Liturgy: The Church's Spirituality
Bruce T. Morrill, S.J.

BAPTISM: THE LIVING SACRAMENT OF LENT

In the Catholic Church today the Season of Lent is undergoing a renewal that was mandated by the Second Vatican Council. As part of the larger liturgical cycle of Easter, Lent prepares us for the celebration of the Easter Triduum (Holy Thursday through Easter Sunday evening). The sacramental key to Easter is the celebration of Christian baptism (along with confirmation and the Eucharist) at the Easter Vigil. As the highlight of the entire liturgical year, the Vigil includes the liturgy of baptism, wherein new members of the Church are baptized, and "old" members renew their baptismal promises of faith. Assembled together in this profound annual celebration, all the baptized share the joy of being the members of the body of the risen Christ now in the world.

Lent is the forty-day period of final, intensive preparation for those who will be initiated (through baptism, confirmation, and Eucharist) at the Easter Vigil. This Lenten period is thus also part of the entire process whereby the Church initiates adults (and children who have reached the age of reason) fully into the body of Christ: The Rite of Christian Initiation of Adults (RCIA). The RCIA is lengthy, comprised of four stages:

1. a period of inquiry and evangelization,

2. the catechumenate,

3. the period of purification and enlightenment, and

4. the season of mystagogy.

Based on the rituals of the earliest Christian centuries, the RCIA has over the past two decades become a powerful means not only for forming new Christians but also for reforming and renewing all the members of local church communities. The third period of the RCIA directly coincides with Lent. In order to understand the richness of this liturgical convergence let us briefly consider some key elements of the RCIA.

Key Elements of the RCIA

The RCIA leaves to local needs and pastoral judgment the fixing of two or three annual dates for accepting people into the order of catechumens. During the catechumenate, members of the local church serve as catechists and sponsors to the catechumens, forming them in faith through doctrine (the Church's teachings), practices of liturgy and prayer, and acts of service in the world. In American churches the acceptance of people into the catechumenate is generally celebrated during a Sunday Mass. Each Sunday thereafter, the catechumens are formally dismissed from the assembly toward the end of the Liturgy of the Word. The assembly watches as the catechist and sponsors lead the catechumens to their own separate, continued reflection on the Word. The faithful then pray for them during the General Intercessions.

The RCIA has an even greater impact on the community's Sunday celebrations during Lent. With the Church having discerned their election to the Easter sacraments, the catechumens are now called the "elect." Lent is the Period of Purification and Enlightenment for the elect, their time of intensive preparation for baptism, confirmation, and Eucharist. The Liturgy of the Word for the third, fourth, and fifth Sundays of Lent focuses on the elect. Special readings from the Gospel of John each week provide the source for the priest to preach homilies that help the elect to discern concretely how Christ is calling them from the darkness of sin into his own marvelous Light. The scrutiny then takes place in the form of intercessions, with the assembly praying over the elect, who kneel or bow in the midst of the community. The priest then prays an exorcism, asking God to protect the elect from evil and the reign of sin. Finally, he dismisses the elect, telling them how much the community looks forward to their joining the assembly soon for the Liturgy of the Eucharist at the Easter Vigil.

RCIA and the Renewal of the Community of Faith

What a profound gift the elect are to the entire community of faith! During the Sunday Masses of Lent the elect become tangible, living signs (i.e., the sacraments) of God's salvation of humanity in Christ. As the priest (with the help of the sponsors and catechists) scrutinizes, exorcises, and exhorts the elect, all of the members of the assembled church are drawn into these spiritual exercises. Seeing how God is now intensely forming these new believers for fullness of life in baptism, the faithful "in the pews" are led to scrutinize themselves in light of the Gospel, to realign their own lives with the baptism they have already undergone. Lent thereby becomes a retreat for the entire local church, a time set aside for remembering that all of our lives are an ongoing conversion away from sin and toward the Gospel.

Jesuit Father Bruce Morrill teaches in the Department of Theology at Boston College.