Glory-Speak: The Doxology
2009 Lenten series
Doxology
Almost every Catholic alive today has heard and can even recite the final lines of the Eucharistic prayer: through him, with him, in him, in the unity of the Holy Spirit all glory and honor is yours Almighty Father, forever and ever. Amen.
This final prayer is known as the doxology. Theologically, it is the high point of the Eucharistic prayer because the bread and wine, transubstantiated into the body and blood, soul and divinity, of Jesus Christ and now offered to the Father. It is Christ himself, through the ministry of the priest, who offers Himself to the father. This offering reaches back to Calvary once again. This is the new and eternal sacrifice that takes away the sins of the world. This doxology is followed by what many today now call “the Great Amen.” A couple of months ago, I was going through a few Catholic blogs ad my eye caught a comment from someone who remarked on the musical settings for this great Amen. He wrote, “what’s so great about it anyway?”
Strange, because I think most of us can understand what this offering means. I think even children can figure this one out. After instructing the altar boys in my first Parish how to incense during the consecration, one of them, without instruction or direction, started incensing during the doxology. When I asked him why he did that, he replied, “well, it made sense.” The physical act of lifting the chalice and the host toward heaven said something. The words of the prayer are clearly addressed to the Father in heaven. The chanting of the priests in unison at this point highlight the solemnity of what is happening. And the musical settings to this conclusion of the Eucharist at prayer are a crescendo of the entire action.
This Lent, like many others before it and certainly many after, is that unique period of the year when we attempt to follow in the footsteps of Christ and to what he did on Calvary. We attempt to offer ourselves by offering things up, taking things on, and trying to practice devotion as best we can. This is not an easy thing to do. It is more than just an act of the will to give up doughnuts or chocolate. This is not a competition or a race or a health plan. Our Lenten resolutions too often become like our New Year’s resolutions. So from the outset, let’s try and do this one right. And we can do that best by affirming the central reason for this devotion.
We are here to speak the glory. Doxology comes from two Greek words: doxa meaning glory; logia meaning the word or to speak or to articulate. We speak the glory of God in prayers recited as well as actions and omissions. We do things that are religious in nature and we freely omit things from life as a sacrifice. We take on the discipline of voluntarily going without as well as taking upon ourselves.
Sounds good so far? Of course it does; it’s a very pious thought isn’t it? So now we ask, how?
In these few weeks we are going to consider that. We are going into the desert of Lent to discover that giving God the glory is not a one time deal. We are going to discover the many movements – or at least some of them – at the heart of our prayer which is lifting up our hearts and our minds and our lives to God. And while our practice of Lent may not be perfect our reason for trying is.
May God, who is worthy of all glory, give us the wisdom, courage, and strength to speak his glory.
1. Through him
One of the nagging questions we ask during Lent and at other times of the year is: is there a better way of doing things? We can reasonably say that human beings pursue excellence for many reasons.
For example, we want things to be done well but try and minimize the energy needed to do them. We find the detergent that not only cleans but also sanitizes and moisturizes. We invent cars and engines that run with more power and less fuel. We are people who believe not only that “necessity is the mother of invention”, we believe that we can also be the inventors. And if not the actual creators, we try and find a way to use what has been invented.
And then someone comes along, and makes something better. And after learning and becoming pretty adept at using something, we discover that there is actually an easier way. In other words the pessimist can say there is nothing that isn’t flawed and the optimist can say that we are always discovering new things. Both are true.
When it comes to faith, we are equally creative. And we’ve been doing this since we started scribbling on the walls of a local cave. There is something hardwired into the human being that points to God. And knowing within us that God is perfect and we are not, the human quest has always been a seesaw of raising the human being and lowering the divine being. We try and wrap our minds around God and God tries to wrap his arms around us.
And so man created religion. It was a way to understand the Creator. We opened the channels of communication with the one who willed creation into existence. And it worked. We figured out for ourselves an efficient process and kept God from destroying what He made. We found ways of bargaining with Him, cajoling Him, and even threatening Him to do things the way we wanted. And from the darkened silence of golden idols, we found a way to coexist with God.
But something changed; a better process was offered. No longer would God’s favor be gained by gifts and bribes and obligations. There was a new operating system and the old things just didn’t work as well – if at all. We may have gotten God’s attention with sacrifices of animals, offerings of produce and the like, but now God asked for our attention. We lit votive candles to remind God that we were here; He placed the light of the world on top of a hill hanging on a cross. Our efforts try to get through to God. But now, through Christ, God has broken through to us.
God is now in the driver’s seat. Like children on a family trip, we may pretend that we are driving as we make our father’s movements. We can pretend that we are turning the wheel or honking the horn and with delight, and out father plays along. But the real action is not in our hands anymore. God’s glory is not in the expense or the expanse of what we built. God’s glory is the delight He has in having us here. And not only us, as individual persons, but everything in our lives – the good the bad and the boring – is now, through Christ, His delight.
We can truly say, with all humility, that through Christ we are the glory of God in world. And if we can see this, even just a little, we can see also that there is nothing in our lives that cannot be used for the glory of God.
No wonder we speak the glory.
2. With Him
The most prominent characteristic of friendship – human or divine – is summed up in the phrase “always there for me.” Even with a caveat to be careful of self-centeredness, this actually is in excellent description of what it means to live with Christ. After all, it was Jesus Himself who said, “Lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the world.” To say that God is always there for me is really just taking Him at his word. It is an act of faith.
And God is honored when we do. We give glory to God, we give him the credit and we praise his goodness, when we live with him. But hold on here – how can we give God glory by living in the only way possible? Whether we focus on it or not, God is with us. Where’s the glory in that?
St. Augustine, writing his confessions, once wrote that God was with him but he was not with God. How could this be? How could any of us be far from God? “If I climb to the heavens, you are there; if I hide in the netherworld you are there as well” says Psalm 139. Theologians call this omnipresence. It is that divine characteristic of God to be present in all places and at all times. It has little to do with us. But St. Augustine discovered something and pointed it out to us.
We are free. We have free will which is not just useful in choosing from the menu or shopping from a catalog. God has given this to us as a tool to build the world and even the world to come. We are carpenters who have the option to build the city of God and his holy temple. And to make the job even more lucrative, God has trusted us to do it. Some would say he took a risk in giving us a share in building his kingdom. St. Paul says that “we are coworkers with Christ.”
And there it is. That is what it means to be “with him.” All that we do, although we have, can be a part of our life with Christ. Nothing is useless or excluded. It can all be consecrated because Christ has chosen to work with it. It can all be holy because his holy ones have. If we are sanctified by Christ, then all that goes along with us can be sanctified as well. And so we go back to that first great gift given – our free will.
God is not glorified only by the things we have or the things we do. God is glorified primarily by our willingness to offer them. We look at the good things of our life – and our talents, skills, abilities and all the rest – and we choose to select them and to make them holy. We can say, in a sense, that what we do with them in grace is what we do with them with Christ. We realize that we are not alone; we are working as a team with the tools we once thought were ours alone. Before, we could move mountains with heavy equipment and explosives. Now, we can pick up a paper clip out of love for Christ and change the world. Before, we could build aqueducts and reservoirs to build the great metropolises of our world. Now, we can give a cup of water to someone who needs it and see the eternal kingdom of God’s glory.
To be with the God who is with us, to live the grace of Emanuel, is to glorify God in every aspect of our lives. It is the best we have to offer them the most we can do. And the God who is with us – the God who is our glory – glorifies us in turn.
3. In Him
Every evening, after the news, we are treated to Hollywood gossip shows that bring us the daily revelation of who exactly is a member of “the in crowd.” This is the crowd that has made it. These are the kings and queens of the hill. They are top of the heap. They are A - #1. As they stroll down the red carpets of life, look just behind them – a little off to the side. There is another crowd there. There always is. It’s the crowd that wants to join in, to be associated with, and – with a little luck and conniving – are looking to take their place. To be inducted, included, incorporated – this is a goal. All the effort, all the hoops, are aimed to bring in those who were outside.
Is this vanity? Is it really all that bad to want to be included? While I think that we can do better than the Hollywood A-list, we’d all like to know that we are included into something great. And there’s nothing wrong with that. It was God himself who said it is not good for us to be alone. That is why we begin in this world in a family and as part of a community. Growing up, we begin to have a little more freedom in choosing which community. And for a good part of our lives we wonder what would be the best community for us to be in. We are all looking for our place in the world. No one, regardless of youth or age, success or failure, really ever gets to the point where their search is over. The countless changes and chances of life never allow it. And the wanderlust of the human heart prohibits it. It’s just who we are.
From the earliest days of the Church, Christians have noticed that things are different with them. Sure they move around, change jobs, live lives of creative self-destruction and reach heights of incredible achievement. But they know something else, something unspoken but very sure. St. Paul said when he said that we have our citizenship in heaven. St. John recalls the words of Christ who prayed that we be in the world but not of the world. Christians have a unique confidence – some would even say arrogance – that we belong even when rejected, included even when exiled. Early on it was noted that Christians live in this world as if they were just passing through. Think about it – a young sister in a cloistered monastery in France (with little education and few skills) had the audacity to claim her location was to be love in the heart of the world. An arrogant and wealthy young man gave up his high-end partying and presumed to rebuild the Catholic Church. A woman close to retirement herself believed that God invested her with the task of caring for the elderly and poor. My, these Christians think they’re all that, don’t they? They are bold and act as if they were the “in” crowd.
Well… they are; we are. We don’t follow the standards as much as set them. We are confident and unafraid because we’re in the right place with the right people. We are not members of the club as much as we are in Christ. And everything in our lives is in Christ as well. Our actions, needs, desires, habits – the whole thing – is in Christ. And because we are, because everything we have is, we are secure and bold. We have chosen because we have been chosen. We love because we have been loved. We give because we have been given. We have been reached even while grasping what we were trying to grab. We need nothing because we have everything.
But few of us are at that point, are we? We have trouble seeing this amazing abundance because we know so well the pain of what we lack. That is why, time and time again, we struggle to offer to the glory of God what is His anyway. Yet each time we do, we grow and find ourselves a little deeper in him. We are encouraged by our efforts as much as we are by His acceptance. He draws us into Himself, into His embrace, gently and slowly. The more He includes us the less we see exclusion. Children who are confident of their parents’ love .are the first to climb the trees. Those trying to win it, fearfully cling to the comfort of proximity.
God is glorified by those who live in Him. He delights in them as a parent delights in their child who sings in the school play. They may be terrible or a future opera star but what matters is the delight of the parent. St. Irenaeus once said that the glory of God is man fully alive. Permit me to add that God’s glory is not a Hollywood special effect of beaming light and rolling thunder. God’s glory is the delight He takes in His children who are confident enough to make a mistake or create something spectacular.
And as we offer more and more in Him as people who know His acceptance, we speak His glory by what we do and by who we are. And if that makes us members of the most popular or unpopular group, we still know our Father’s arms holding us close.
4. In the unity of the Holy Spirit
Unity is a good thing. We have experienced in our families and our nations the effectiveness of a common goal supported by a common effort. Things just get done when people agree to do them. The old saying remains true: United we stand, divided we fall. But don’t be surprised that unity is a good thing. The natural world rises and falls according to it. A big chunk of ice can make a dent in the roof of the house; a couple of million snowflakes will crush it. A large stone will fall to the valley floor but thousands of little rocks going in the same direction and obeying the laws of gravity can build a dam. When all the pillars holding up a building are acting unity, the building stands. When they don’t, collapse is imminent.
So unity is a strength that allows positive human development. Unity is also a spiritual virtue and one that Christ prayed would mark his disciples. He prayed that they would be one as He and the Father were one that the world might believe. Soon after the ascension, the church began to grow and the Acts of the Apostles begins to record even the number of people being brought into Christ. Even in our day, we see unity as a strength because there is strength in numbers. There are even religions that believe God is praised by an ever increasing number of converts – willing or otherwise.
However, this is not the same as a unity in the Holy Spirit. It is a unity perhaps at times in numbers. What we are considering is not a unity merely of numbers; it is in the Holy Spirit which means it is a unity in God Himself. The Holy Spirit is the agent of unity and not the good intentions of the organizers. Common consensus is mutual respect and it is a good thing when it is for the right reason. So when we speak of this spiritual unity, maybe it would be best to move beyond a social definition. Beginning with it, let’s expand it to the unity of harmony. It is that beautiful and distinct sound which comes from a union of voices and instruments all in right order. It echoes a transcendence higher than its own machinations that speak to the soul as well as to the mind and the emotions. St. Ignatius of Antioch often used this image to describe the unity intended for the church. And in the ancient world, some believed that the natural harmony of the physical world moved with the precision that the highest of the arts could only begin to echo.
Okay Father, with all that high-falutin’ poetry, how come we have so much trouble getting the potluck dinner together? All right, I’ll answer that hypothetical question based on actual experience. We have trouble getting people together to run the potluck dinner perhaps because this potluck dinner may not be in line with the will of God. Or perhaps more distressing, the people here are not acting in unity with the Holy Spirit. Of course you have to be very sure that the Holy Spirit does in fact desire a common sharing of casseroles and tuna melts. So common purpose is not necessarily unity and the Holy Spirit. And there is a very great danger of determining whether or not people and churches are acting in accord with the Holy Spirit.
But there are many times that we do. There are many moments when God offers us the opportunity to act in unity with him. For example, somebody is hungry and we have the ability to feed them. And we do. Or somebody is feeling despondent and we have the opportunity to encourage them even by just cheering them up a little. And we do. Maybe it’s a difficulty that no one can see and starts making life a little more difficult for us. And we do as grandma said – we offer it up. The Holy Spirit, the third Person of the Blessed Trinity, is active in the world and remains with us so that we do know – as best we can and as honestly as we can tell – the will of God.
From a human point of view, what could bring God more glory in this world then doing what He wants? I mean, isn’t a parent proud and content when their children actually follow their instructions? Obviously, the answer is yes. But living life in unity with the Holy Spirit, is not about simply fulfilling a list of tasks issued by God. The relationship at the heart of this is not a command and demand structure that merely requires obedience and fulfillment. It certainly doesn’t exclude it, but that is not the heart of it. God is not glorified by those who say yes; He is glorified by those who know and do his will
To do the will of the Father, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, begins with following the example of the Son. Christ’s obedience in the Garden of Gethsemane was the glory of God. Doing the Father’s will was the one thing required. And often for us as well, we hear that will in the Garden of Gethsemane more than by the poolside sipping cocktails! So why did Christ obey? Where was the glory in that? And why should we do something similar?
The unity we hope to live is a relationship of love. In doing the Father’s will, we act in love. There is no disconnect, no distinction between love of God and doing His will. We are inspired and strengthened for the task of doing what the God we know has asked us to do. Most of us do not know the people who wrote the law saying we shouldn’t drive over 55 miles an hour on the highway. We may know the ones who enforce it, and that is good enough reason to obey it. But I don’t think most people – especially New Yorkers – obey the speed limit out of love. On the other hand, it’s amazing how we go out of our way for someone we love who is suddenly sick. The moment requires the assistance of those who choose the opportunity to love out of love itself. Sure, it’s never perfect and, yes, we are people of mixed motive. Even with that allowance, we offer our imperfect service and it is accepted. Not only is it accepted, it brings glory to the God who has chosen us to be His glory.
5. All glory to you Almighty Father
In any family, people are bound by nature to resemble each other. You often hear that someone looks so much like this uncle or that aunt. If a child messes up, the neighbors usually say “like father, like son” or “the apple does not fall far from the tree.” The resemblance is not merely physical; it is moral. That means there is a similarity of action and choice. In our family, Jesus Christ resembles our heavenly Father in just the same way. He is the mirror of the Father’s perfection, wisdom, generosity and love. And Christ, being the perfect image of the Father, thereby offers Him the most perfect glory.
At St. Joseph’s seminary in Yonkers, there is a marvelous stained-glass window in the chapel showing this. In glory, Jesus stands before the Father in a gesture of offering. In the smaller window below, the priest is offering mass. Directly across the chapel, there is a window of the crucifixion and under it is an image of the high priest offering the sacrifice in the Temple before the Ark of the Covenant. These windows are a sermon without words. What is clear is that every action done by Christ, in the Holy Spirit, offered to the Father. That is why we call the doxology the high point of the Mass. It reaches back to Calvary with the echoes of the offering of atonement in the temple. It resembles that most profound and most hidden offering of the Son of God to God the Father. And as one church father said, “the priest does at the altar what Christ is doing before the Father in heaven.”
Again, these can be very pious theological ramblings but I believe they are far more than that. Superstition is the repetition of actions based on perceived outcomes that attempt to give meaning to what is essentially senseless. It is easy to understand how ritual gestures – even those of the Mass itself – can be seen in this way. And sadly, it is easy to treat them this way even by those of goodwill. But to know instead that there is nothing meaningless in the eyes of one who loves us changes everything. Christ revealed the Father to us and gave us a way - by His example - to the Father. In the perfection of the Incarnation, everything human was sanctified to the honor of God the Father. This sad hopelessness of existence without purpose was replaced by pure hope. Every human action and the reaction now had direction and a final point. In the Father’s will, nothing and no one was excluded. Jesus proved that in the joy of the crowds who saw his miracles and He paid for it as the crowds shouted, “crucify him.”
When our hope, rooted solidly in our faith, and lived out in the Divine love we experience and show, that is glory. No pain, no joy is without its glory because, by God’s grace, a holy thing. No triumph is so great and no failure so complete that it is outside the will of God.
The night before Jesus made that one perfect sacrifice, He desired that we’d be a part of it. Obviously, not in the same way that He would offer it but still a part of it. And perhaps His desire was that we experience the one contradictory thing we normally do not associate with sacrifice: joy. Our joy is complete in Him and in Him alone. All the reasons for hope are in Him, all the meaning of life is in Him. And presented to the Father and accepted by Him, that glory is our glory.
Like bystanders on the sidewalk near the concert hall, we hear only snippets of the music from within. The joy we experience (in the limited way we can) of doing the Fathers will is perhaps our eavesdropping in the glory of heaven itself. This contentment of offering our imperfect efforts to follow the example of our Savior might be foreshadow the peace to come.
Forever And Ever
Throughout these reflections I have tried to avoid any specific reference to the holy sacrifice of the Mass. I know I’ve used many terms and words that can refer to the Mass. I am certainly not denying that they are but I was hoping that we would see in ourselves what we can ascribe to the Eucharist. In other words, could we see in this greatest of prayers our own prayer? Could we see in this sacred Action our own?
The Doxology does not begin at the end of the Eucharistic prayer. The Doxology begins in the soil - in the earth itself - that nourished the seeds of the grapevine and the wheat stalk. Like us, they grew and developed, changed and prepared. By God’s will and the Word they became what they were not in what they never could have conceived of. And in God’s goodness, heaven and earth met in harmony and the offering is complete. How right then that our prayer should end with an eye on eternity.
In many popular images, when God is offered a sacrifice, He accepts it in a blaze of flaming fire. Hollywood has really helped with this one. Scripture tells us that God is a “consuming fire.” Until the Mass, almost every sacrifice throughout world religions involved the consumption of what was sacrificed by fire. It is this natural chemical reaction that gives us the image of transformation and purification. In the Eucharist, what was once an image is now reality.
We are transformed by what is offered and received. What is wrong is redeemed. What is mixed or uncertain is purified. For centuries since Christ ascended to our Father, the Church has offered the Mass. Human beings are flawed creatures who are incredibly resourceful. Our best dreams and our worst nightmares do not always come true. Our fallen nature gives in to despair far too easily and hope is a stubborn as a two-year-old. That is why we offer the Mass; that is why Christ asks us to offer the Mass “from the rising of the sun to thus setting of the same.” St. Thomas called the Eucharist “a pledge of the glory to come” because as a foretaste of heaven, we began have been given. As we offer ourselves, our lives, and everything in it and make it up, we begin to see the glory.
If that glory on earth is a reflection of the splendor of heaven, we see it in lives redeemed by the offering of Christ. For good reason we call the reception of the Eucharist “holy Communion” because as we offer glory to God we receive it as well. Communion is a reflection of that divine unity we seek to live in this world. Yes, we are still on a journey through “this valley of tears.” We are hindered by the lingering effects of Adam’s sin and our own. We stumble and fall as we reach for the goal. But along this rocky and often ruined way, we press on. God’s glory, even if misunderstood or misinterpreted, is addictive. By comparison, we know that driving power of tainted earthly things, so how can we be amazed at a glory so strong it drives sinners to be saints?
These are hardly the most theologically articulate or spiritually complete reflections on the glory of God. I beseech you all to avoid the temptation to ascribe such spiritual mastery to me on account of these! But I think it’s important that we take the time and put the effort into considering the things most familiar to us. Most of us on a weekly, if not daily basis hear the ancient words of this prayer. If we can begin to appreciate the role of the Mass in our salvation, we begin to enter the action of God himself. And as we do, His glory becomes our glory.
May our Lord Jesus Christ through whom we have everything that is good, with whom nothing can be against us and all things are ours, and in whom our joy is complete; give us the grace that, remaining secure in the power of the Holy Spirit to do the will of God, we may offer all that we have and all that we are to the Father who is glorified by our desire to stand before Him now and then in the eternity of the glory incapable of fading or defilement.