Tom Hill

21. English Major.

Thoughts on Sacraments

“A sacrament is an outward sign of God’s love, they taught me when I was a boy, and in the Catholic Church there are seven. But, no, I say, for the Church is catholic, the world is catholic, and there are seventy times seven sacraments, to infinity.”

-Andre Dubus 

  This past summer, I read a collection of essays by the late writer Andre Dubus. He was one of the great short story writers of the late twentieth century, but after an accident that robbed him of a leg and of the ability to walk, he turned to writing nonfiction. In his essays, he writes of his deepened Catholic faith and of his experiences living in a wheelchair. His essay, “Sacraments” is one of the best personal essays I have ever read, and recounts Dubus’s belief that sacraments extend beyond those defined by the Catholic Church. For Dubus, writing was a sacrament, as was smoking and making sandwiches for his daughters. Running was a sacrament Dubus had cultivated during his time in the Marines as a young man, and after his accident, he was unable to walk or run, yet his memories of being a “biped” was a new kind of sacrament, something that brought him closer to God and made him a more spiritual man. Perhaps most important to Dubus was Holy Eucharist, which he tried to receive everyday throughout his life.

  Since reading “Sacraments”, Dubus’s worldview has fascinated me. While his Catholic faith was important to him, he viewed everyday activities as equally as important as receiving the official sacraments. Dubus never proselytized, he was not religious writer, he was simply a writer who sometimes wrote about religion. His writing is inspiring though, because it establishes a connection between God and the world that is not based necessarily on just the narrow confines of Catholic sacraments. Holy Communion and Mass, for Dubus, simply reaffirmed what he already saw in the world: outward signs of love from God and from himself, toward others. Dubus seems to be saying that the Catholic Church does not have a stranglehold on sacraments, they are available to everyone.

  I have received sacraments drunk, and I have received sacraments sober. I once sat silently, with a girl, on the front porch for an hour, neither of us speaking, her arm linked in mine. The warm weight of her arm was a reminder, a sacrament. For an hour, all I wanted was to sit with her, to know she was present, to feel God through her.

  Conversation around a fire is a sacrament. Waking the next morning and smelling it on your clothes is a sacrament. Rain and the calmness it provides is a sacrament. Working is a sacrament, and sleeping is a sacrament. Infatuation is a sacrament and love is a sacrament. What makes me so sure? Because in them, I feel what I feel at Mass: desire, comfort, gratitude, happiness. 

  I remember being young, at Mass. The priest saying,

  “You must wait for the slow unfolding of God’s plan. It is not your plan, it is His. God may ask you to bend over backwards, or sideways, or hardly at all, but you must do it and not be afraid. God bends with you.”

  As a child, I don’t think I bought what the priest was selling. Now, however, I understand it better. There will be suffering too, but suffering does not negate the good things in the world. Suffering serves to strengthen, and it presents an opportunity for those of us who are not suffering to alleviate other’s suffering. But, I feel I am beginning to sound lofty. 
On the not-so-good-days, I think back on my sacraments. I remember a person’s eyes. I think about bagging groceries, about walking to work. I remember the last day of high school, the air wet with spring. I see my father crying at the wake of my grandmother. Most of all, I relive the times I felt the sacrament in me expanding, pulsing with newness. These were the times I realized something was beautiful, and whether it lasted or not, I would always have it. And I think about the words of my childhood priest, and I understand, that yes, sometimes God asks you to bend hardly at all.

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