Lex orandi, lex credendi

"Lex orandi, lex credendi" literally means "the law of praying [is] the law of believing." Another way that this phrase is rendered is: "How we pray is how we believe." This statement indicates the power of gesture, ritual, and symbol. These are a reflection of belief, but they also shape belief, for good or for ill.

How we enter a church is a good example of this principle. If we come in and simply walk into a pew, our gesture indicates that we do not believe (either explicitly or implicitly) that Jesus is truly present in the Eucharist reserved in the tabernacle. But if we genuflect before entering the pew, and specifically genuflect toward the tabernacle (wherever that may be), then we are reminding ourselves, and acting as a witness to others, that we believe Jesus is physically there. But if we genuflect toward the front (in effect, toward the altar) when the tabernacle is not situated there, then our way of praying is a habit rather than an assent, an affirmation.

After mass, my family and I go up to the tabernacle to pray. (We never used to do this, but have been doing so for a while now.) Although we have received Jesus, although we ourselves are for the moment "tabernacles" (since we actually, really, physically carry Jesus within us), going up to the tabernacle reinforces this. Think about Jesus, at the Last Supper, where he is both physically present in his human nature and then also Eucharistically present in the bread-turned body and the wine-turned blood. That act is not redundant, it's not superfluous. Rather, it's super-abundant. But if we receive communion and immediately leave, what are we saying about what we have just received? Are we treating communion as a kind of "fast food"? Are we saying, "this is merely bread, this is merely wine"?

When my family and I pass a Catholic church while driving, we acknowledge Jesus' presence there. My wife and I make the sign of the Cross, while our children, who are 5 and 4, say "Hi, Jesus." I try to do this even when I am in a car with other people (although I am still somewhat self-conscious about it). This can be a very important witness to others, even other drivers simply passing by when you are doing this. We want our children to internalize and reinforce belief in the Real Presence. If we can instill reverence for the presence of Jesus outside of the church building, perhaps that will increase our reverence even further when we are inside the church and in close proximity to Jesus himself.

I don't mean to imply that I and my family do this perfectly and that others are don't. This is a reminder to myself that I can and need to do better, to do more. We cannot show Christ too much reverence, reverence which is due to him because of his nature (for he is God) and because of his sacrifice (for he is our redeemer).

St. Cyprian of Carthage - Matter Matters

I have been reading more of William Jurgens' Faith of the Early Fathers. St. Cyprian (ca. 200 -258) was bishop of Carthage; he survived the Decian persecution but ultimately was martyred by beheading. Among his writings are passages about the Eucharist. One of his letters ("To a Certain Cecil," 63, 9) indicates the nature of Catholic sacramental theology in which a certain form and matter is necessary. The form is the words or actions being said or performed, and the matter is the material used in the sacrament. For example, in baptism the form is the Trinitarian formula: "I baptize you in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit." (That is why last year the Vatican re-affirmed the teaching that baptisms not using the Trinitarian form are not valid.) The matter in baptism is the water.







In the Eucharist, the form is the Eucharistic prayer, and the matter is the bread and wine (mixed with water). Cyprian addresses a practice of using water instead of wine, rather than wine mixed with water:





We find that the cup which the Lord offered was mixed; and that what was wine, He called Blood. From this it is apparent that the Blood of Christ is not offered if there is no wine in the cup; nor is the Sacrifice of the Lord celebrated with a legitimate consecration unless our offering and sacrifice corresponds to the passion... I wonder, indeed, whence this practice has come, that, contrary to evangelic and apostolic tradition, in certain places water alone, which cannot signify the Blood of Christ, is offered in the cup of the Lord. (Faith of the Early Fathers, Volume 1, #582, p. 232).


Because the matter used does not conform to the matter required (no wine is used) in accord with the "evangelic and apostolic tradition," the sacrament does not take place. We cannot simply make it up as we go along. The power of the sacraments comes from the One who instituted them, and the One who instituted them knew that the physicality of the sacraments (and thus how the sacraments signify what they effect) matters. When we are tempted to think that the Church has too many rules about things, it is important for us to remember the reasons why she has such rules. Again, we see the truth of lex orandi, lex credendi (literally, "the law of praying, the law of believing"). What the phrase means is that the way we worship affects how we believe, so orthodox worship leads to orthodox belief and theology. It is also true that heterodox worship leads to heterodox belief and theology. So in our liturgy and in our sacraments, what we say and do has far-reaching consequences.

The Rosary and Eucharistic Adoration

I came across an interesting article, "The Rosary and Eucharistic Adoration," by Susan Benofy from May, 1999 in the Adoremus Bulletin. Adoremus - the Society for the Renewal of the Sacred Liturgy promotes authentic reform of the liturgy.

Benofy does a very good job of addressing concerns that the Rosary is not an appropriate devotion done before the Blessed Sacrament. Benofy shows how the Congregation for Divine Worship (CDW) and various popes have explained what the Rosary is and how that is thoroughly compatible with Eucharistic adoration, given the proper disposition of the faithful. This was, apparently, a bit of a reversal of position by the CDW from a 1968 statement which concluded that the Rosary was a prayer addressed to Mary and therefore not appropriate for Eucharistic adoration.

However, in a 1999 document, the CDW cites Paul VI's Marialis Cultus , which affirms the Rosary as Christ-centered:

As a Gospel prayer, centered on the mystery of the redemptive Incarnation, the Rosary is therefore a prayer with a clearly Christological orientation. Its most characteristic element, in fact, the litany-like succession of Hail Mary's, becomes in itself an unceasing praise of Christ, who is the ultimate object both of the angel's announcement and of the greeting of the mother of John the Baptist: "Blessed is the fruit of your womb" (Lk. 1:42). (section 46)

In his apostolic letter, Rosarium Virginis Mariae, John Paul II writes:

The Rosary, though clearly Marian in character, is at heart a Christocentric prayer.... With the Rosary, the Christian people sits at the school of Mary and is led to contemplate the beauty on the face of Christ and to experience the depths of his love. (section 1)

Brant Pitre discusses the Jewish roots of the Eucharist, and in doing so highlights the bread of the presence in the temple as a type of the Eucharist. The word for "presence" in that phrase can also be translated "face." Both John Paul II and Pitre show us that the Rosary and the Eucharist are complementary ways of encountering the face of Christ.

John Paul II goes into great depth connecting Mary and the Eucharist in his encyclical, Ecclesia de Eucharistia, where he speaks of "Mary, Woman of the Eucharist" (Chapter 6). Of course, his addition of the Luminous Mysteries includes the Institution of the Eucharist, which makes the Rosary even more obviously Eucharistic. However, even in the original mysteries, he sees profoundly Eucharistic connections:

In a certain sense Mary lived her Eucharistic faith even before the institution of the Eucharist, by the very fact that she offered her virginal womb for the Incarnation of God's Word. The Eucharist, while commemorating the passion and resurrection, is also in continuity with the incarnation. At the Annunciation Mary conceived the Son of God in the physical reality of his body and blood, thus anticipating within herself what to some degree happens sacramentally in every believer who receives, under the signs of bread and wine, the Lord's body and blood.

As a result, there is a profound analogy between the Fiat which Mary said in reply to the angel, and the Amen which every believer says when receiving the body of the Lord. Mary was asked to believe that the One whom she conceived “through the Holy Spirit” was “the Son of God” (Lk 1:30-35). In continuity with the Virgin's faith, in the Eucharistic mystery we are asked to believe that the same Jesus Christ, Son of God and Son of Mary, becomes present in his full humanity and divinity under the signs of bread and wine.

“Blessed is she who believed” (Lk 1:45). Mary also anticipated, in the mystery of the incarnation, the Church's Eucharistic faith. When, at the Visitation, she bore in her womb the Word made flesh, she became in some way a “tabernacle” – the first “tabernacle” in history – in which the Son of God, still invisible to our human gaze, allowed himself to be adored by Elizabeth, radiating his light as it were through the eyes and the voice of Mary. And is not the enraptured gaze of Mary as she contemplated the face of the newborn Christ and cradled him in her arms that unparalleled model of love which should inspire us every time we receive Eucharistic communion? (section 55)

Finally, there is a good address by Cardinal Archbishop Sean O'Malley of Boston on "Mary and the Eucharist." He gave this at a Eucharistic congress, and it is specifically on the the Sixth Chapter of Ecclesia de Eucharistia. Cardinal O'Malley is clearly comfortable combining the Rosary with Eucharistic adoration:

Allow me to share with you some of my personal meditations on the Joyful Mysteries of the rosary. These are the mysteries I like to use when I am praying the rosary during a holy hour before the Blessed Sacrament.

It is important that we think about what we are doing and saying when praying the Rosary in Eucharistic adoration. Such clarifications are important, given the principle of lex orandi, lex credendi (literally "the law of praying, the law of believing," meaning that how we pray forms what we believe). We can be thankful for the clarifications given by these people and others, which help us to draw closer to our Savior in the Blessed Sacrament.