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The Liturgy, Work of the Trinity/2: God the Son (CCC 1084-1090)

ROME, FEB. 22, 2012 (Zenit.org).- In the second part of the section on the liturgy as work of the Most Holy Trinity, dedicated to God the Son, the Catechism of the Catholic Church presents the essential elements of the sacramental doctrine. Christ, risen and glorified, pouring out the Holy Spirit upon his Body which is the Church, now acts in the sacraments and through them communicates his grace. The Catechism recalls the classic definition of the sacraments, which are: 1) perceptible signs (words and actions); 2) instituted by Christ; 3) which make present efficaciously the grace that they signify (n. 1084). In the celebration of the sacraments, that is, in the sacred liturgy, Christ, in the power of the Holy Spirit, signifies and realizes the Paschal mystery of his Passion, Death on the Cross and Resurrection. This mystery does not consist simply in a series of events of the remote past (even if the historicity of those events cannot be overlooked!), but enters the dimension of eternity, because the actor that is, He who acted and suffered in those events was the Word incarnate. Because of this, the Paschal mystery of Christ embraces all times and is being made present in them all (n. 1085) through the sacraments that He himself entrusted to his Church, especially the Eucharistic sacrifice. This singular gift was given first to the Apostles, when the Risen One, in the power of the Holy Spirit, conferred on them his power of sanctification. In turn, the Apostles conferred this power on their Successors, the Bishops, and in this way the goods of salvation are transmitted and actualized in the sacramental life of the people of God until the Parousia, when the Lord will come in glory to fulfill the Kingdom of God. Thus the apostolic succession ensures that, in the celebration of the sacraments, the faithful are immersed in communion with Christ, who blesses them with the gift of his salvific love, especially in the Eucharist where He offers himself under the appearance of bread and wine. Sacramental participation in the life of Christ is a specific way, given in the rite, which, in 2004, the then Cardinal Ratzinger explained as the form of celebration and prayer that matures in the faith and life of the Church. The rite or the family of rites that come from the Churches of apostolic origin is a condensed form of the living Tradition [], thus rendering experimental , at the same time, communion between the generations and communion with those who pray before us and after us. Thus the rite is a gift made to the Church, a living form of paradosis [tradition] (30 giorni, nr. 12 2004). Referring to the teaching of the conciliar Constitution on the sacred liturgy, the Catechism recalls the various ways of the presence of Christ in the liturgical actions. In the first place, the Lord is present in the Eucharistic Sacrifice in the person of the ordained minister, because having offered Himself once on the cross, He now offers himself through the ministry of priests [Council of Trent], and especially under the Eucharistic species. Moreover, Christ is present with his virtue in the sacraments, in his word when Sacred Scripture is proclaimed and, finally, when the members of the Church, beloved Bride of Christ, are gathered in his name for prayer and praise (cf. n. 1088; Sacrosanctum Concilium, n. 7). In fact, the earthly celebration, whether in the splendor of one of the great cathedrals or in more simple but worthy places, participates in the heavenly liturgy of the New Jerusalem and gives a foretaste of the future glory in the presence of the living God. This dynamism confers on the liturgy its grandeur, it prevents the individual community from being enclosed within itself and opens it to the assembly of the Saints of the heavenly city, as evoked in the Letter to the Hebrews: But you have come to Mount Zion and to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to innumerable angels in festal gathering, and to the assembly of the first-born who are enrolled in heaven, and to a judge who is God of all, and to the spirits of just men made perfect, and to Jesus, the mediator of a new covenant, and to the sprinkled blood that speaks more graciously than the blood of Abel (Hebrews 12:22-24).
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It seems appropriate, therefore, to conclude these brief reflections with the happy words of Blessed Cardinal Ildefonso Schuster, who described the liturgy as a sacred poem, which heaven and earth have truly set about. *** *Father Uwe Michael Lang, C.O., is an Official of the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments and Consultor of the Office of Liturgical Celebrations of the Supreme Pontiff.
On the 40 Days of Lent "Time Spent in the Desert Can Be Transformed Into a Time of Grace"

Dear brothers and sisters, In this Catechesis, I would like to reflect briefly upon the season of Lent, which begins today with the Liturgy of Ash Wednesday. It is a journey of 40 days that will lead us to the Easter Triduum -- the memorial of the Lords Passion, Death and Resurrection, the heart of the mystery of our salvation. In the first centuries of the Churchs life, this was the time when those who had heard and received the announcement of Christ began, step by step, their journey of faith and conversion on the way to receiving the sacrament of Baptism. It was a time of drawing near to the living God and an initiation into the faith, which was gradually to be accomplished through an inner transformation on the part of the catechumens; that is, on the part of those who desired to become Christians and to be incorporated into Christ and the Church. Later on, also penitents and then all the faithful were invited to live out this journey of spiritual renewal and to increasingly conform their own lives to Christs. The participation of the entire community in the various stages of the Lenten journey underlines an important dimension of Christian spirituality: It is the redemption not of some, but of all, made possible thanks to the death and resurrection of Christ. For this reason, both those who were making the journey of faith as catechumens in order to receive Baptism, as well as those who had distanced themselves from God and from the community of faith and who were seeking reconciliation, and also those who were living the faith in full communion with the Church -- everyone together knew that the time preceding Easter was a time of metanoia; that is, of a change of heart, of penance. It is the season that identifies our human life and all of history as a process of conversion set in motion now so as to meet the Lord at the end of time. Using an expression that has become customary in the Liturgy, the Church calls the season we have entered today Lent; that is, the season of 40 days; and with a clear reference to Sacred Scripture, she thereby introduces us into a precise spiritual context. Forty, in fact, is the symbolic number that the Old and New Testaments use to represent the salient moments in the life and faith of Israel. It is a number that expresses the time of waiting, of purification, of return to the Lord, of knowledge that God is faithful to His promises. This number does not represent an exact chronological period of time, marked by the sum of its days. Rather, it indicates a patient perseverance, a long trial, a sufficient length of time to witness the works of God and a time when it is necessary to decide to accept ones responsibilities without further delay. It is a time for mature decisions. The number 40 first appears in the story of Noah. This just man, on account of the flood, spends 40 days and 40 nights in the ark, together with his family and the animals that God had told him to take with him. And he waits another 40 days, after the flood, before touching down upon dry land, saved from destruction (cf. Genesis 7:4,12; 8:6). Then, the next stage: Moses remains on Mount Sinai, in the presence of the Lord, for 40 days and 40 nights, to receive the Law. He fasts the entire time (cf. Exodus 24:18). For 40 years, the Hebrew people journey from Egypt to the Promised Land, a fitting time to experience the faithfulness of God. And you shall
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remember all the way which the Lord your God has led you these forty years in the wilderness your clothing did not wear out upon you, and your foot did not swell, these forty years, Moses says in Deuteronomy at the end of the 40 years of migration (Deuteronomy 8:2,4). The years of peace Israel enjoys under the Judges are 40 (cf. Judges 3:11,30); but once this time has passed, they begin to forget Gods gifts and to return to sin. The prophet Elijah takes 40 days to reach Horeb, the mountain where he encounters God (cf. 1 Kings 19:8). For 40 days, the inhabitants of Ninevah do penance in order to obtain Gods pardon (cf. Genesis 3:4). Forty is also the number of years of the reign of Saul (cf. Acts 13:21), of David (cf. 2 Samuel 5:4-5) and of Solomon (cf. 1 Kings 11:41), the first three kings of Israel. The Psalms also reflect the biblical significance of the 40 years; for example, Psalm 95, the passage we just heard: O that today you would hearken to His voice! Harden not your hearts, as at Meribah, as on the day at Massah in the wilderness, when your fathers tested me, and put me to the proof, though they had seen my work. For forty years I loathed that generation and said, They are a people who err in heart, and they do not regard my ways (verses. 7c-10). In the New Testament, before beginning His public ministry, Jesus retires into the desert for 40 days, neither eating nor drinking (cf. Matthew 4:2); His nourishment is the Word of God, which He uses as a weapon to conquer the devil. The temptations of Jesus recall those which the Jewish people faced in the desert, but which they were unable to overcome. For 40 days, the Risen Jesus instructs His disciples before ascending into Heaven and sending the Holy Spirit (cf. Acts 1:3). With the recurring number of 40, a spiritual atmosphere is described which remains relevant and valid. And the Church, precisely through these days of Lent, intends to preserve their enduring value and to make their efficacy present for us. The Christian Liturgy during Lent seeks to promote a path of spiritual renewal in light of this long biblical experience, above all for the sake of learning to imitate Jesus, who during the 40 days He spent in the desert, taught us to conquer temptation with the Word of God. The 40 years of Israels wandering in the desert presents ambivalent attitudes and situations. On the one hand, it is the season of first love with God, and between God and His people, when He speaks to their hearts, pointing out to them the path to follow. God, as it were, had taken up His abode with Israel; He went before them in a cloud and a column of fire; each day, He provided for their nourishment by making manna descend from the heavens and by making water gush forth from the rock. Therefore, the years Israel passed in the desert can be seen as the time of their being especially chosen by God and of their clinging to Him: the time of first love. On the other hand, the Bible also portrays another image of Israels wandering in the desert: It is also the time of the greatest temptation and peril, when Israel murmurs against her God and wishes to return to paganism and to build her own idols, out of the need she feels to worship a God who is closer and more tangible. It is also the time of rebellion against the great and invisible God. This ambivalence, a time of special closeness to God -- the time of first love -- as well as a time of temptation -the temptation to return to paganism -- we surprisingly rediscover in Jesus earthy sojourn; naturally, however, without any compromise with sin. After His baptism of penance in the Jordan -- when He takes upon Himself the destiny of Gods Servant, who renounces himself and lives for others and takes his place among sinners in order to take upon himself the sin of the world -- Jesus goes into the desert and remains there for 40 days in profound union with the Father, thus repeating the history of Israel, all the rhythms of the 40 days or years I mentioned. This dynamic is a constant during the earthly life of Jesus, who always seeks moments of solitude in order to pray to His Father and to remain in intimate communion, in intimate solitude with Him, in exclusive communion with Him, then to return among the people. But in this time of desert and of special encounter with the Father, Jesus is exposed to danger and is assailed by temptation and the seduction of the Evil One, who proposes another Messianic way, one distant from Gods design, for it passes by way of power, success, and
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domination and not by way of the total gift of the Cross. These are the alternatives: a Messianism of power, of success, or a Messianism of love, of self-gift. This situation of ambivalence also characterizes the condition of the Church as she journeys in the desert of the world and of history. In this desert, we who believe certainly have the opportunity to have a profound experience of God, who strengthens the spirit, confirms faith, nourishes hope and inspires charity. It is an experience that makes us sharers in Christs victory over sin and death through His Sacrifice of love on the Cross. But the desert is also a negative aspect of the reality that surrounds us: aridity; the poverty of words of life and values; secularism and cultural materialism, which enclose people within the worldly horizons of an existence bereft of all reference to the transcendent. This is also the environment in which even heaven above us is obscured, for it is covered by the clouds of egoism, misunderstanding and deception. Despite this, also for the Church today, time spent in the desert can be transformed into a time of grace, for we have the certainty that God can make the living water that quenches thirst and brings refreshment gush forth even from the hardest rock. Dear brothers and sisters, we can find in these 40 days that lead us to the Easter of Resurrection the renewed hope that enables us to accept every difficulty, affliction and trial with patience and with faith, in the knowledge that out of the darkness the Lord will make a new day to dawn. And if we have been faithful to Jesus by following Him along the way of the Cross, the radiant world of God, the world of light, of truth and of joy will be restored to us: It will be the new dawn created by God Himself. I wish a blessed journey of Lent to you all! [Translation by Diane Montagna] [In English, he said:] Dear Brothers and Sisters, Today the Church celebrates Ash Wednesday, the beginning of her Lenten journey towards Easter. The entire Christian community is invited to live this period of forty days as a pilgrimage of repentance, conversion and renewal. In the Bible, the number forty is rich in symbolism. It recalls Israels journey in the desert, a time of expectation, purification and closeness to the Lord, but also a time of temptation and testing. It also evokes Jesus own sojourn in the desert at the beginning of his public ministry, a time of profound closeness to the Father in prayer, but also of confrontation with the mystery of evil. The Churchs Lenten discipline is meant to help deepen our life of faith and our imitation of Christ in his paschal mystery. In these forty days may we draw nearer to the Lord by meditating on his word and example, and conquer the desert of our spiritual aridity, selfishness and materialism. For the whole Church may this Lent be a time of grace in which God leads us, in union with the crucified and risen Lord, through the experience of the desert to the joy and hope brought by Easter. *** I greet all the English-speaking visitors present at todays Audience, especially those from England, Belgium, Norway, Canada and the United States. I offer a special welcome to the faithful of the Personal Ordinariate of Our Lady of Walsingham on the occasion of their pilgrimage to the See of Peter. I greet the pilgrim group from the Diocese of Antwerp, and I thank the choirs for their praise of God in song. With prayerful good wishes for a spiritually fruitful Lent, I invoke upon all of you Gods abundant blessings! Copyright 2012 - Libreria Editrice Vaticana [In Italian, he said:]
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Lastly I greet young people, the sick and newlyweds. Lent is a favorable time to intensify your spiritual life: may the practice of fasting help you, dear young people, to acquire an ever greater self-mastery; may prayer be for you, dear sick, the means of entrusting your sufferings to God and of feeling Him always near; finally, may the works of mercy help you, dear newlyweds, to live your married life open to the needs of your brothers and sisters. A blessed Lent to you all!

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