Blessed, Blessing, Blessings!!

Ephesians, Chapter 1 – My first fully Catholic Bible Study.

In case you missed my first post in this series, I am leading a Catholic Bible Study through the lens of the Catechism of the Catholic Church (CCC). This is opening up the Scriptures in a marvelous new way for me – giving St. Paul’s letter an ecclesial dimension I’d never seen in my favorite book of the Bible while loving it as only an Evangelical Christian can.

Cross-referencing to Church teachings (see the Citations Index at the back of the Catechism), I came away from Chapter 1 with one word resounding in my soul: BLESSING! It’s not that the author used the word so much, but that the Church amplified it so fully through the Catechism.

St. Paul says, “Blessed be God…who has blessed us.” (Eph. 1:3). The Catechism (especially CCC 2627, 1083, 1671) kept me from breezing past the word (as though it had been uttered in response to a sneeze!).

Blessing – the “basic movement of Christian prayer,” “encounter between God and man,” “God’s gift and man’s acceptance of it, …united in dialogue with each other.” (CCC 2626) No wonder you’ll hear Ephesians read in Years A, B and C at Mass on the Feast of the Ascension! “Prayer ascends in the Holy Spirit through Christ to the Father – we bless him for having blessed us; it implores the grace of the Holy Spirit that descends through Christ from the Father – he blesses us.” (CCC 2627) Burned into my mind, no, is the image of Christ ascending like my prayers ascend, so that the Holy Spirit may return to me, descending to bless, in a continual movement of interaction with God. Bless my soul! I can hardly go on, this so captivated me.

My next surprise? A blessing is a sacramental. (Does everyone already know this? I’ve been a Catholic for 18 years now, and the light just went on!) “Among sacramental, blessings (of persons, meals, objects and places) come first.” (CCC 1671) I had to back up a bit to make sure I understood sacramentals.

“Sacramentals…prepare us to receive grace and dispose us to cooperate with it. …There is scarcely any proper use of material things which cannot be thus directed toward the sanctification of men and the praise of God.” (CCC 1670) Wow! I bless food before I eat, but always thought of that as an expression of my thankfulness. Here, I understood the blessing to be preparing this nacho, this salad, this steak to be a means by which God could convey grace – spiritual nourishment! – to me, and prepare me to receive supernatural food through mere substances.

Have you blessed your computer today? Your car? Your bed? Your shower? Your coat? Your coffee? Your medications? Your smart phone? Well, get busy! “…every baptized person is called…to bless.” (CCC 1669) That’s you! That’s me! We have work to do!

We had a priest bless our home, animals, and bee hives, but it never occurred to me to make the rounds myself, blessing all the material things that surround my family and friends. But this beautiful, vertical movement of blessing between God and me is meant to turn ‘horizontal’ and move His grace outward from me as I return – as blessing turns – material things to Him for “the sanctification of men and the praise of God”! “The dual dimension of the Christian liturgy [is] a response of faith and love to the spiritual blessings the Father bestows on us…” (CCC 1083)

I’m on verse three of Chapter 1 and seeing the Liturgy of the Church as I’ve never seen it before – supporting me, directing me in this priestly role of blessing. This may be the slowest Bible Study on record!

Next up: Ephesians, Chapter 1, Part Two: Ways and Means, Means, Means