Andrew Meredith’s Reviews > Rites of the New Humanity: Essays on Sacramental Theology > Status Update

This chapter traces back to his influential teaching which sparked the long-running debate between whether the sacraments convey the "res" (substance) or whether they only symbolize the "res," and then Leithart challenges the whole paradigm altogether utilizing another of Augustine's (historically neglected) teachings.

Those who affirm a sacramental economy of grace and those who deny it share the fundamental assumption that interior grace is what matters. Whether the elements are vessels somehow transmitting the grace to the recipient or mere symbols meant to bring it to mind for edifying contemplation, the sacraments are understood in both views as material accommodations to our (defective) physicality. Bluntly, both assume that the human encounter with God takes place at a deeper, internal, spiritual level than the material level (gnostically implying that embodiment itself is an infirmity to be overcome).

Compounding the problem, this dualism has, since the time of medieval spiritualism (mysticism) and Renaissance humanism, been allied with a semi-Marcionite understanding of the relationship between the Old Covenant and the New. Explicitly taught by many evangelical expositors today, the Old was earthly, material, and "this world focused," while the New is heavenly, spiritual, and "next world focused." In this paradigm, Jesus came to rescue us from what is material/temporal, and deliver us to what is spiritual/eternal. Salvation itself becomes ontological (overcoming finitude), rather than ethical (overcoming sin and death).

Leithart finds the root of the issue in the distinction Augustine made between "signum" (the sign) and "res" (the substance of the signification). Originally, Augustine's intent was to show continuity between the Old and New Covenants. The "signum" (the Sacraments; i.e., the sacrificial system, holy days, etc.) could change while the "res" (Christ) remained the same. But, he took the idea in his shadow/substance metaphor to the point of downplaying the "signum" itself, as if the symbol was only to get the substance (a completely different thing altogether) into our minds.

This epistemological chasm between symbols and the things they symbolize has recently been philosophically and culturally challenged by various language studies. Humans, designed as locution-oriented creatures, think in images/symbols/stories/language (the latter of which is just sophisticated symbol transmission).

Interestingly, one doesn't have to go very far to encounter a historico-theological basis on which to build a more coherent, sociological view of the sacraments because Augustine himself provides it in his "Contra Faustum."

In brief, Augustine focuses his attention in the work on the "Totus Christus" (Whole Christ: meaning Christ and His Church as One "Spirit"-ual Body), and then teaches that it is the WHOLE Christ that was prefigured in the Old Testament sacraments and fulfilled in the New Testament sacraments. This renders them tangible, social, and material as well as spiritual. By the very act of partaking of the one bread, we are acting out the one body nature of Christ.

Concretely, if the "res" of the sacrament is the Totus Christus, and if the goal of the sacrament is to unify the Church in Christ, then contemplating the sacrament (questionably assuming that's what we're even suppose to do with it) does not bring something else to mind. What is sensibly apparent is what is accomplished (both shown forth and reinforced), the unity of the Body.

Furthermore, the dualism of "outward sign of an inward grace" paradigm is erased when we take into account the corporate nature of both sin and grace. If human sickness consists in strife, violence, and other disruptions of the community that potentially prevent table fellowship, as well as sins of the heart, and if salvation consists in gathering all nations into one Body, then the form of the sacrament is simply indistinguishable from the grace.

Question: "What is accomplished by gathering these people for this meal?"

Answer: "To gather these people for this meal."

The act is the point, is the sign, is the healing, as we all sit down together in brotherly fellowship with one another and with Christ (the Totus Christus).

Most interesting thought: Augustine offers a metaphor of verb conjugation in "Contra Faustum" to explain how the Old and New Covenants relate to one another as future tense and past tense.

Anyone who studies language knows that (most) verbs have a root that all conjugations of that verb build off of in various ways. For instance, in Latin amō (I love) is the root/present tense, amābō (I will love) is the future tense, and amāvī (I loved) is the (perfect) past tense. In the same way, the elaborate Old Covenant sacramental system was future tense, looking forward to Christ, the simpler New Covenant sacramental system is past tense, looking back to Christ, but the root was and is the Totus Christus.