Why is it wrong to discuss whether God Himself cares about which way we receive Him in Holy Communion? Wouldn’t God be the FIRST Person we should consider here? And if it isn’t important to Him, then maybe we should examine why it’s important to us.
Sigh. I keep saying “externals have value.” I just don’t know how much God cares about how well we follow them. For example, we can have a beautifully choreographed TLM where everything is just so, and it is breathtaking to us. But what about God? Does God consider one Mass, or one form of receiving, greater than another? I think he was VERY clear that He considered internals of utmost importance, almost to the exclusion of externals. Can you show me a single example of where Christ spoke otherwise?
Alan
It is the consistent teaching of the Church that a priest, no matter his defect of character, always confects valid Sacraments when he intends to do what the Church does:
“(Priests)…validly perform and confer the Sacraments, provided they make use of the matter and form always observed in the Catholic Church according to the institution of Christ, and provided they intend to do what the Church does in their administration (p. 155).” -Catechism of the Council of Trent
The efficacy (that is to say, the actual quantity of grace) received at the hands of a wicked priest may however, be less than those received from a holy one, but no less valid. The hands of a priest, consecrated at Ordination, have an essential nature such that they will always perform holy Sacraments and indeed be holy when performing that work. The character of the priest is irrelevent because, when giving the Sacraments,
he is Christ, an alter Christus, and Our Lord becomes the actual minister of the Sacrament, not the man performing it. The priest is merely the physical vehicle of Christ’s redemptive work. This is why the holiest saint, if not ordained, can never perform a valid sacrament, because he has not been transformed by grace and election into the alter Christus (another Christ) necessary to make this happen. It is a true, real, and permenant change of nature within a man, which no sin can take away.
I accept you acknowledge externals have value, but perhaps not in the same sense I value them. I believe the externals are true manifestations of the internals within, expressed by action without. Lex Orandi, lex credendi (the Law of Prayer is the law of belief) as people like to quote. I do not defend externals merely for their sake, but rather in their preservation as true and real signs of our inward belief. Christ was specific about private prayer: “But thou, when thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut thy door, pray to thy Father which is in secret; and thy Father which seeth in secret shall reward thee openly.” (St. Matthew 6:6) Again, Our Lord’s intention here was to give instruction of how render prayer from a sincere heart, not merely in observation of formality. The form was an expression of the interior, as in His contrary example: “And when thou prayest, thou shalt not be as the hypocrites are: for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and in the corners of the streets, that they may be seen of men. Verily I say unto you, They have their reward.” (St. Matthew 6:5) The hypocrite’s public prayer was a manifestation of their interior disposition, which exposed their hypocrisy by the very act of doing so. To view traditions as “keeping the institution of the Church together” I believe is to demote them to a very low utilitarian level, and I believe robs them of their actual signifigance in real time.
I addition, I feel that speculating what God “values as important,” aside from what we know in Divine Revelation and from the Church, is a difficult path to start treading down. If the Church tells us a certain form and manner of performance is necessary for the sake of the rite, then She has reasons and I think that to speculate God may perceive them as unimportant or of secondary importance is to suppose for ourselves a level of speculation I do not believe we enjoy. It is stated it is important, and that suffices for us, unless we discover or are told otherwise, in my humble view.
As a parting note, there is one notable example of where God emphasized the externals, where one form of worship was valued over another: The story of Cain and Abel (Genesis 4:1-8) and let not forget the most important external of all: the Eucharist. "…this do ye, as often as you shall drink, for the commemoration of me. (1st St. Paul to the Corinthians 11:25).
Thuswise would I disagree that the Church is machine, and need ever change, for She is a True Body, and Her Living True Life.
