What Religious Liberty?
The Incredible Ever-Expanding Dead End
Anti-Cure, Anti-Life
Whose Values in
Education?
Toppling
Dominos
Anti-Christians
don't have to be Hypocrites but Many Volunteer
Intolerant Tolerance
The Emperor's
Clothes or a Cheap Tuxedo
The Myth of
Hitler's Pope, Part I
The Myth of
Hitler's Pope, Part II
Embryonic
Stem Cell Research Again
The Madness of
Secularism
"Don't Impose Your
Religion on Me"
Dictatorship of Relativism
Two Babies at Christmas
Living Will or Death
Warrant?
Court Ordered
Slow Motion Torture-Death Sentence
Men in Black
A Lot of Hot Air
The Culture War
Battles
"Stay with us, Lord"
Secular-to-English Dictionary
Moral Guidance for
Catholics in this Election
Christians
Losing America
Stem Cell Wars
Catholic
Pro-Abortion Politicians and Communion
Useful Idiots
Who Killed Jesus?
A Primer on Gay
Marriage
Whose Side are You
on?
Vouchers Revisited
Real and Fake
Cloning Bans
Broken Compasses
No Room in the Inn
Killing Fields
Revisited
Gay but not Merry
Adam and Steve?
The Battle for the Court
Victimless Crimes
More Salt, Please
The Next Big Fight
When Religion
Becomes Evil
Virginity Making a Comeback?
You've Come a Long Way,
Baby
The Incarnational
Approach
The Many Meanings of ACLU
Things Your Media Never Told
You
A Nasty Little Secret
Two Points of View on the Birth of Jesus
You Gotta Kill Them. How Else
Are They Going To Learn?
Perplexing Christmas Questions
How Do You See Christ Today?
Now that there is Another Ewe, will there be
Another You?
What is Conscience Anyhow?
Divorce of Love and Life
What Counts as a Mass?
What is a Covenant?
I Wish I had Your Faith
Are there Too Many Decrees of
Nullity?
Dutch Treats
Ecumenism
Going from Baby Doe to Granny Doe
Comments of Evangelium Vitae
The Exception Corrupts the Rule
Good Morality or
Good Medicine
Generation-X'ers Smart in Every Way But
One
A Matter of Good Breeding
Herod and Pontius Pilate at the
Polls
Hitler's Pope or Righteous Gentile?
The Unknown God
What exactly is wrong with
homosexuality?
Ideology Trumps Science, Reality,
and Common Sense
What Exactly is an Indulgence?
Infallibility and Error in the Church
Pilate Asked, "What is Truth?"
The Truth about Families
New Killing Fields
Choice of Language and Language of
Choice
A Lexicon for Our Day
Why are there so many bodies?
Marijuana, Medicine or Menace?
Medical Research and Ethics
Meditation
"You Taught me well,
Mommie dearest"
Moral Fallout
Neutral on the Wrong
Side
"These are the
Nineties After All"
Many are Wed but Few
are Married
"...Prepare him for
additional obligations"
A Useful Lie
A Partridge in a
Pear Tree
Religious Persecution in
the U.S.?
What Makes a Person a
Person?
The Point of a Point of
View
Politically Correct,
Morally Depraved
Population
Controllers out of Control
Practical Dreamers
Social Progress
through Immorality
Shall we Do Evil for
Goodness Sake?
Reason and Faith
Resurrection Glory
Same Sex Marriages?
Pearl of Great Price
"I used to be
schizophrenic, but we're all right now"
Sexual Morality
Irrelevant in Judging Public Officials?
Undesirable Side Effects
Some News is Good News
SOSSLQ's, not POSSLQ's
Spoils of Splits
Why Attend Mass
Every Sunday?
Is it All Right to Pull
the Plug?
An Appeal for Intolerance
Topics Catechetical
A Voting Catechism
A Moral Guide to
Voting
Vouchers: Has Their Time Come?
What Child is This?
What did they die of?
You are the Man
You may be a liberal
if...
Get Rid of that Worthless
Relative
Planned Un-Parenthood
Weighing Pro-Life Issues
Prior to Voting
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by Monsignor James C. Brunner |
Faith Points |
What Counts as a Mass?
When I was a boy, a very long time ago, we learned in our catechism lessons that the essential parts of the Mass were the offertory, consecration, and communion. We were told that to fulfill our obligation to attend Mass on Sundays and holy days we had to be present for those parts. As a result some made a fine art of arriving at church at the end of the creed just in time for what we then called the offertory. They skipped the scriptural readings and the homily, which, although it was wrong, were not considered as essential as the rest of the Mass.
In our day we look upon that theology as defective and inaccurate. We have a renewed awareness that there is a close connection between the liturgy of the Word and the liturgy of the eucharist that we are not to break. In apostolic days the liturgy of the Word was an integral part of the Lord’s Supper. This we can gather from Acts 20:7-12 where Paul during a eucharistic celebration preached a sermon that lasted until midnight. (Some in our day think that the sermons are long, but no priest that I know would dare preach from supper to midnight.) The whole Mass is not just the liturgy of the Eucharist but also the liturgy of the Word. The Instruction on the Worship of the Eucharistic Mystery orders: "Pastors should therefore ‘carefully teach the faithful to participate in the whole Mass’ showing the close connection between the liturgy of the Word and the celebration of the Lord’s Supper, so that they can see clearly how the two constitute a single act of worship…It is the purpose of the liturgy of the Word to develop the close connection between the preaching and hearing of the Word of the liturgy of the Word of God and the eucharistic mystery…. Thus the Church is nourished by the bread of life which she finds at the table both of the Word of God and of the Body of Christ." The word of God prepares for the celebration of the sacrament and the sacrament makes real the word of God.
In the liturgy of the Word we find the listening Church. Caesarius of Arles wrote, "The word of Christ is no less than the body of Christ." Ambrose stated, "One drinks Christ from the cup of the scripture as well as from the eucharistic cup." The liturgy of the Word is not a prelude or preamble to the sacramental celebration but is also a communion with the Word. Origen insisted on the necessity of eating the Word under the appearances of scripture as the road to the eating of the body and blood of Christ. The gesture of standing for the reading of the gospel is a sign that the people recognize and acknowledge the presence of Christ speaking to them. The liturgy of the Word is the choicest place for the faithful to be formed in their common faith in Christ through the work of the Holy Spirit. The word of God is a sign of the salvation history that is occurring here and now in the liturgy. The celebration of the word of God in the liturgy is the actualization of the salvation announced by it. The word of God announces the history of salvation and the celebration of the word in the liturgy makes real the mystery of salvation contained and transmitted in it and by it. Christ is proclaimed in the liturgy of the Word and Christ becomes the reality proclaimed and communicated by the liturgy. The scriptures that reveal salvation are completed in the liturgy.
In the Old Testament the word of God announced and brought into realty the liberation of Israel and converted it into the People of God. For all the more reason in the New Testament the word of God should be allowed to liberate and bring into reality the new People of God. Listening to the word of Jesus particularly as he speaks in the liturgy, the official worship of the Body of Christ, the Church, is a cause of eternal life. "Amen, amen, I say to you, whoever hears my word and believes in the one who sent me has eternal life and will not come to condemnation, but has passed from death to life" (John 5:24). From the book of Exodus we learn that the Israelites became God’s Chosen People after they listened to an explanation of the Law and promised, "All that the Lord has said, we will heed and do" (Exodus 24:7). The covenant or contractual arrangement was then sealed with the blood of some animals offered in sacrifice, half of which was sprinkled on the altar representing God, while the other half was sprinkled on the people, the other contracting party. Both the reading of the word of God and the sacrifice were necessary to seal the covenant. Without the reading the Israelites would not have known to what they were committing themselves. Without the sacrifice they would not have sealed the contract. Similarly both word and sacrifice are essential for our weekly renewal of our covenant with Jesus in the liturgy. If we miss the liturgy of the Word we do not know to what we are asked to commit ourselves this week. As word and sacrifice were essential for the Old Covenant, they are essential for the New Covenant. When Jesus accompanied the disciples on their way to Emmaus he first instructed them in the scriptures. Later, at table "he took the bread, said the blessing, broke it and gave it to them" (Luke 24:13-35). In each Sunday liturgy Christians commit themselves to what they have heard in the reading of the scriptures and seal this covenant with Christ’s blood in the sacrifice of the eucharist. It is essential that they be present for both Word and sacrifice since neither would make sense without the other.
What counts as a Mass? The liturgy of the Word and the liturgy of the eucharist. To fulfill the obligation of Mass attendance Catholics should participate in both.
