Franciscan at Home

In the Rite of Christian Initiation of Adults there are several aspects of formation and many moving parts that all contribute to the overall formation of the catechumens and the candidates. The pastoral aspect of formation concerns itself with the overall discipleship development of the catechumens, while the catechetical aspect helps them come to know the Word of God and brings them into intimacy with Jesus Christ. However, it is sometimes easy to forget that the RCIA is a liturgical rite and that the liturgical rites provide the grace and supernatural power that transforms the catechumens to become more like Christ and brings them into the life of grace. Therefore, it is crucially important that we both understand and fully implement all of the liturgical rites the Church provides us in the RCIA process in order to effectively form life-long disciples of Jesus Christ.

The Liturgy: The Grace that Drives the RCIA Process

First, we have to understand that the Rite of Christian Initiation of Adults is exactly that—a liturgical Rite. It is the liturgical rites that drive the process, from marking the movement of the catechumens from one period to the other to lavishing the catechumens with the grace of Christ and the Church as they move through the joyful (yet sometimes long and difficult) RCIA journey. Without this grace and supernatural assistance—which is the living water that drives the entire process—we risk forming catechumens who are not adequately prepared and empowered by God’s grace to live the Christian life.

In discussing these liturgical rites, we can distinguish between two particular kinds of rites given to us by the Church in the RCIA process. The first is called a “major rite” which includes “the more intense moments of initiation” (RCIA, 6). Examples include the Rite of Acceptance into the Order of Catechumens that begins the Period of the Catechumenate. Another would be the Rite of Election and Enrollment of Names that begins the Period of Purification and Enlightenment; and the final major rite is the reception of the Sacraments of Initiation at the Easter Vigil. These rites provide the grace and assistance of the Church as the catechumens progress from one period of the process to another.

The RCIA also offers a variety of other liturgical rites that are called “minor rites” that belong to particular periods of the RCIA. While these rites are called “minor rites” to distinguish them from the “major rites” that coincide with the major liturgical steps in the process, these minor rites are in no way to be neglected and are a crucial and indispensable part of the overall RCIA process. These minor rites are in fact packed with major grace that assists, strengthens, heals, and empowers the catechumens as they journey towards fullness of life in the Catholic Church.

The bottom line is that any fully effective RCIA process must employ the minor and the major rites in order to bring about the full and fruitful discipleship development of the catechumens. Let’s now explore more fully the minor rites of the RCIA process and how we can most effectively celebrate these rites.

Recientemente, en una conferencia para dirigentes católicos, me preguntó un joven sacerdote a qué me dedicaba. Le dije que ayudo a las parroquias a inventar estrategias para crear una cultura de discipulado en su parroquia. Me preguntó cómo hago eso. Le contesté que nos gusta enfocar principios, no balas de plata, y capacitar a un grupo de dirigentes en la parroquia para producir un cambio cultural al proyectar una visión, edificando un camino claro hacia el discipulado, movilizando a los líderes, y alineando ministerios claves con una visión orientada hacia el discipulado.

Recently, at a conference for Catholic leaders, I was asked by a young priest what I do. I told him that I help parishes strategize around how to create a culture of discipleship in their parish. He asked me how I do that. I told him that we like to focus on principles, not silver bullets, and train a group of leaders in the parish to create culture change by casting vision, building a clear path to discipleship, mobilizing leaders, and aligning key ministries with a discipleship-oriented vision.

His face fell. I wondered what I had said to offend him!

In Lumen Gentium, the Second Vatican Council’s Dogmatic Constitution on the Church, we are taught that “all the faithful of Christ of whatever rank or status, are called to the fullness of the Christian life and to the perfection of charity” (40). If wit and brevity are more your speed, perhaps Mother Angelica said it better: “if you’re breathing and you’ve got two legs, you’re called to holiness.”[1] This is an important thing for every catechist to remember, especially on days when students seem extra bitter, extra ornery, and extra closed-minded. God still loves each of them profoundly and intimately, and he wants to be in relationship with them.

One of the best ways to steer students in the right direction is to bring them to the Sacrament of Confession. After all, the whole power of this sacrament “consists in restoring us to God’s grace and joining us with him in an intimate friendship” (CCC 1468). However, those of us who are parents and teachers—especially of teenagers—know that this sacrament is not as frequently sought out as it ought to be. How can we change that? Here are three brief but hopefully effective strategies to integrating sacramental confession into the life of your high school.

By definition, Catholic schools are an extension of the Church’s saving mission of evangelization, with a special responsibility to provide “a privileged environment for the complete formation of her members” within that context.[1] That “complete formation” must have as its goal a lively and enlivening relationship with Christ specifically in the Eucharist, around which all apostolic work and even the other sacraments are centered (CCC 1324). Turning that belief into practice is one of the most critical activities in which a Catholic school must engage if it is to fulfill its own identity within the larger context of the Church’s mission.

Evangelization and the Eucharist
The Church understands evangelization and the Eucharist to be mutually coefficient. Evangelization is directed in a very real way towards the Eucharist, and the Eucharist is what unleashes the spiritual energies upon which the fullness of evangelization depends.[2] They support and feed each other, and where one is absent, the other will eventually struggle and fail, or at the least be a pale shadow of what it should be.

This means that the Eucharist must have a privileged role in the life, activity, and identity of every Catholic school. Spiritual formation should be centered on the Eucharist, spiritual programs should revolve around it, and catechesis specially devoted to it must have a priority; but, above all, evangelization should be specially directed toward it, and any activities centered around the Eucharist should be in some way linked with evangelization as well.

On November 2, the Church commemorates the Feast of All Souls. In contrast to the Feast of All Saints the day before, the All Souls liturgy remembers all who have died, not just the saints in heaven. As such, it is a much more somber occasion. After all, many souls will never be saints in heaven: they have elected an eternity separate from the love of God and must therefore suffer the torments of hell. But even though “it is not the will of your heavenly Father that one of these little ones be lost” (Mt 18:14), the punishment of hell is both righteous and just. In The Problem of Pain, C.S. Lewis called the damned self-enslaved—their doors to eternity are locked from the inside. Love, even and especially God’s love, can never be forced. Thus, we ultimately do not mourn or pray for the conversion of souls in hell, for they would not want God even if they could have him.

There are those, however, that will never suffer eternal torture. They thirst painfully for God but have not yet achieved their heavenly reward. These souls have died in God’s friendship but must still be refined in the furnace of affliction (cf. Is 48:10): they must pay the temporal punishment for their sins. These are the Church Suffering, the holy souls in purgatory. It is chiefly them we remember in our prayers and in the sacrifice of the Mass on All Souls Day.

Coloring Our Faith

There is a maxim in the Church which states, “lex orandi, lex credendi.” Summarized in the Catechism, “the law of prayer is the law of faith: the Church believes as she prays” (par. 1124). Whether we realize it or not, vestments are part of that “concrete mode of catechesis,” which Pope St. John Paul II named as a function of sacred art. The style, the symbols, the color…these are all elements of sacred vestments which convey a subtle visual theology to all those participating in the Lord’s Supper. When it comes to Masses for those who have died, the visual prayer of the priest’s vestments can influence how we move forward in faith after the death of a loved one.

Regarding the color of sacred vestments, the General Instruction of the Roman Missal says this:

Besides the color violet, the colors white or black may be used at funeral services and at other Offices and Masses for the Dead in the Dioceses of the United States of America (#346e).

Yes, in the Ordinary Form of the Roman Rite, black is an acceptable and legitimate liturgical color for funerals and Masses for the Dead (including All Souls).

En nuestro número anterior, Dr. Kreeft exploró varios asuntos importantes que se suscitan cuando consideramos las preguntas de “¿quién?” y “¿dónde?” en cuanto se refieran a Cristo en la Eucaristía. En este artículo, el autor examina las tres preguntas finales con tal de ayudarnos a mejor comprender la enseñanza de la Iglesia sobre nuestro Señor Eucarístico.

¿Qué?
¿Qué actividad realiza Cristo en la Eucaristía? Obviamente, Él actúa sobre nosotros y dentro de nosotros en la Sagrada Comunión, tanto en nuestro cuerpo como en nuestra alma, ya que Él nos penetra en Cuerpo y Alma, no solamente para estar allí, para ser actual, sino para ser activo también en nosotros. Nos hace cosas. Nos salva de nosotros mismos, nos lava quitando nuestros pecados, nos justifica y santifica, y nos glorifica. Nos da toda gracia, nos hace, de forma gradual, lo que le hizo a María repentina y totalmente, es decir “llena de gracia”. En nuestro caso, este proceso no es completado y perfeccionado en esta vida, como lo fue para María. Pero lo que le hizo Dios, nos lo hace a nosotros. Hace – está ahora manos a la obra haciendo – una obra mucho mayor que el hacer el universo entero desde la nada: está haciendo santos de pecadores. El mundo entero es como aquella caja-más-que-mágica a la que llamamos el confesionario: Adán entra y Jesús sale. Cristo hace lo que únicamente Dios puede hacer: crea en nosotros un corazón puro. Nos está operando el corazón. Él es quien T.S. Eliot llamó “el cirujano herido”. La Sagrada Comunión es cirugía cardíaca.

Pero, ¿qué hace Cristo en la Eucaristía todo el tiempo, aun cuando no estamos recibiendo la Sagrada Comunión y cuando no estamos ofreciendo su Cuerpo y su Sangre al Padre para la salvación del mundo cuando asistimos a Misa? ¿Qué hace durante la Adoración Eucarística? ¿Qué está haciendo ahorita mismo?

Santo Tomás contesta esa pregunta con una sola palabra, una palabra maravillosa, en el himno eucarístico más perfecto que se haya escrito. El primer renglón es “Adoro Te devote, latens deitas, quae sub his figuris, vere latitas” (Devotamente te adoro, Dios escondido, oculto verdaderamente bajo estas apariencias). Aquella palabra, latitas, es la respuesta a nuestra pregunta, “¿Qué está haciendo Cristo allí?” Se está ocultando.

Ocultarse es un acto, no solo un estado estático de ser, sino una acción, una actividad, un acto libremente deseado que hace una diferencia, que cambia algo. Cuando nos ocultamos, cambiamos nuestra apariencia. Si no nos ocultáramos, estaríamos visibles; cuando nos ocultamos, hacemos algo, cambiamos algo, nos volvemos invisibles. Nos retiramos de las apariencias. Cuando dejamos de ocultarnos, no le sumamos nada a nuestro ser, sino que nos quitamos algo: nos quitamos nuestro disfraz, o nuestro escondite. Cesamos la acción de ocultarnos.

n our previous issue, Dr. Kreeft explored several important issues that arise when we consider the questions of “who” and “when” as they relate to Christ in the Eucharist. In this article, he will examine three final questions, to help us better understand the Church’s teaching concerning our Eucharistic Lord.

What?

What activity is Christ performing in the Eucharist? Obviously, he is acting on us and in us in Holy Communion, both in body and soul, since he enters us both in body and soul not just in order to be there, to be actual, but also to be active in us. He does stuff to us. He saves us from ourselves, he washes away our sins, he justifies and sanctifies us, and glorifies us. He gives us all graces, he makes us, gradually, what he made Mary suddenly and totally, namely “full of grace.” For us, this process is not completed and perfected in this life, as it was for Mary. But what God did to her, he does to us. He does—he is now at work doing—a far greater work than making the entire universe out of nothing: he is making saints out of sinners. The whole world is like that more-than-magical-box we call the confessional: Adam walks in and Jesus walks out. Christ does what only God can do: he creates in us a clean heart. He is performing heart surgery on us. He is what T.S. Eliot called “the wounded surgeon.” Holy Communion is heart surgery.

But what is Christ doing there in the Eucharist all the time, even when we are not receiving Holy Communion and when we are not offering his Body and Blood to the Father for the salvation of the world as we assist at the Mass? What is he doing there during Eucharistic adoration? And what is he doing right now?

St. Thomas answers that question in a single word, a wonderful word, in the most perfect and beautiful Eucharistic hymn ever written. The first line is “Adora te devote, latens deitas, quae sub his figuris vere latitas.” (Devoutly I adore thee, hidden deity, Who beneath these figures hideth there from me.) That word latitas is the answer to our question, “What is Christ doing there?” He is hiding.

In what is perhaps the most foundational statement in all the Catechism of the Catholic Church, we read something puzzling: “The ultimate end of the whole divine economy is the entry of God's creatures into the perfect unity of the Blessed Trinity.”