Hiding the Victim

These days, I generally like the writings of Todd from Catholic Sensibilities. While I often do not agree with him, I have been finding that he has endeavored at least to be thoughtful in his position. However, I find that when he tries to defend the status quo as regards modern Roman Catholic liturgical praxis, he tends to lose his otherwise admirable sensibility and thoughtfulness.

A case in point is a recent entry of his, entitled: "Why Can't I Find Jesus", regarding the apparent tendency of modern Roman Catholic liturgists to place the tabernacle (or the place in which the Eucharist is reserved) in places that cannot easily be found by the faithful. Todd’s response to the question is as follows:

To which I might reply, "Because you didn't look for him."

Sorry, Todd, but that dog just won’t hunt. Translating that from southern vernacular into standard English: in this instance, your comment is beside the point. To give but one example: it took me three visits to the Roman Catholic Cathedral of Los Angeles, Our Lady of The Angels, before I was able to find that the Eucharist was in fact reserved, let alone where it was.

The first time, I was impressed (not favorably) by the fact that the interior was bare grey concrete. I was also impressed by the fact that, although it was one of those rare clear blue days in L.A. outside, due to the lighting, it was perpetual june gloom inside (like daylight in the movies A Nightmare Before Christmas or The Addams Family). I looked distantly to the front of the church (as there was nothing to distinguish it from the rest of that great hall, I could not call it a sanctuary). I saw the big bishop’s chair (so at least the place could with accuracy be called a cathedral) and the even bigger table (at least sixteen feet on a side) apparently topped with illuminated glass, more like God’s coffee table in that great living room than like a table of the Lord. There was no crucifix, or other Christological representation in the sanctuary. It looked like a place in which Our Lord had not been invited.

I searched everywhere for any indication that the Body and Blood of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ might be somehow present, including the mausoleum beneath the nave. It had endless rows of blank faux marble, though the material when I touched it felt harder than steel. If I were going to make a good motion picture of A Wrinkle in Time, and if I were going to make a visual representation of Central Central Intelligence on the planet Kamazotz, I’d film it in the Cathedral’s mausoleum.

I went back up to the nave, briefly admired the tapestries on the north and south walls, and looked again at the structure. It looked as though someone was trying to make a building that would have the same function as Union Station, but who had failed to capture that Station’s noble qualities. I looked at the concrete walls, with their patterned holes in those walls, and suddenly realized that it was the same building pattern used by L.A. Metro, the (so-called) rapid transit authority which mismanages the bus and train lines here. To complete the Metro analogy, at the east wall of the Cathedral was, not an icon of Our Lady, or a grand mosaic of Our Lord, the Creator of all (or Pantocrator), but instead a hazy image of a map of the Los Angeles Archdiocese, exactly like the sort of map of L.A. that would be found in any Metro terminal.

I finally saw a dim light at the east wall of the Cathedral which looked as though it might be a sanctuary light. I decided to overcome my tendency of not lightly walking in any sanctuary, and went to the front of the Cathedral to see what that light was. I finally saw that it was a standard official “Exit” light. Taking that for a sign, I decided to leave the building and return to the nearby Law Library to continue my work for that day.

The next time I visited the Cathedral, during great Lent of this last year, I decided to pay more attention to the tapestries. They were images of the saints, in almost photographic detail. The apostles were scattered among them, and everyone from St. John Chrysostom to the Venerable Bede to Mother Teresa. All were appropriately dressed and coiffed (with the two exceptions of Moses the Ethiopian [with dreadlocks], and St. Nicholas of Myra [dressed like a mediaeval Roman Bishop, instead of the patristic Greek Bishop which he was]. All were looking forward toward the so-called sanctuary. But I noticed that this time, there was a life-sized crucifix of dark wood between the Cardinal’s chair and the great coffee table, with a life-sized corpus upon the cross, carved and painted in Latin American style. I felt much better, although I still could not find any indication that our Lord Christ might be present in any other way.

As a side note, I was told by Fr. Alexei, my parish priest, and a senior official in the Archdiocese, that the crucifix had been placed there during that Lent for the benefit of those asking for it, and had been adopted by the Latino community as their own, and so it was not removed after Pascha. Whatever the reason, I was at least glad that for this great continuing Wedding party, someone had decided to remember the Founder of the Feast.

The third time that I visited the Cathedral, I spent a few minutes looking at the exhibits inside the south wall of the building. I happened to find a small sign, about 8” x 8”, which read, “Blessed Sacrament Chapel”. I followed the sign, and finally found the tabernacle. Or something resembling it.

What I found was a small room, built like a niche into one of the side entrances into the Cathedral nave. It had a small glass door, which had words etched in it saying that all were to remain silent. Perhaps twenty or thirty people could stand inside, and there were a small number of kneelers (I believe that they are also called prei-dieux, or something like that). There was something like a small, misshapen, bronze sarcophagus at the front of the “chapel”, in which I suppose the Blessed Body and Blood had been reserved. This thing would not have been at all out of place in the final “wedding” scene in the movie Beetlejuice. Many people were praying there, and the overwhelming feeling that I got there was sadness. I too prayed for a time, and then left.

As an aside, and as an eastern Catholic, I do not understand the apparent need of Westerners to have to see the Eucharist in order to adore it. We in the East think it far more important to consume the Sacred Body and Blood, and to consider it to be our Food and our Medicine of Immortality. Also, because its earthly form is leavened bread and unpreserved red wine, its form does not keep all that long.

Nonetheless, our Churches reserve some of the Sacred Body and Blood, not to adore it, but for the benefit of the sick and the suffering for whom our priests and deacons take the Eucharist to them, for their healing, their health, and their salvation. We also reserve the Eucharist during Great and Holy Lent for the Liturgy of the Presanctified Gifts, which we do because a canon of the early Church (once respected by both the East and the West) forbids us to confect the Eucharist during weekdays of Great Lent. Perhaps modern RC liturgists thought that by removing the tabernacle from the central visual focus of a church, they would be more in line with Eastern liturgical practice.

If so, they are mistaken. While we do not visually adore the reserved Eucharist, we honor it in the best way that we can. In the center of the sanctuaries of our churches, guarded and shielded by the iconostasis, is the altar, shaped in the form of a cube, as a type of the altar of sacrifice of the old Temple of Solomon. On the right front corner of that altar is placed the Book of the Gospels, to honor the presence of Christ the Word. But in the center of the altar, placed within a small wooden structure made to resemble that of the exterior of our churches, is reserved the Sacred Body and Blood, in the true center of our Church.

So, no, Todd, I do not think it is appropriate for you to blame those who cannot find the Eucharist in these new “churches” of yours. I think that it is the case that you are merely blaming the victim. But I think that your fault is far less than those modern RC liturgists, who seem intent on hiding the Victim.