordination, this is normal. And again it happened that, you know, they stood and the, you know, huge congregation knelt. Then, at communion time, we sang, the Taizé people eat this bread, drink this cup.

[71:01]

That's what we sang. And we were not offered the cup. And so, There's an example where there's a dissonance between what you're singing and what you're doing. And it becomes even worse when you see a hundred priests receiving the cup and then you don't. Then it's even worse. So we have to watch that we're singing something and it's authentic. Then the gathering song itself, I read all this stuff about gathering. Now I know over here that they do these wonderful antiphons, which is a long-standing Benedictine tradition. But if you have a congregation, let's say a parish, then it's mixed, meaning of different ethnic groups. If you don't allow the group to feel included by sometimes using their music, even if they are just a minority in the parish, then the music itself can isolate people.

[72:07]

Or if only the choir knows it and the people don't know it. Doing that can also make people feel isolated and estranged from the action that's happening. So those are some of the things that need to be attended to. Now that doesn't mean that every Eucharist you have to have, you know, every group where we said it and have a United Nations musical repertoire. But over time, you should. You know, over the church year, you should have the opportunity to do all those kinds of things. And there should be a mix of styles because and a mix also of how old the music is. Because we are a church. We belong to a church that is 2,000 years old. And the people who have gone before us, who are in the communion of saints, are part of what we're part of.

[73:08]

And so singing chants and singing older things puts us in touch with our tradition and And our church, in other words, is part of who we are. And so we should have music that covers various periods. And then we should also have contemporary music. Now, I know of parishes and groups, most of the time they're very contemporary groups, that will not sing any contemporary music. Now, I can understand why they may feel that way in 1965, but not in 2009. Because in 1965, we didn't have much more than Sons of God, and here we are in Kumbaya. As we think back on it, it was pretty pathetic. Of course, at the time, we thought it was wonderful. But now we know better, because we've developed our ability to have a wonderful repertoire in our English language. So there is a lot of good contemporary music out there.

[74:12]

And this goes back to the whole idea of God being mediated through the body. And one of the bodies is social and ancestral, and it's cultural, which means that if you say that we cannot worship God in the music of 2009, then that is really an affront to the incarnation. Because God saw fit to reveal God's self to us through the culture of the time that he was living in. And that culture is no better than ours in terms of its ability to mediate God's presence. And so we are able to mediate God's presence in 2009, just as God's presence was mediated when Panjaleel was first written. in the 12th century. Well, 13th, I think, yes. Right.

[75:14]

So, anyway, so we need to have a variety of things that represent people, that represent styles, because most groups are mixed. You know, it's rare that you're going to get a group together of, let's say, the Bach choral society. You know, they live for Bach. whom I happen to love myself, but I wouldn't just do that. So you need to have a mix of things that will in some way speak to the whole group over time because we need, these are symbols that median our identity and our relationships. And so somehow the world I live in, the culture that speaks to me has to be a way of mediating God's revelation to me in 2009. And so we need to use those resources. Of course it needs to be good, you know. It's got to be good. And everything isn't good. But by now I think we have a much better sense.

[76:17]

because we have so much more to choose from of the stuff that's really good. And then, of course, it has to fit the group, because if they can't do the music, then no matter how good the composer is, they'll kill it. And how good is that? Then it's going to be just as bad. So all these things need to be taken into account. You really got me going, because this summer I'm teaching at Notre Dame a course called Music and Ritual. And so we're going to be exploring a lot of this. But my dissertation was on the question of music as ritual symbol. I mean, I've devoted most of my life to that. So I studied all these liturgies, I mean, theologies of symbol in order to interpret what's happening in the ritual, what's going on with the music. And so, I mean, I could talk about that till I can't say till the cows come in anymore. So does a sheep, or a shorn, or whatever.

[77:19]

One of those things. So that's it. You know, that idea of Symbolon as negotiating identity and relationships is very important. My sister can't be once. had a metal on and I almost went nuts because you know what they did in the ancient world is they didn't have MasterCard or Visa so they would break a piece of metal or pottery and they would go off with the two broken pieces and had no value broken separately but when they came together they would make a whole. So my sister had on this necklace with a piece of metal that on one side was a nice smooth round curve and the other side had jagged edges. I said, Andy, what are you wearing? You know, I'm thinking, I must be going crazy because I'm working on my dissertation and I see symbol everywhere. She said, this is a symbol. I said, it is. She said, yes, and Jim has the other half. That's her husband. So when you put it together, it made a perfect circle.

[78:21]

So the point is that it negotiated their identity as a married couple, as people devoted to each other, as people who are one. So I always say, there is no such thing as it's all. You never put the word only in front of symbol. because a symbol is a powerful reality. Something is real and symbolic. So, I think I've said enough. Oh, look, we have a couple of more people who want to speak. I wasn't going to bring this up, but the resurgence of Latin and the Trinitinian language was right, right, right in this country. How is that going to affect people like you? Well, I am distressed. But I must have stressed so much about, see, like, I don't have a problem singing Latin once in a while, you know, until they have some Latin and I think it's beautiful.

[79:25]

But pretending that it's the past when it's the present is another kind of denial of the incarnation. because God is working in our culture now. But there's also a symbolic problem, I think, with the other rites, which technically is not the Trinitine rite unless we refer to it because there were some reforms of it by John XXIII. But let's talk about it as the Trinitine, because we know what we're talking about. That rite negotiates a certain understanding of church with all the symbols and symbolic actions in it. And then you've got the contemporary rite that we are familiar with, that we are doing. And that, again, is completely a symbolic way of of negotiating who we are as church and expressing who we are as church.

[80:26]

The problem is that the Trinity Rites and the Rite of Paul VI have two very different ecclesiologies. That's why I have problems with it. Not because I don't like Latin or smell the belts, although I went to one once and I thought, yes, no, I don't need this anymore in my life. You know, I was a child, and I remember it distinctly. But the problem is that you've got two very different ecclesiologies that really cannot stand side by side. Because then we're saying we have two different, we have groups, of course that's part of my exposal, we are Catholics, you know, we don't all agree on things, but somehow we're all under the umbrella. But I find it problematic because of that, because it negotiated a church where the community were receivers of the action of the priest, not doers. I went, I studied at Catholic U and I took a course in Gregorian chant. And the professor was a big name.

[81:28]

He took the whole class down to the Smithsonian, gave a lecture and used the class to exhibit how it sounded. He said to me, sister, you can't sing. Because I was the only woman in the class. Because that's not the way it was done. There were no women in the medieval period that he was demonstrating singing. It was choirs of clerics. Yes. Rates, not women. Yes. I think this follows off on that. Do your students get discouraged? Can you speak about the lack of liturgical leadership roles for women over the domination of these roles by men? Well, one of the things that I do as a topic in one of my classes is how do we name God? and we get into the issue of inclusive language, but they always bring up priesthood, you know, and so I don't... I don't treat it as a topic in the class, but I usually give them a few remarks, you know, and I always say, the Holy Spirit will have her way eventually.

[82:38]

But, you know, I don't... I don't do any kind of full promoting of it because I don't want to be silenced. But I do tell them that, you know, naturally I believe that women will eventually become priests because the church needs it. Eventually we will need it. You see, what happened with confirmation got separated from baptism and communion because they decided in the medieval period that a bishop had to do it. people used to be baptized, conferred, and received communion in one fell swoop, so to speak. It was all one sacrament. And it got separated because of this idea the bishop has to do it. Okay, if we continue to say it has to be a male celibate who celebrates the Eucharist, eventually we will less and less have the Eucharist, and the Eucharist is what makes us who we are.

[83:39]

That's the problem. And a lot of people who don't understand the difference between Eucharist and a service Sunday without a priest, who don't understand that, don't realize the danger of that for a long, ongoing basis. But what makes us who we are is Eucharist. And if we can't get to it because there aren't enough priests, then we have a really serious problem. And that is the primary thing. Come down again.

[84:18]

@Transcribed_v004
@Text_v004
@Score_JJ