By
Cindy Wooden
Catholic News Service
VATICAN CITY — Catholics must believe in the real presence of Jesus
in the Eucharist, celebrate the liturgy with devotion and live in a way
that demonstrates their faith, Pope Benedict XVI writes, in an apostolic
exhortation released this month.
“The celebration and worship of the Eucharist enable us to draw
near to God’s love and to persevere in that love,” the Pope
says in “Sacramentum Caritatis” (“Sacrament of Charity”)
which was made public Tuesday, March 13.
The 131-page document is a papal reflection on discussions and suggestions
made during the 2005 world Synod of Bishops on the Eucharist.
When Jesus instituted the Eucharist at the Last Supper, He did not simply
thank God for the ways He had acted throughout history to save people,
the Pope says in the document. Rather, he says, Jesus revealed that He
was the sacrifice that would bring salvation to fulfillment.
“The institution of the Eucharist demonstrates how Jesus’
death, for all its violence and absurdity, became in him a supreme act
of love and mankind’s definitive deliverance from evil,” Pope
Benedict wrote.
In celebrating the Eucharist, he said, “the Church is able to celebrate
and adore the mystery of Christ,” who is present in the bread and
wine through the power of the Holy Spirit.
In his exhortation, Pope Benedict makes several specific suggestions for
further study and for celebrating the Mass in the Latin rite:
• While he encourages wider knowledge and use of the Mass prayers
in Latin and of Gregorian chant, he also repeats the synod’s affirmation
of the “beneficial influence” of the liturgical changes made
by the Second Vatican Council on the life of the Church.
At the same time, he also endorses the synod’s suggestion that at
Masses with a large, international congregation, the liturgy be celebrated
in Latin, “with the exception of the readings, the homily and the
prayer of the faithful.”
• He encourages bishops’ conferences, in collaboration with
the Vatican, to examine their practices for the order and timing of the
sacraments of Christian initiation: baptism, confirmation and the Eucharist.
The three sacraments are administered together for infants and adults
in many of the Eastern Churches, and for adults joining the Latin rite.
In the Latin rite, children are usually baptized as infants, receive first
holy Communion around the age of 7, and are confirmed several years later.
“It needs to be seen which practice better enables the faithful
to put the sacrament of the Eucharist at the center, as the goal of the
whole process of initiation,” the Pope says.
• In expressing his concern for the number of Catholics unable to
receive Communion because of irregular marital situations, Pope Benedict
confirms Church teaching that those who have been divorced and civilly
remarried without having obtained an annulment are not to receive Communion.
However, the Pope encourages bishops to make sure they have fully trained
and staffed marriage tribunals to deal with annulment requests “in
an expeditious manner.”
• He says the sign of peace at Mass “has great value,”
especially in demonstrating the Church’s responsibility to pray
for peace and unity in a world too often troubled by division, violence
and hatred.
While Catholics at Mass should exchange a sign of peace with those near
them, he also calls for “greater restraint” to ensure the
moment does not become one of irreparable distraction.
The Pope says: “I have asked the competent curial offices to study
the possibility of moving the sign of peace to another place [in the Mass]
such as before the presentation of the gifts at the altar. To do so would
also serve as a significant reminder of the Lord’s insistence that
we be reconciled with others before presenting our gifts to God.”
• The Pope also says the Church should consider providing new texts
for the rite of dismissal at the end of Mass, so that Catholics understand
better the connection between what they have just celebrated and the fact
that they are sent out in a mission to bring God’s love and truth
to the world.
• Pope Benedict says in order to help Catholics “believe,
celebrate and live ever more fully the mystery of the Eucharist,”
several Vatican offices are preparing a compendium of texts, prayers and
explanations of Church teaching on the Eucharist and on the Eucharistic
prayers used at Mass.
• He calls for a general improvement in the quality of homilies,
and says bishops have a particular responsibility to ensure that the liturgies
they celebrate provide an example for the whole diocese of a liturgy celebrated
with dignity, beauty and fidelity to the approved rites.
• The Pope asks Catholics to pay more attention to how their postures
and gestures at Mass communicate their faith in the Eucharist, particularly
by “kneeling during the central moments of the Eucharistic prayer.”
“Amid the legitimate diversity of signs used in the context of different
cultures, everyone should be able to experience and express the awareness
that at each celebration we stand before the infinite majesty of God,
who comes to us in the lowliness of the sacramental signs,” he says.
• As for Church architecture, Pope Benedict encourages parishes
to make sure their facilities are fully accessible to people with disabilities,
and that the tabernacle containing the Blessed Sacrament is “readily
visible to everyone entering the Church. …
“In Churches which do not have a Blessed Sacrament chapel and where
the high altar with its tabernacle is still in place, it is appropriate
to continue to use this structure for the reservation and adoration of
the Eucharist,” the Pope says.
“In new Churches, it is good to position the Blessed Sacrament chapel
close to the sanctuary; where this is not possible, it is preferable to
locate the tabernacle in the sanctuary, in a sufficiently elevated place,”
he says.
However, the Pope says, the “final judgment on these matters belongs
to the diocesan bishop.”
In his letter, Pope Benedict also formally reaffirms the obligation of
celibacy for priests in the Latin rite and the fact that, in most cases,
Catholics and other Christians should not share the Eucharist, which is
a sign of full unity in faith.
He reminds Catholics of the obligation to be in a “state of grace,”
free from serious sin, before receiving Communion, and of the fact that
by receiving Communion they are publicly proclaiming their unity with
the teaching of the Church.
“Respect for human life, its defense from conception to natural
death, the family built upon marriage between a man and a woman, the freedom
to educate one’s children and the promotion of the common good in
all its forms … are not negotiable,” he says.
Politicians and lawmakers must introduce and support laws inspired by
those values, the Pope says.
He states: "Bishops are bound to reaffirm constantly these values
as part of their responsibility to the flock entrusted to them.”
But the Pope does not mention his position on whether bishops should declare
publicly that they would withhold Communion from a politician who does
not fully accept Church teaching.
At the Vatican press conference presenting the document, Italian Cardinal
Angelo Scola of Venice was asked what the Papal position is on that issue.
“He does not want to say that which he does not say,” the
cardinal responded.
In the exhortation, the cardinal said, the Pope reminds bishops that they
must call all Catholics, particularly politicians, to coherence of faith
and action, “but he cannot substitute himself for the pastoral prudence
of the bishop.”
The complete text of the Pope’s post-synodal apostolic exhortation
can be found at: www.vatican.va/holy_father/benedict_xvi/apost_exhortations/documents/hf_ben-xvi_exh_20070222_
sacramentum-caritatis_en.html.