It is all about the prayer

After the man, Adam, had eaten of the tree,
the LORD God called to the man

and asked him, “Where are you?”
He answered, “I heard you in the garden;
but I was afraid, because I was naked,
so I hid myself.”

 

This past couple of months we have been reflecting on The Confessions of St. Augustine.  Augustine, although aware of his sinfulness, does not attempt to hide himself from God like Adam, but rather lays bare his most intimate self.  He does so,  not primarily for his readers, but for God to whom his prayer text is directed.  Augustine permits us to overhear his prayer in the same way that Christ permits us to overhear the prayer of the Pharisee and Tax-collector in Luke.  He writes down his Confessions to the same end that Christ relates his parable —to reveal just how the kingdom is coming about in his time and ours.   It's all about the prayer. 

Augustine begins with, and sustains throughout the confessions, a profound sense of repentance.  The Mass maintains the same attitude, beginning with the Kyrie right through to the reception of communion where we say, "Lord I am not worthy to receive you."  But repentance is not enough. We need hope for the future. God expresses his hope for us  in the incarnation of his son, the Word made flesh. At the heart of the Mass we hear spoken  the marriage vows of Christ with his Church-- “this is my body which will be given up for you” and “this is the cup of my blood, the blood of the new and everlasting covenant. It will be shed for you and for all that sins might be forgiven.”  Those in the congregation who constitute the spouse of Christ,  each in their own way, commits his or her body to this marriage -- sometimes to be born out in martyrdom but mostly to be born out in the everyday crosses and celebrations of life, but always born out in chastity.

Many people criticize the teaching of the Church concerning our bodies, accusing it of being "hung-up" on chastity -- teaching against contraception, divorce, fornication and the practice of homosexuality. And many blame Augustine for what they believe is a distortion of the gospel.  Little do they realize, as Augustine surely did,  that it is at the very core of the Church's being-- this generous giving of bodies in the marriage covenant with God.  To the secular mind the sacrifice required to become chaste is  foolishness when it isn't tragically painful. To them the default position of the human condition is loneliness, and the chaste gift of God two thousand years ago in the pascal mystery means nothing really substantial to their well being.  But to those who appreciate the reality of God's love,  revealed in the life, teaching, passion and death, and presence of Christ among us still, the sacrifice required to becoming chaste is not too much to ask.

The Church is not going to change it's teaching on sexuality because this sacred commitment of our bodies is of the very essence of the new covenant and the incarnation of the kingdom. The Church's teaching on sexual matters has been contentious from the very beginning.  When Jesus  explained to the Pharisees that although Moses allowed men to divorce their wives, it was still against the will of God,   his own disciples balked. They much preferred the "pastoral" care of Moses who permitted divorce because of the hardness of human hearts to the  revelation of God's kingdom in Jesus.   They also  balked  when Jesus revealed that, "unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you do not have life within you."  Jesus didn't back down even when the apostles told him this was too hard a teaching. The gospel narrative tells us "as a result of this, many (of) his disciples returned to their former way of life and no longer accompanied him."


God,  like Augustine in his Confessions, does not hide himself.  The pure of heart can see God because they are willing to repent their notions of what God should be like if he really loved them, and model their life after the chastity of God-- revealed in Jesus. To those,  Jesus reveals himself in the breaking of the bread-- and invites them to the wedding feast of the kingdom.