The Sacramental Universe

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Sacramental Universe 

After reading Bouyer’s Cosmos, Catholics treating the sacraments as a right of passage need to hear this story of caution on several of his points concerning separation from the sacramental universe. This topic is necessary because religion and the faithful tend to fade in evolved societies like the United States. We can see this everywhere today in the Catholic community. Not a day goes by that I do not run into a Catholic and invite them to Mass to experience the Liturgy. They most always decline and say, “Oh, my parents go, but I do not.” I respond, “You said you were Catholic,” and they say, “Ya, but I don’t go to Mass it has no meaning to me.” Bouyer is right that these people are more concerned about this life than the next one. He goes on to explain what forms this takes. Christians start to view, for example, the sacraments as more magic than encounters with God. They lose sight of how worldly creatures communicate with God through the images God has made clear in His word. The macro view of a sacramental life has been lost for many. This manifests itself as Mass becomes a mere performance and symbolic gestures to be completed to these willfully blind people. When they need God, they believe that He can be summoned on demand to fix their problems instead of maintaining an actual relationship with Christ through the Liturgy of the Word and Eucharist. Bouyer tells us, “ The only unpardonable sin is thus a failure to acknowledge this action of the Spirit through Jesus, which is the world’s only hope of salvation.”1    

We should note that societies have always been in the presence of mysteries from ancient times through today. Bouyer goes to great lengths to show the development from myth to mystery to clarity as presented as images in the Bible where meaning is clear. Even though science or wisdom seeks to solve these mysteries, scientists typically generate more questions than answers. This leads to an ever-increasing form of a desacralized society as humans believe they have a clearer picture of how things work which leads to a falling away from Christ until needed. To be clear, humans suffer when they decide that ritual can produce an outcome from God on demand (magic).  To quote Bouyer, “And when magic becomes confident, its unfailing result is not only to destroy religion, even when religious forms are most carefully preserved, but also destroy itself through its own victory.”2 

The next caution for today’s society is the desire for money to replace the need for the sacraments. The problem humans face in present times is very similar to the problem of the 15th century that kicked off the reformation and counter-reformation. Bouyer makes the point that the success of society starts to turn people away from God based on a false security that relies on a bourgeois(middle-class) life where people see worth based on money. This thinking is all around us today. Christianity, however, has a way of standing firm, demanding that the resurrection of Jesus through the mystery of the cross makes us realize the material possessions of this world have little meaning as we prepare for the world to come. Humans should reject the trappings of this world and remain disciplined in their actions.3 Bouyer continues that through the 18th century, with the advent of industrialization, Christianity fell into this lust for mammon. His quote, “Under this influence, strengthened by the development of scientifically based techniques which conversely held science in thrall, there would be a trend, starting in the eighteenth century with the industrial revolution, to consider the world simply as a source of sense satisfactions.”4 Humans started to view everything in a zero-sum gain, leading to harsh predatory practices to acquire more. This inevitably leads to our inability to see the world in a transcendent way where we stop contemplating the universe through the Trinity. Further, humans have continued to destroy many of God’s gifts on this planet so they can live a more comfortable life. Humans have set themselves on a path of destruction through their appetites. Bouyer makes the point this hunger does nothing but make us enslaved people to material things instead of servants to God and the cosmos He created. He points out this is never more evident than in our treatment of the environment and the consequences like extreme weather patterns, pollution, and accelerated extinction of species. Bouyer stated, “Indeed, it is a problem of our own inner disintegration, together with the deterioration of the world, which we have brought about.”5 This leads society to view humans in the same way as they have the environment where people become things to control and possess. As we turn away from God and fail to realize there is more to gain than things, this inevitably leads to man’s death with nowhere to go but the abyss. 

Fortunately, there is an answer through a Eucharistic and Liturgical revival. This book makes the point that we must never forget Christ is our entry into a universal cosmos and that we experience union with Him through a sacramental life. These traditions (sacraments) are not just rites of passage but part of the liturgical life Christ calls us to lead. This is the key to Christian hope, where one unionizes with God and other believers, becoming part of the body of Christ. This unfolds a sacramental universe and the ability to change human beings by joining with Christ.

In summary, the sacramental universe is a profound link to a spiritual realm embedded in the rich history of Christian traditions. These are not just rites of passage but the only way for earthly creatures to interface with God. Bouyer writes, “Appearing with Christ, and descending with him from the side of the Father, will be his eternal Bride, the eschatological Church, the redeemed, saved and glorified cosmos.”6 Understanding the roots of Judaism and Christianity is crucial in appreciating the power of this connection. Christianity transcends mere written words; it embodies a living pronouncement, where the logos took the form of a man to save us from eternal damnation. We must be present and act, where the past is rediscovered, and the future approaches. This mystery of faith asserts that each day incorporates the deeds of Christ, accomplished long ago by reconciling humanity to Him, with the outcomes present in ourselves. Jesus Christ’s actions unveil our true purpose, and the Christian journey involves internalizing through the sacraments so we may realize the benefits of this joyful mystery. We must  “rediscover the world in God, whose Love produced, redeemed and adopted it.”7 . Colossians 27 gives us a good sense about this mystery.  “To them God chose to make known how great among the Gentiles are the riches of the glory of this mystery, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory.”8 

  1. Cosmos, Bouyer, Louis, 1982, Les Editions du Cerf (89) ↩︎
  2. Cosmos, Bouyer, Louis, 1982, Les Editions du Cerf (118) ↩︎
  3. Cosmos, Bouyer, Louis, 1982, Les Editions du Cerf (121) A point Bouyer wanted to make so I summarized his thought. ↩︎
  4. Cosmos, Bouyer, Louis, 1982, Les Éditions du Cerf (122) ↩︎
  5. Cosmos, Bouyer, Louis, 1982, Les Éditions du Cerf (123) ↩︎
  6. Cosmos, Bouyer, Louis, 1982, Les Éditions du Cerf (123) ↩︎
  7. Cosmos, Bouyer, Louis, 1982, Les Editions du Cerf (181) ↩︎
  8. Holy Bible,  New Revised Standard Version Catholic Edition, Colossians 1:27 ↩︎