4/3/2022

It two weeks, we will celebrate Easter. Normally numbers attending Mass are up, and some of the people we see in church seem to come mainly on this feast and on Christmas. I would like to suggest that we welcome those who come whoever they may be, regulars or not. Reflect on the reception that the father gave his prodigal son in last week’s gospel, and try to live in that same space. Comments like, “Haven’t seen you in a while!” or “Did you get lost?” or “Where have you been?” don’t come from the New Creation in which the father dwelt. While I don’t expect you to wrap your arms around them as the father did to his prodigal son, I would like everyone who comes here to feel welcome – including you and all our regulars. The community will grow if we can treasure each faithful member, those who struggle to be faithful, and any newcomers who happen to drop in on a given weekend. Thank you for your perseverance, for your generosity, for your commitment to this community. As Christ’s disciples, we are building a New Creation. The “anniversary” of the “Big Bang” of that New Creation is the Resurrection which we celebrate on April 17th this year. Having prepared for 40 days for this feast, let us celebrate this wonderful feast, and welcome all those who come to celebrate with us.
The next question is about the difference between sacraments and sacramentals. Sacraments are the seven specific acts which Christ gave to the Church to carry on His ministry. They are signs which give grace. Sacramentals (the word means ‘little sacraments’) are less important, but are meant to help prepare us for the reception of sacraments and to appreciate the sacraments we already have received. They serve the purpose of disposing people to receive grace and to cooperate with the grace we receive. Sacramentals are often things or actions which are blessed. Examples of sacramentals would be the Sign of the Cross which simultaneously reminds us of the Trinity and the Cross, two realities at the heart of our creation and redemption; holy water which reminds us of baptism, of repentance associated with baptism in adults; medals, which remind us of holy people or the cross or whatever is on them; statues or images (icons) of key moments from the gospel or from history where God’s presence was keenly felt, or of people whose holiness inspires us. When we say that sacramentals are “blessed,” we mean that the Church invokes God’s protection and favor to make them holy or set aside and consecrated for the special purpose of communicating God’s grace to us. Once something has been “blessed,” the blessing cannot be sold and the object is set aside as “holy.” The danger with sacramentals is that one can be perceived to worship them, and not the God they are intended to honor and bring us closer to. We treat blessed statues of Mary or the saints or Jesus as holy objects, and some people misunderstand our reverence as being for the object, and not for the person that the object represents. It is incumbent upon us to distinguish the statue from the person we are honoring, and allow the person we are honoring to lead us to God. Our devotion to Mary or to St. Joseph or another saint should not be misconstrued to be worship – only God is to be worshipped. The incarnation has made it possible to use material things to represent the spiritual realities, and so there is the double meaning of the physical presence or appearance of the object (statue, medal, etc.) and the spiritual reality of that which is represented. We humans are both physical and spiritual, so have a dual nature, and sacramentals allow physical creation to communicate/make visible the spiritual graces which we receive and are reminded of through the sacramentals. I hope that was not too confusing.

Father Albert, O.S.B.