Theology Essay

THEOLOGY ASSESSMENT TASK 3: MAJOR ESSAY
The term Paschal Mystery refers to Christ’s life, death and resurrection. It is a way of symbolising those events that lie at the heart of the Christian experience of salvation. The term “Paschal” comes from the Hebrew word “pesach” which refers to Israel’s annual commemoration of the first Passover where the Israelites were liberated from slavery in Egypt. It becomes, then, a fitting image for Jesus’ own Passover from death into the fullness of divine life in which we participate in. The Paschal Mystery does not just refer to Jesus’ death and resurrection, but also and very importantly to our participation in that mystery and as the central, ongoing reality in the life of the church. Therefore, what we are only beginning to grasp is the astounding concept that this mystery, is our mystery. We, who live, die and rise today as the body of Christ in the world. The Paschal Mystery occurs in the life of every one of us individually and in the life of the church as a whole. It plays itself out constantly in our daily lives as we choose fidelity to Christian discipleship by dying to self so that we, and others, may have fuller life. And it plays itself out in liturgy where we celebrate it in ritualised form. Everytime we gather for liturgy, we are the church visibly united in communal surrender to this dying and rising mystery which defines our lives. Within and through rite, we surrender as one body to this redemptive mystery, and as one body, we undergo transformation to new life.
In this essay, I will be discussing how Christ is involved in the Paschal mystery, how we as a Church are involved in the Paschal mystery, how we have access to this mystery in Liturgy and finally why Paschal mystery is so important to the understanding of what it is to be Christian.

HOW IS THE PASCHAL MYSTERY ABOUT JESUS? talk about life, death resurrection,
The notion of Paschal mystery revolves around Jesus – the event of his whole life, his death and his resurrection which accomplished our salvation.
Christ is our Pasch. He is the word made flesh for our salvation. He suffered for our sake and passed over from death to life showing us the way. “In the most biblical sense, the great mystery is that of secondarily the saving plan of God for humankind. This plan is a hidden reality made known only through revelation and therefore available in faith. ”
It is only with the resurrection that we perceive fully the Trinitarian character of the paschal event. In the resurrection, the revelation of the trinity appears in clear light – the father to whom is attributed the initiative in raising the son, the son who appears as the living one, and the spirit who is sent forth into the world. While the father takes the initiative in raising the Son and, as creator, brings his salvific plan for creation to its completion in the resurrection, the resurrection of Jesus is actually accomplished in the powerful transfiguring action of the Spirit of God. The Holy Spirit is also the milieu of the resurrection. It was the spirit who held open and bridged over the separation of the Father and the Son in the cross and descent into hell.
In Jesus’ life out of death, the wounds of his self surrendering love remain. He is the slain lamb. “This image of the slain lamb is an emblem of the vision of the Trinitarian relations as relations of total self surrender in love, as revealed in the paschal mystery.”

TALK ABOUT HOW CHRIST IS INVOLVED IN P.M THROUGH LITURGY, THROUGH CHURCH BUT NOT IN DETAIL.

CHURCH:
Christ is the head, and the church is the fullness of his body. It is through the church that the mystery of salvation is revealed. The relationship between Christ, who is the great sacrament of salvation, and the church, which is his body, is a great mystery. The figure of the church as the body of Christ is the basis of pauls appeal for Christian unity and fellowship. This unity is symbolized by the one bread of the eucharist

The church is the whole body, or congregation, of persons who are called by God the father to acknowledge the lordship of Jesus, the son, in word, in sacrament, in witness, and in service, and, through the power of the holy spirit, to collaborate with jesus’ historic mission for the sake of the kingdom of god

INTRO:
Define Paschal Mystery
State what I will be talking about eg. Church, liturgy (eucharist), baptism, Christ

PARAGRAPH 1 – Church

PARAGRAPH 2 – Liturgy (Eucharist)
PARAGRAPH 3 – baptism
PARAGRAPH 4 – Christ
CONCLUSION

CHURCH
As often as the sacrifice of the cross in which Christ our Passover was sacrificed, is celebrated on the altar, the work of our redemption is carried on, and, in the sacrament of the Eucharistic bread, the unity of all believes who form one body in Christ is both expressed and brought about. (VATICAN COUNCIL)
-the church has been seen as “a people made with the unity of the father, the son and the holy spirit” (Vatican)
-often the church has also been called the building of god.
-this temple ( the church), symbolized in places of worship built out of stone, is praised by the holy fathers and, not without reason, is compared in the liturgy to the holy city, the new Jerusalem. As living stones we here on earth are built into it (Vatican)
-the church is the people of god, whose king is Christ and whose history and charter is the bible. Under the authority of the apostles and their successors, the pope and bishops, the church continues the word and action and sacrifice of jesus. (the paschal mystery in the Christian year)
-Lumen gentium affirms that the church is a mystery, “a communion of faith, hope and love”, “a kind of sacrament or sign of intimate union with god” (church as graced communion lecture readings pg 3)
-the church exists only since Christ, only in Christ through his spirit, only by Christ, and only for Christ and the god he reveals. If it is ever separated from Christ, absolutized in itself, it ceases to be a Christian church and becomes just one more human institution among many in the world. The church is not only an institution which Christ established; it is also, and mysteriously, his body in the world (church as graced communion pg 3)
-without god, there would be no church, for there would be no men and women to be gathered into a people. No Christ to fashion the people as his own, no sending of the spirit to constitute the people-in-communion and to shower them wirth gifts. (church as graced communion pg 5)
READ REAST OF CHURCH AS GRACED COMMUNION . VERY IMPORTANT.
EUCHARIST & BAPTISM
In that Body the life of Christ is poured into the believers who, through the sacraments, are united in a hidden and real way to Christ who suffered and was glorified.(6*) Through Baptism we are formed in the likeness of Christ: "For in one Spirit we were all baptized into one body"(51). In this sacred rite a oneness with Christ's death and resurrection is both symbolized and brought about: "For we were buried with Him by means of Baptism into death"; and if "we have been united with Him in the likeness of His death, we shall be so in the likeness of His resurrection also"(52) Really partaking of the body of the Lord in the breaking of the Eucharistic bread, we are taken up into communion with Him and with one another. "Because the bread is one, we though many, are one body, all of us who partake of the one bread".(53) In this way all of us are made members of His Body,(54) "but severally members one of another".(55) (Vatican)
-the ‘passage’ of the lord is not only in the order of the past history. It is mysteriously renewed in the liturgy or sacred “mysteries” organized round the basic sacrament, the euccharist, for which baptism Is the preparation and initiation. By these rites the grace of god enters time and space. What jesus did once by dying and rising, he now does mystically in this ritual passage wherein, by means of signs, the death and resurrection of the savior are made present. (the paschal mystery in the Christian yr pg 14) To receive baptism, to participate in the Eucharist, having received the message of salvation, is to cling willingly. Wholeheartedly, actively, to Christ the redeemer who by means og his cross draws us with him towards the father. It is to discover the means of “dying with him in order to be glorified to him”. The liturgical or Eucharistic mystery is, therefore, a mystery of transformation, a real ‘passage’ with the lord. (the paschal mystery in the Christian yr pg 14)
- St paul uses the term body of Christ to mean 3 different things. First, it is the crucified and risen body of Christ; second, it is the lord’s body present in the lord’s supper; and finally, it is the union of the members of the church through the lord’s supper and the crucified and risen jesus. By being baptized, we are buried and made alive with crhist; thus we share in the body of the crucified and risen Christ, and through that identification we become united with one another and become “one body in Christ”. In other words, through baptism, and especially through the eucharist we are united with the crucified and risen jesus. We are united to one another by being united with him. He is the source nad the symbol of our unity, and our unity, in its turn, is a manifestation of his death and resurrection. (Andrew Greeley pg 56)
- In celebrating the eucharist we take on the mind and heart of jesus himself, opening ourselves, as he did, to everyone without exception and committing ourselves to the creation of a world where no one is excluded from the table. When jesus said “do this in memory of me”. He was asking us not only to repeat the celebration of the eucharist but also to fulfill the missionary mandate implied in the celebration. (Catholicism, pg 830)