RITE AND REASON: The body of Christ is about the kingdom of God and not some 'anatomical miracle'
IF CHRIST has not risen from the dead life is a Greek tragedy. By the grace of God I accept that our task is to be open to his unconditional love for humankind and to grow in compassion. I cling to the Catholic Church with a mixture of affection, gratitude and exasperation.
Christian mysticism consists in loving the Christian mystery and being transformed by it. The Latin American bishops have asserted: “A sincere conversion has to change the individualistic mentality into one of social awareness and concern for the common good.”
We now share a global consciousness. What we need is a conversion to justice and compassion. It is another commonplace that there is no longer any alternative to peace.
I believe that the Incarnation was a decisive event in history.
Christ became human so that we might become divine. The evolutionary achievement of Jesus as incarnate God, Jack Mahoney SJ has written (in Christianity in Evolution), was to break through death to a new phase of life, and to share this with all those who try to live according to his message of universal altruism.
St Irenaeus’s world view is of a painfully slow climb towards maturity. The eternal God is capable of embracing human suffering: he is not absolute power but absolute love.
William Johnston SJ regards meditation as a key factor in human development. It generates self-emptying love which is the most powerful energy in the universe. Fr Daniel O’Leary declares we are “co-creators with God of a steadily developing, ever-evolving universe”.
The great truth of our faith, according to Benedictine teacher of Christian meditation John Main, is that the risen Christ lives in our hearts. Prayer is intimacy with God. Prayer is not a matter of talking to God, but of listening to him or being with him.
We are praying when awakening to the presence of the Spirit in our hearts. The great religions all point to the heart’s inner core as the place where, in the words of St John of the Cross, the “sounding silence” may be heard. It is in silence that we find God. But we should take God seriously, not ourselves. Cardinal Basil Hume said the hallmarks of the Christian are trust, joy and commitment. The liberty of a Christ-centred life frees us from the ego and its anxiety.
Focusing on transubstantiation seems anachronistic today. The theme of the Eucharistic Congress was “communion with Christ and with one another”. Communion is about community. The Christian community is the body of Christ.
We celebrate our new, shared humanity in Christ with thanksgiving. We receive the eucharistic sacrament as a manifestation of the kingdom of God and not as some “anatomical miracle” (in the words of Orthodox theologian Alexander Schmemann). The risen Christ is “a life-giving Spirit” (1 Cor 15:45).
Roman Catholics believe the bread of life is the most important spiritual nourishment on our earthly pilgrimage. Julian of Norwich compared Christ in the Eucharist to a breast-feeding mother.
He shares his life with us so that we may be transformed and embrace his vision for creation. Helder Camara talked “of passing from the Blessed Sacrament to your other presence just as real in the Eucharist of the poor”. How we relate to one another is part of how we relate to God. The Eucharist is the food of sinners, however, rather than a prize for the perfect.
The challenge for the church is to become the sort of community that can speak convincingly about God, Timothy Radcliffe OP has remarked, “which is to say a place of mercy and mutual delight, of joy and freedom”. While the Vatican may be the centre of paralysis at present, we are all engaged in building the kingdom.
Dr Brendan Ó Cathaoir has a certificate in theology