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Catholics: a Sacramental People the Church in the 21St Century Center Serves As a Catalyst and a Resource for the Renewal of the Catholic Church in the United States

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Catholics: a Sacramental People the Church in the 21St Century Center Serves As a Catalyst and a Resource for the Renewal of the Catholic Church in the United States spring 2012 a catalyst and resource for the renewal of the catholic church catholics: a sacramental people The Church in the 21st Century Center serves as a catalyst and a resource for the renewal of the Catholic Church in the United States. about the editor from the c21 center director john f. baldovin, s.j., professor of historical and liturgical theology at the aboutBoston theCollege editor School of Theology and Dear Friends: richardMinistry, lennanreceived, ahis priest Ph.D. of in the religious The 2011–12 academic year marks the ninth year since the Church in the 21st Century Diocesestudies from of Maitland-Newcastle Yale University in 1982. in Fr. initiative was established by Fr. William P. Leahy, S.J., president of Boston College. And the Australia,Baldovin is is a professor member of thesystematic New York theologyProvince inof the SchoolSociety ofof TheologyJesus. He current issue of C21 Resources on Catholics: A Sacramental People is the 18th in the series of andhas servedMinistry as at advisor Boston to College, the National where Resources that spans this period. heConference also chairs of theCatholic Weston Bishops’ Jesuit The center was founded in the midst of the clerical sexual abuse crisis that was revealed in Department.Committee on He the studied Liturgy theology and was a atmember the Catholic of the InstituteAdvisory ofCommittee Sydney, Boston and the nation in 2002. C21 was intended to be the University’s response to this crisis theof the University International of Oxford, Commission and the on and set as its mission the goals of becoming a catalyst and resource for the renewal of the UniversityEnglish in theof Innsbruck, Liturgy. He from was whichpresident Catholic Church by focusing on four focal issues: heof theobtained North hisAmerican doctorate. Academy Among of his handing on the faith; publishedLiturgy from works 1990 are: to 1991,The Ecclesiology of the of relationships and sexuality in the Catholic Church; Societas Liturgica from 1999 to 2001, Karl Rahner (Oxford University Press, roles and relationships in the Church; and 1995)and of and the RiskingInternational the Church: Jungmann The the Catholic intellectual tradition. ChallengesSociety for ofJesuits Catholic and Faith the Liturgy(Oxford 2008 Universityto 2010. Fr. Press, Baldovin 2004). also He serves is also on the In the past nine years, the center has sponsored 350 on-campus events, welcomed to campus Board of Trustees of the College of the a former president of the Australian 400 prominent scholars and Church leaders, drawn 50,000 participants to its programs, CatholicHoly Cross Theological and of Fairfield Association. University. created a robust website with hundreds of thousands of visitors, distributed C21 Resources He has published and lectured widely. His most recent books are Reforming the to 160,000 readers twice a year on topics important to the Catholic community, established Liturgy: A Response to the Critics (2008) a book series that currently includes 10 volumes, and developed a presence in the world and Bread of Life, Cup of Salvation: of social media on Facebook, YouTube, and even a C21 app. With the continuing generous Understanding the Mass (2003). support of the president’s office and the rich collaborations the center has established with departments and schools throughout the University, we have no intention of slowing down. This issue of C21 Resources follows the fall issue that focused on the Eucharist by exploring how Catholics are essentially a sacramental people. We have the good fortune to have as guest advisory board editor Fr. John F. Baldovin, S.J., professor of historical and liturgical theology in the Boston Jonas Barciauskas College School of Theology and Ministry. Fr. Baldovin edited the Fall Resources, one of our Ben Birnbaum most popular issues, and with minimal persuasion agreed to edit the current issue. We are Thomas H. Groome Fr. Robert Imbelli most grateful for his expertise and generosity. Thomas J. Massaro, S.J. We hope that you find Catholics: A Sacramental People an illuminating and inspiring Robert Newton experience. Barbara Radtke Jacqueline Regan Sincerely, C21 Resources, a compilation of the best analyses and essays on key challenges facing the Church today, is published Robert R. Newton by the Church in the 21st Century Cen- Interim Director, Church in the 21st Century Center ter at Boston College, in partnership Special Assistant to the President with the publications from which the featured articles have been selected. To learn more, please contact: the church in the 21st century center boston college 110 college road, heffernan house chestnut hill, massachusetts 02467 © 2012 Trustees of Boston College bc.edu/church21 2 the in the 21 spring 2012 catholics: a sacramental people contents sacraments in general anointing of the sick catholics: a sacramental people 2 Anointing as Pastoral-Sacramental by John F. Baldovin, S.J. Ministry to the Sick 13 by Bruce T. Morrill, S.J. What Makes Us Catholic: The Sacremental Principle 4 by Thomas H. Groome A Changed Sacrament with Many Graces 18 by Barbara Beckwith The Blessing of a Latino/a Religious Worldview 5 by Nancy Pineda-Madrid penance Sacraments: The Road Back to Christ 7 Why Go to Confession? 20 by David Farina Turnbloom by John F. Baldovin, S.J. baptism How Do You Go to Confession? 21 by Kurt Stasiak, O.S.B. Pope Benedict XVI: From Homily on the “Feast of the Baptism of the Lord” 8 Liturgies of Reconciliation 23 Infant Baptism and Adult Faith by Bernard J. Cooke by Michael Drumm 9 marriage confirmation The Sacrament of Marriage 25 The Missionary Nature of Confirmation 10 by Michael Lawler and William Roberts by Marc B. Caron A Promised Lifetime 27 Confirmation: A Sacrament in Search of a Theology 11 by Colleen Campion by Owen F. Cummings Faithful Love 29 by Melinda Brown Donovan christian funeral Naming the Shadows 30 by Michael A. King Life Is Changed, Not Ended 31 by Catherine Dooley, O.P. update calendar 16–17 on the cover In 1999 artist John Nava was commissioned by the Archdiocese of Los Angeles to create three major cycles of tapestries for the new Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels. The cover image is one of those tapestries and is a depiction of Jesus being baptized by St. John the Baptist in the River Jordan. This tapestry is forty seven and a half feet high and seven feet wide. Used with Permission, Copyright 2003, John Nava/The Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels w w w . b c . e d u / c h u r c h 21 1 Catholics: A Sacramental People john f. baldovin, s.j. “The world is charged with the grandeur of God.” he first line of Gerard Manley Hopkins’s Moreover, a number of 20th-century Catholic theologians poem (printed in full on the opposite (especially Karl Rahner, S.J. and Edward Schillibeeckx, O.P.) page) is a fine starting point for considering helped us to recover the idea that in a fundamental way the importance of sacraments and Christ is THE sacrament of God and that the Church is the sacramentality for Catholics. The best primary sacrament of Christ in the world. It’s on this basis Tof our Catholic tradition has always shown an immense that we can understand the seven sacraments of the Church respect for and appreciation of the goodness of God’s as genuine engagements with Christ through his Church. creation. Put simply, we don’t believe that it’s necessary Each of the individual sacraments helps us to encounter the to flee the world and created things to encounter God. Incarnate Lord Jesus and to enter into the effects of his saving On the contrary, because of the goodness of creation and passion, death, and resurrection in a different way. It’s been especially because God chose to commit him irrevocably said, and quite correctly I think, that we better understand to humankind and our created world in the Incarnation, the sacraments as verbs than as nouns. In other words, they we believe that God encounters us through what He has are the actions of the Risen Lord transforming us more made. Put another way, God doesn’t communicate His life and more into His Body. This is a fine way to appreciate to us despite our created, physical, human condition but our participation in Christ’s returning creation back to the precisely in the midst of it. Father by our common participation in His priesthood. This 2 b o s t o n c o l l e g e | c 21 r e s o u r c e s | s p r i n g 2012 sacrament w w w . b c . e d u / c h u r c h 21 3 is the Church’s fundamental priesthood, which is served by pastoral care. In other words, they are ideally not so much the ordained priesthood (the subject of the spring 2011 issue discreet moments as they are high points of a process of of C21 Resources). Hence the central importance of baptism Christian life. which makes us a part of the common priesthood. The final two sacraments are called “sacraments at the The Catechism of the Catholic Church pointedly does service of communion.” Holy orders and holy matrimony, not take a one-size-fits-all approach to the sacraments. each in its own way, help to build up the Christian Instead, it presents them in three groupings. The first is community by incarnating God’s service to us (holy orders) sacraments of initiation. This group includes baptism, and God’s love for the world (marriage). Each of these confirmation, and the Eucharist. Note that this is the sacraments is realized more in being lived out than simply original sequence of Christian initiation, which has now in the ceremonies that initiate them.
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