"REAL PRESENCE" OF WHAT? The Meaning of Liberal Sacraments, by Gary L'Hommedieu

Commentary

By Canon Gary L'Hommedieu
www.virtueonline.org
11/17/08

"The sacraments mean nothing if people don't meet with the living Lord Jesus Christ," said the Rt. Rev. William Godfrey, Bishop of Peru, guest preacher at the opening Eucharist of the Ft. Worth Diocesan Convention.

Bishop Godfrey's remark could be a principle for reformation in any era of Church history. The classic Reformers used similar words to criticize a corrupt religious hierarchy for its willingness to exploit the mystical power of rites for its own aggrandizement--what St. Paul called "holding the form of religion but denying the power of it" (2 Tim 3:5).

There's nothing protestant about the theological principle expressed in the Bishop's remark, just as there's nothing catholic about a cultivated taste for ritual. The Church's sacraments are not magic, nor are they substitutes for faith in a living Lord. Such was the battle cry of both the Protestant Reformers and the Council of Trent.

Within the past few generations in the United States many Protestant denominations have discovered a renewed interest in the ancient rites of the Church. The Episcopal Church had already been dividedbetween high and low factions, favoring its catholic and evangelical wings respectively.

As a conclusion to its own renewal studies in 1979 TEC declared itself explicitly catholic with the approval of its new Book of Common Prayer. That Book contained nine or ten forms for the Holy Eucharist (a term I had never heard before attending seminary) as well as two forms of sacramental confession.

The liturgical renewal seemed to fit naturally with the postwar shift to theological liberalism. In His new role as therapist God was using ritual to massage the inner recesses of individual and collective consciousness. In His zeal as liberator God was using the liturgy as a basis for ordaining political ideologies left and right.

Faith in sacraments as transcendent interventions in a world scandalized by the supernatural is strange indeed.

In the early 1980s I served with professed Anglo-Catholics who denied a historical resurrection of Jesus and yet insisted upon the "real presence" of Christ in the Eucharist.

In those days everybody was becoming "catholic", which meant multiplying signs of the cross, calling clergymen "Father", and arguing about the validity of sacraments based on the correct use of liturgical colors. (I'm not kidding. In my first parish in the historically low Diocese of Connecticut the head of the altar guild recounted an incident where a young curate hotly declared a Eucharist "invalid" because the sanctuary had been vested in the wrong seasonal colors. This is high church on steroids.)

There's a strain of medievalism in the liberal understanding of presence and its correlation with validity. In the medieval Church the validity of the Catholic sacraments was the divine basis for the power of the Catholic priesthood. Hence the direct translation of the Ordinal: "Receive the power of offering sacrifices to God and celebrating Mass, as well for the living as for the dead."

Then as now, the evolution from otherworldly into worldly power was never long. Upgrade the medieval notion of spiritual power to its nearest modern equivalent, political power, and you have an impressive toolkit for today's religious professional. One might be enticed to feign belief in the "real presence" of an unascended Christ or, worse, believe that there's no contradiction between denying the truth of fundamental doctrine and affirming the divine power of sacraments.

There is a delightfully mystical quality in pretending to hold two opposite viewpoints at the same time. Today's seminary trained clergy believe however much or little of historic doctrine it takes to empower their status as heads of congregations, with however much mystical spin it takes to bewilder congregants into attending their services. Power corrupts, and supernatural power corrupts miraculously.

This is what the Reformers derided as "priestcraft", dressed up for a new era. When the new Presiding Bishop is enthroned amidst sprinklings of baptismal water on worshippers, accompanied by the announcement that they are now bound by a covenant into supporting a UN scheme for saving the world, this is a combination of magic, misinformation, and manipulation.

The Episcopal Church has become a dispenser of its own "blessings", borrowing the external rites from historic Christendom and conferring new graces tailored to the needs of the popular culture. What's being planned for the next General Convention are two made to order: open communion services and rites for same-sex unions.

The new sacraments follow a precise formula. First, empty the rite of any reference to the truly supernatural--that embarrassing God who miraculously raises the dead and changes normal bread and wine into a means of union with Himself.

Make the new sacrament about togetherness and inclusion at the local clubhouse. Never mind that togetherness and inclusion are nowhere to be found in TEC clubhouses despite decades of customized sacraments, but only lawsuits, expulsions from ministry, and dwindling enrollments.

Second, make sure the new rite conspicuously thumbs its nose at some traditional understanding either of religion or society. (Open communion and same-sex unions both fit this bill admirably.)

Brazen contempt for authority and tradition confects a prophetic spirit comparable to the Spirit that once transformed natural elements on medieval altars. Voila. A new god puts words in the old god's mouth that are authoritative for our time, conferring the assurance of political correctness, today's counterpart to saving grace.

In 2009 the Episcopal Church will take ecclesial corruption to a new level in its enthusiasm for "the form of religion". Paraphrasing Isaiah 1:13, the next General Convention will explicitly ordain solemn assembly as the means for "blessing" iniquity. Here's where sacrament comes in with the threefold power of magical thinking, theological misinformation, and good old fashioned mind games and manipulation.

Bishop Godfrey's word cuts through with a clarity that is earthshaking in its simplicity: take the real Jesus out of the sacraments and the only reality you have is a real deception. Sacraments don't mechanically make things happen, except (as Paul writes) the judgment of those who receive them "unworthily"--i.e., "without discerning the Lord's body" (1 Cor 11:29). They are not psychological props for achieving desired outcomes at public gatherings.

They are not the raw materials for benign illusions to be conferred upon targeted groups. They don't make togetherness happen.

The Bishop's terse comment pinpoints the basis and function of the catholic sacraments. The basis is a real living Lord who has ordained certain rites as means to communicate His supernatural life. The function of sacraments is to enable Christians to grow in faith until they literally resemble the Person of their Lord.

At the conclusion of the same historic Convention where Bishop Godfrey preached the opening sermon, Bishop Jack Iker said this: "Anglo-Catholicism is not about wearing vestments. Anglo-Catholicism is about theology and ecclesiology." Richard Hooker couldn't have said it better.

There is nothing "catholic" about quasi-Christian rituals divorced from their historic meaning and attached to fashionable causes. Whatever power they have is illusory, if not demonic. While they do empower a liberal hierarchy (despite the unceasing proclamation of a classless organization), they only bewilder the rank and file. They do not strengthen them, and they do not change anything for the better.

All they "really" do is invite God's judgment.

---The Rev. Canon J. Gary L'Hommedieu is Canon for Pastoral Care at the Cathedral Church of St. Luke, Orlando, Florida, and a regular columnist for VirtueOnline.