Meditations for Layfolks - The Sacraments

The three great virtues, Faith, Hope, and Charity, teach us the true following of Christ they point out to us, that is, wherein the pathway that He chose can be traced; they tell us what we have to do in order to be saved. By means of faith we learn what are the mysteries that God has vouchsafed to reveal to our race, and thereby, because truth and knowledge open to us the kingdom of God's love, we are led closer to Him. Thus hope enables us to see on what grounds future attempts at holiness and the firm purpose of amendment are made possible. We grow confident of the divine mercy and, conscious of our own weakness, place in it all the source of our courage. Thus there arises the full flower of charity. Faith is taught through the Creed, hope through the voice of prayer, and charity through the commandments. For as our Lord more than once insisted, love of God is no emotional experiment to be narrowed to its expression in words, but it must find in acts the sole sure show ing of itself: "If you love Me, keep My commandments." But all this is not enough. It is not enough merely to know what the right thing is, though this too is essential; I must know how to please God before I set out to please Him. Yet even when I do know what He would have me to do, there are still difficulties in the way. To know what is right is one thing, to do what is right is another. Here is the unique power of Christ our Lord. It is sometimes said that the whole of Christianity is contained in the sermon on the mount. If it may be said reverently, the sermon on the mount is the least original side of our Lord; every religious teacher almost has said what was said then. But to this He added another thing; He taught us what to do, and, further, gave us the strength to do it: this strength comes through the sacraments.

Just because He was God as well as man, He had power over all creation, and could help man even in the most intimate portion of his being, within the boundaries of his will. Here come in the force and value of the sacraments: they give us the help of God, by which we are enabled to do that which we know to be right. Divine Himself, He can give us divine strength. He can lay down the commandments and then give us also the sacraments to enable us to keep them. It does not take us long to find out the need we have of help, and consequently He has given us these seven means of obtaining His aid: these correspond to the various stages of the soul's development, and are the recurring helps, chosen with regard to the sevenfold needs of life. Baptism begins our life with its new birth, then Communion becomes the food of the soul, Confession is the medicine whereby our ailments are removed and our health restored, Confirmation fills up the gaps in our strength that the early dawn of battle discovers to us when we stand upon the threshold and begin to see the long line of foes drawn up against us, Marriage affords us those graces of loyalty and duty required for the exact fulfilment of the marriage contract towards wife and children, Holy Orders confers on the priest those high powers and that high vocation whereby we too are made partakers through him of the deep life of the mystical body of Christ, and the Last Anointing prepares the soul for its last long journey or gives (if God sees it to be good) health and strength to the body. Thus all along life's highway stand these helps, from which the power of God is imparted to us and by which we are made partakers of the divine nature.

Now the way in which these things are communicated to us has been itself a stumbling-block to some, for our Lord has chosen to give His grace by means of material things. In every sacrament there is what is called an outward sign, which represents the inward effect on the soul, but also does actually produce that effect. Thus in Baptism the water, chosen because it shows the purpose of the sacrament in cleansing from sin, itself through the merits of Christ's passion causes the grace to operate on the soul. Again, in Confirmation the oil hallowed by the Bishop, by its being applied to the fore head, works in this way also upon the soul, conferring upon it the gift of strength which in the East is often typified by the produce of the olive. Now to many outside the Church it seems to be a difficulty to suppose that matter can so affect the spirit, yet is it not one of the commonest principles of God's dealing? Especially since the Incarnation, He has often made use of the body or the visible appearance of things to show and to cause His works on earth. In the miracles of the New Testament how often He made use of clay or water or the outstretching of a hand, or nails or spear or a cross. These things are surely in the same fashion, as the Blessed Body that He chose for Himself, a thing of matter, yet, as with our own, the Living Temple of the Holy Spirit, and in His case united hypostatically to the Word of God. The whole tendency of Christian worship and doctrine is to make use of visible things to produce invisible effects. Here, then, also I must realize the material side of the sacraments and see their place in the economy of the Divine Plan. But, above all, I must use them for the saving of my soul. They are the channels which He has chosen for imparting His grace to me. Without them I shall surely perish, but with them I shall become a partaker of His divine nature.

- text taken from Meditations for Layfolk by Father Bede Jarrett, O.P.