Sacrament and Service Go Hand in Hand

My next “Faith Perspectives” column for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch appeared online yesterday and should appear in the paper on Saturday morning. It’s a reflection on the recent Holy Thursday liturgy and the link between sacrament and service, between sharing in the Eucharist and washing the feet of those around us. You can read my column below or online here: http://bit.ly/sacramentservice

Just a few weeks ago at the evening Holy Thursday “Mass of the Last Supper” at my parish, I sat and kneeled and prayed, contemplating the creation of the sacrament of the Eucharist by Jesus in that upper room so long ago. This simple sacred meal, in which Catholics believe bread becomes Christ’s body and wine becomes his blood, is celebrated daily by Catholics around the world as the true presence of Christ in our midst. It is our center, our gathering place, our source and sustenance.

But the mass and the scripture readings for that evening did not end with the disciples huddled in the upper room, prayerfully professing their faith in this new-found communal meal. For before they had much time to even ponder the meaning this new sign of the divine in the world, Jesus gives them something else to consider.

He gets down on his hands and knees with a basin of water and a towel and does the seemingly inconceivable: He washes their feet. This is the model of living and loving that he gives them right after he gives them his body and blood. For it’s not enough to gather together to pray and worship. It’s not enough to be solitary Christians content to quietly go about spiritual lives in small sacramental acts, no matter how sacred, no matter how closely those actions put us in contact with the essence of God. We have to take care of one another. We must be willing to go beyond our comfort zones — to wash feet and have our feet washed — if we want to call ourselves disciples.

Why? Why isn’t it enough to just pray to God and maybe worry about a few close friends and family members around us? Why do we need to pull ourselves away from a quiet time of prayer and head out into the world? Why is there a need to move from contemplation to action, to being aware of God not just in the chapel or at the altar but also at work, at the grocery store, at PTA meetings? Why can’t we just sit and contemplate in faith instead of having to stand up and walk in it?

Jesus answers those questions without leaving the upper room: Because we are not called to be solo Christians. We are called to be more than enlightened individuals. We are created to be light in our communities, to be in service to one another. We are called to be in communion with God, yes, but we are also called to be in communion with others. This is what makes us Church.

We are called to be for and with others because we are so inextricably linked to them in a most profound and real way, although we don’t always stop and realize it. Mother Theresa once said that the problem with the world is that we have forgotten that we belong to one another.  Thomas Merton said that people walk around “shining like the sun” because they are loved by God, and we should be able to see that and love them in the same way, no matter who they are.

If we live our lives with that kind of expectation, if we can learn to love and serve others because God loves them, we will do so because our loves grows out of our lives of prayer and sacrament.

This is why Jesus washed the feet of his disciples. This is why he taught that our neighbor is anyone in need. It’s why he told us to love the least of our brothers and sisters. Because that’s where he is and where we will most readily find him. Serving others is more than charity, more than good works, more than a quick foot washing. It’s a chance to meet Jesus face to face.