In our North American society, there is
little doubt that our lives are governed by the school calendar: summer
vacation, Christmas vacation, March or Spring break. Even when nobody in our immediate lives is in
school, this calendar still affects us.
One just needs to look at vacation package prices for Spring/March break
to be reminded of this reality.
In a society that lives within this
academic-year backdrop, it is no surprise that the “graduation model” permeates
so much of people’s thinking about the sacraments that we celebrate with young
people and their families. Think of the
requirements needed to obtain a High School Diploma: courses that need to be
completed, certain grades that must be attained, a defined minimum number of credits
in subject categories, and a minimum number of hours in each of those
credits. This need to complete these
permeates this graduation model.
This graduation paradigm is reinforced
when we speak in terms of knowledge to be gained, work to be done, hoops to be jumped
through, before a child or young person can celebrate a sacrament. You need to
do this – in order to get that. All of
“these things” need to be done before you get the carrot at the end of the
stick – whatever sacrament that might be.
Once you have graduated you have completed the task. Just as graduation is seen as the end point,
so the sacrament is seen as the end point.
We also live in a culture where
experiences are treated as commodities, where the experience of praying and chanting
compline in a chapel with monks is then packaged as a CD to be played in the
background at a dinner party or cocktail hour.
A mystical spiritual experience that requires time and effort on the
part of a participant is now packaged for “atmosphere” and demands nothing of
the hearer, let alone that person’s attention.
The graduation paradigm also fits this approach, treating sacraments as
commodities. Something must be “done” so
something can be “obtained.”
We need a paradigm shift here: a shift
from graduation to initiation.
Now, the initiation paradigm sees the
preparation for and the celebration of baptism, confirmation and Eucharist as
incorporation into the life of the church.
Initiation is the opposite of graduation. Initiation sees each of these sacraments as a
beginning, as a start, as immersion into the life of Christ, not
as an ending, or as a final goal.
How do we make such a shift?
First, we need to see how we operate out
of the “graduation” model as ministers within the church. How often do we treat the sacraments as
commodities that we dole out when people have achieved a certain knowledge
base, or have done a certain number of community service hours, or made a
certain number of visits to the church?
I remember a parishioner who was absolutely distraught one Sunday
morning a number of years ago. The
source of her distress was a comment that the mother of a family had made to
one of her children who was literally tearing the songbook to shreds: “Don’t
worry, honey, after today we only have to come back here one more time.” Have we forgotten that readiness to celebrate
a sacrament is connected to relationship: relationship with God and with the
local believing community? Hoops, hoops,
hoops. Come to this Mass, present this
letter, receive this cross, get your name checked off … We need to examine ourselves: does the graduation
model not lurk in all these approaches?
We also need to name the difference for our
parishioners. Let’s use clear examples
of the difference between the two mindsets.
When we speak to families of young people who are preparing for the
sacrament of confirmation, we can quite literally speak of how a child who
graduates from elementary school is no longer welcome in that school without a
“Visitor” badge from the office. In this
situation graduation means completion and departure. Celebrating a sacrament of initiation is the
exact opposite of graduation: it is
about belonging and inclusion.
Regardless of the timing and order of the sacraments of Initiation, each
one and all three together are about incorporation into the life of Christ, who
brings us into the shared life of the Trinity.
When we work with children and families
who seek a sacrament, there is a catechesis relevant to the sacrament that is
being anticipated. This is different
from religious education. Ongoing
religious education, either in a Catholic school, or in the parish and home
setting, differs from the formation and catechesis that are linked to
initiation sacraments. In religious education,
participants fill in books, and get stickers and perhaps even grades. And they pass from one grade to another. Religious education rightly falls within the
scope of the graduation paradigm.
Preparation for sacraments of initiation does not fit this
paradigm. Some parishes expect
candidates for a sacrament to participate in a certain number of community
service hours. Community service is a
good thing. Years ago the Province of
Ontario instituted a specific number of community service hours as a
requirement for graduation from secondary school. Seen in this light, a set number of community
service hours as a requirement for young people preparing for Confirmation
reinforces the graduation mindset.
Publicly stating this, and encouraging candidates to see service as a
way we live our life as Catholic Christians, not merely as something (or worse
– as a hoop) to be “done” in order to “get” confirmed, can allow both parents
and children to make this shift as well.
A number of historical and cultural
factors have influenced our mindset and impacted on our parish practices. The graduation model encourages people to see
sacraments as end goals, instead of moments that invite us into continued
relationship with our Triune God. What
we as church are about in the sacraments of baptism, confirmation and Eucharist
is initiation: bringing people into this life of God lived in the community of
the Church gathered around the table of the Eucharist. Until we as pastors, catechists, religious
educators, sacramental preparation leaders and co-ordinators realize the need
for this shift from graduation to initiation, the people we serve will hardly
be able to make this shift themselves.
Written by Fr. Larry Léger and originally published in Celebrate! March –
April 2010
