we are liturgical animals, Homo liturgicus
JB on November 17, 2009 in Practices & Experiences, the interpretive - ReligionThis is in response to a Jesus Creed blog post The Age of the Spirit – Sacrament and Mission:
It seems we have learned from anthropology that we are story-tellers and that our intellectual, affective, moral and social growth comes not only from propositional cognition but also from our participatory imagination, our active participation in various narratives.
One could say we are liturgical animals, Homo liturgicus. And this is true whether one practices an explicit faith, implicit faith or no faith at all. And this is true for better and for worse, as our desires are formed, shaped and reinforced by the liturgies of the mall, sports stadia and the marketplace as well as by our worship and fellowship. So, an approach that best articulates our faith (including propositions), best celebrates our hopes and best reinforces our love will, in my view, help us move more swiftly and with less hindrance along our ongoing journeys of transformation, enjoying a life of superabundance. So, I’m thinking there will be some type of sacramental economy in play for all, again, for better or worse, which helps order our orthodoxy, orthopathy and orthopraxy. What that should be, precisely, is another consideration but there certainly will be norms in play.
Even people of implicit faith and no “formal” sacramental access will be realizing life’s most important values of truth, beauty, goodness and unity, in other words, a life of love and abundance (as various semiotic signs and symbols bring into reality what they bring to mind). I don’t view these value-realizations in terms of all or nothing but more so in terms of degrees of fullness of realization of the God-encounter (as well as frustration of). It is said that the God-encounter is a full body-blow (head & heart, body, soul & spirit) and that seems an apt anthropological description.
As for the nature of the soul, however dual or nondual or in-between (hylomorphic), I think it suffices to recognize that our temporal experience is radically integral, which is to recognize that our experience is wholly embodied & wholly ensouled. What happens transtemporally in an eternal realm is nothing God can’t handle insofar as He’s not constrained by our speculative metaphysical constructions.
For more on Homo liturgicus, see this article, Liturgy Forty Years after the Council, written by Cardinal Godfried Danneels, Archbishop of Mechelen-Brussels.
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In my Roman Catholic [RC] tradition, Eucharist is broadly conceived to include 1) meal 2) memorial 3) thanksgiving 4) covenant and 5) presence. All of these sacred realities are further nuanced, of course. For example, presence is then broadly conceived to include Christ present a) as the People gathered b) in the Word broken open c) as represented by a presider and d) in the sacred species.
Perhaps this gives us some room to establish some common ground between traditions although differences in interpretation remain that resist being “nuanced away.” Unfortunately, in my RC tradition, we are yet to overcome a rationalistic overemphasis on various outdated metaphysics, which is unfortunate. The whole transubstantiation issue is grounded in a substance ontology that has very little traction in advancing speculative metaphysics nowadays. For example, not even a process approach or even a substance-process approach, as root metaphors, can help us renormalize gravity and quantum mechanics, which is to recognize that their concepts can not be easily cashed out in terms of any pragmatic value. How, then, do they gain such an inordinate normative impetus in things like church discipline (e.g. gender roles and women’s ordination), moral doctrine (e.g. human sexuality) and sacramental theology (e.g. transubstantiation)? I cannot fathom. Even on the sacred species issue, we could prescind from our robust metaphysic to a more vague semiotic approach and describe presence in terms of tran-SIGN-ification, it seems to me, which could further advance at least our Roman-Anglican dialogue. Maybe with others?
Some form of Eucharist does seem essential, indispensable even, emphasizing one or more of the attributes I listed above, although this might be accomplished in manifold and varied ways. There is a certain irony in the RC literalism re: Eucharist. It seems to be the only scriptural text RC takes literally, while, for some of the more fundamentalistic Protestant traditions, it’s the only one they don’t.
Should one liturgy or set of rituals or practices be prescribed over others as an expression of what Eucharist entails? That position would seem difficult to defend. Such norms would lend themselves to broad conception and liberal interpretation, sensitive to cultural and linguistic pluralisms and suitably enculturated theologies.
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In my Roman Catholic [RC] tradition, Eucharist is broadly conceived to include 1) meal 2) memorial 3) thanksgiving 4) covenant and 5) presence. All of these sacred realities are further nuanced, of course. For example, presence is then broadly conceived to include Christ present a) as the People gathered b) in the Word broken open c) as represented by a presider and d) in the sacred species.
Perhaps this gives us some room to establish some common ground between traditions although differences in interpretation remain that resist being “nuanced away.” Unfortunately, in my RC tradition, we are yet to overcome a rationalistic overemphasis on various outdated metaphysics, which is unfortunate. The whole transubstantiation issue is grounded in a substance ontology that has very little traction in advancing speculative metaphysics nowadays. For example, not even a process approach or even a substance-process approach, as root metaphors, can help us renormalize gravity and quantum mechanics, which is to recognize that their concepts can not be easily cashed out in terms of any pragmatic value. How, then, do they gain such an inordinate normative impetus in things like church discipline (e.g. gender roles and women’s ordination), moral doctrine (e.g. human sexuality) and sacramental theology (e.g. transubstantiation)? I cannot fathom. Even on the sacred species issue, we could prescind from our robust metaphysic to a more vague semiotic approach and describe presence in terms of tran-SIGN-ification, it seems to me, which could further advance at least our Roman-Anglican dialogue. Maybe with others?
Some form of Eucharist does seem essential, indispensable even, emphasizing one or more of the attributes I listed above, although this might be accomplished in manifold and varied ways. There is a certain irony in the RC literalism re: Eucharist. It seems to be the only scriptural text RC takes literally, while, for some of the more fundamentalistic Protestant traditions, it’s the only one they don’t.
Should one liturgy or set of rituals or practices be prescribed over others as an expression of what Eucharist entails? That position would seem difficult to defend. Such norms would lend themselves to broad conception and liberal interpretation, sensitive to cultural and linguistic pluralisms and suitably enculturated theologies.
See my executive summary re: Roman-Anglican Dialogue
This addendum is in response to Fr. Bosco Peters’ blog post: Catholic Spirituality
The criticisms that Father Peter Williams has inventoried match my own critique of Rome, as a loyal dissenter. I suspect that the root cause of Rome’s problems is that it has not yet overcome its rationalistic metaphysics.
Don’t get me wrong. I affirm both metaphysical and moral realisms. I just think that our deontology has to be at least as tentative as our ontology is speculative. And finding a good root metaphor for our highly speculative metaphysics has been extremely problematical (substance vs process vs experience vs semiotic). Bottomline, we need to be more fallibilistic and not persist and even advance into a creeping, even creepy, infallibilism. This epistemically indefensible apodictic certainty pervades our church disciplines (e.g. gender roles, celibacy, women’s ordination), moral doctrines (e.g. human sexuality & procreation) and sacramental theology (e.g. a robustly ontological transubstantiation rather than a more vague semiotic tranSIGNification). There must be some type of invincible ignorance in play (as I eschew a rash judgment of arrogance … sigh)?
But all of the above issues are accidentals, nonessentials. What is essential is our radically incarnational outlook and pervasively sacramental economy fueled by our vivid pneumatological (Holy Spirit) and analogical imaginations. In other words, what Fr. Bosco Peters said, CATHOLIC.
Therefore be it resolved, I am already in full communion with both Rome and Canterbury, at least New Zealand, on essentials, and consider Anglican Catholic – not an oxymoron, but – a redundancy! And it is good to be one with you my dear brothers and sisters! Very good!
Deep peace,
Johnboy
New Orleans