Paschal Mystery: Path to Union

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The underlying mystery of much of the deposit of faith is the Paschal Mystery. It is the catch-all term for the central mystery of salvation history: the passion, death, resurrection, and ascension of Jesus, and the sending of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost. In RCIA this year, I tried and somewhat succeeded to teach a class on it. The Paschal Mystery is a bit unwieldy as mysteries go, due to its incredible breadth. Pastors, teachers, and the faithful have contemplated the Paschal Mystery since the earliest days of the Church. Two thousand years later, we cannot exhaust its richness and beauty.

How do we make sense of such an incredible mystery? It involves so many subjects that could be semester-long courses on their own: redemptive suffering, the Eucharist, how Jesus fulfilled the prophecies of the Old Testament, ecclesiology, and the action of the Holy Spirit. And just to be clear, we cannot completely sort out the Paschal Mystery. That should not stop us, however, from contemplating the mystery with the two wings of faith and reason.

For a mystery so great as this, I think it’s important to wrestle with it and try to gain insights from our heavenly Father from it. One of the fruits we can mine from contemplating the Paschal Mystery is union with God.

Time Runs into Eternity

The union of God and humanity is nothing new in Sacred Scripture. Throughout the Old Testament, God joined Himself to Israel with a series of covenants. In the Paschal Mystery, Jesus effected the new covenant. Jesus became incarnate, so that we could become incarnated in Him. Time as we know it does not constrain Our Lord’s divine work: the passion and death of Jesus is an eternal thunderbolt piercing space and time, reaching from the beginning of human history to the very end.

All other historical events happen once, and then they pass away, swallowed up in the past. the Paschal mystery of Christ, by contrast, cannot remain only in the past, because by his death he destroyed death, and all that Christ is – all that he did and suffered for all men – participates in the divine eternity, and so transcends all times while being made present in them all (Catechism of the Catholic Church 1085).

An ancient homily for Holy Saturday mystically recounts Jesus descending into hell and bringing Adam and Eve into heaven. Jesus came for our first parents, you and me, and every person who will live after us. As only the divine Son of God can do, He set His face on the past, on the present, and the ultimate eternal destination of every man and woman.

So why is this important? It validates St. Teresa of Calcutta’s beautiful meditation, “I Thirst.” On the cross, Jesus’ thirst was for souls. Mother Teresa’s meditation has Our Lord repeating over and over, “I thirst for you.” The union with humanity that Christ thirsted for was union with you and me. Can we ever contemplate that enough?

The Eucharist

In a sense, the Eucharist is the incarnation—the Word becoming flesh—of the Paschal Mystery. The holy sacrifice of the Mass remains the fullest celebration of the Paschal Mystery that the Church can offer (Catechism #1067). Building on the last point, we participate in the heavenly liturgy every time we go to Mass. That is, Jesus’ eternal offering of Himself to the Father, in the Holy Spirit (Catechism #1090).

We cannot neglect to see how down to earth the Paschal Mystery is being made for us. The Holy Trinity makes the first move toward us so that we can move toward God—and the Eucharist exemplifies this.

Our union with Christ, which is a gift and grace for each of us, makes it possible for us, in him, to share in the unity of his body which is the Church. The Eucharist reinforces the incorporation into Christ which took place in Baptism though the gift of the Spirit (cf. 1 Cor 12:13, 27). (John Paul II, Ecclesia de Eucharistia #5)

Every time we approach the altar of sacrifice and receive holy communion, Jesus unites Himself to us. This surpassingly precious gift needs to be received in full union with Christ, the Church, and all her beliefs and teachings. For this reason, St. Paul warned the Corinthians about partaking in the Eucharist worthily, and not eating and drinking judgment upon themselves (1 Corinthians 11:27-32).

Jesus can do incredible things with a heart fully united to Him!

The Church

The Catholic Church was birthed out of the Paschal Mystery in multiple ways. First, Jesus instituted the Eucharist and the priesthood at the Last Supper. Second, Jesus destroyed the power of sin and death with his passion and resurrection; enabling Him to grant the apostles the authority to bind and loose (John 20:22-23). Third, Jesus ascended into heaven just after commissioning the apostles to make disciples of all nations, and baptize in the name of the Holy Trinity. Finally, the Church received the power to do all of these things on Pentecost in the Holy Spirit.

The Eucharist unifies and builds the Church; the forgiveness of sins participates in Jesus’ saving action on the cross and heals the wounded human race; baptism unites us to Jesus; the Holy Spirit further unites us to Jesus and gives us the capacity to lead a Christ-like life. In this light of the establishment of the Church, the Paschal Mystery glows especially bright in unifying humanity to God.

Someday, God willing, we will experience the fullness of what the Paschal Mystery promises: complete union with God.

The End and the Beginning

Seeing the end brings us back to the start. For, in the beginning, God created humanity out of love. When we strayed, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit undertook the Paschal Mystery to not only restore our station but to advance it to eternal heights. What wondrous love is this that awaits us!

For through his Paschal Mystery, he accomplished the marvelous deed, by which he has freed us from the yoke of sin and death, summoning us to the glory of being now called a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for your own possession, to proclaim everywhere your mighty works, for you have called us out of darkness into your own wonderful light (Preface I of the Sundays in Ordinary Time).

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5 thoughts on “Paschal Mystery: Path to Union”

  1. Pingback: Advancing in the Spiritual Life - Catholic Stand

  2. Pingback: VVEDNESDAY EDITION – Big Pulpit

  3. Your beautiful humbleness of heart is beautiful. My Dad raised me, started when I was five years old, on the Summa, and on the extreme importance of the meaning of words and what they will tell to the student and reader. So these kinds of things I notice. Every word you say when teaching and discussing, your students might well take in and think on and share with others, because this is what the teacher said. Yours is a very great responsibility. Receive the leading and guiding of the Holy Spirit, always. God our Father Loves to Father us, and Jesus so loves us too!
    God bless, from a rather old woman who is a cradle Catholic of the old days, with twelve solid years of Catholic Academy schooling, and because my Dad always let me ask questions during our “Aquinas discussions”, I carried that over to my freshman religion class and was promptly told, on the first day, that I was notvto ask any more questions for the year!

    C-Marie

  4. Thanks C-Marie for your comments.
    1) You’re right, the usage of incarnate was imprecise and a different word like incorporate would have been better.
    2) A more precise word would have been the homily mystically “envisions” or something along those lines.
    3) You’re reading something into that sentence that isn’t there. Jesus became man for the sake of every person–what we do with that, as you pointed out (and again in #5), is a different story. That line doesn’t equate to universalism, and I don’t think it hints at it either.
    4) You’re right on this in a formal way, but by starting the sentence with “In a sense…” I was shooting for a more contemplative (?) thought. You’re right that the Eucharist isn’t a becoming of something, and that I could’ve said better. But there is a theological/analogical link between the Incarnation and the Eucharist, even if the two things are different mysteries.
    5) I meant “God willing” in the colloquial sense and a different phrase would have worked better.
    God bless,
    John

  5. 1.”Jesus became incarnate, so that we could become incarnated in Him.”

    Incarnate means to become embodied in flesh or the taking on of flesh whose original nature is immaterial. Therefore, we do not become incarnated in Christ.

    2.”An ancient homily for Holy Saturday mystically recounts Jesus descending into hell and bringing Adam and Eve into heaven. Jesus came for our first parents, you and me, and every person who will live after us. As only the divine Son of God can do, He set His face on the past, on the present, and the ultimate eternal destination of every man and woman.”

    We do not know if or that Jesus brought Adam and Eve into Heaven. We do know that they knew God, and that they decided that they would rather believe the devil and be like gods, but we do know this: “God knows well that as soon as you eat this fruit your eyes will be opened, and you yourselves will be like gods, knowing good and evil.” Genesis 3: 5.

    3.”Jesus came for our first parents, you and me, and every person who will live after us.”

    This sentence could be mistakenly taken to mean that Jesus will take everyone to Heaven. He did come to accomplish salvation for all, and He did so, but free will can refuse this gift.

    4. In a sense, the Eucharist is the incarnation—the Word becoming flesh—of the Paschal Mystery. The holy sacrifice of the Mass remains the fullest celebration of the Paschal Mystery that the Church can offer (Catechism #1067). Building on the last point, we participate in the heavenly liturgy every time we go to Mass. That is, Jesus’ eternal offering of Himself to the Father, in the Holy Spirit (Catechism #1090).

    Actually, the Eucharist is not the Word becoming flesh. It is not the Word becoming at all. It is Jesus Christ, the Word of God, Who IS Incarnated. And the incarnated Son of God, Jesus, said, “This is My Body. This is My Blood.” He Who was and is Incarnate spoke the miracle into being. The bread and wine are not incarnated … see the definition of incarnate above.

    Plus, the miracle of the Holy Eucharist, is the only miracle that had no physically seen results, that I can think of.

    5.”Someday, God willing, we will experience the fullness of what the Paschal Mystery promises: complete union with God.”

    God IS willing that all of humanity experience the fullness of what the Paschal Mystery promises: complete union with God. That was and is the WHOLE point of Jesus becoming Incarnate.

    It is Us who use our free will to receive God’s Son as our Lord, our Saviour, and our God, or to NOT do so, and if we choose to not do so, it is our own selves who keep us from complete union with God. God has already proven His will towards us.

    God bless, C-Marie

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