Liturgy and sacrament book

• The color of clerical vestments carries symbolic meaning in the liturgy.
• Covenanted People

  God repeatedly called the people of Israel and continues to call Jews and Christians to a covenant relationship with different purposes and partners. Covenants with Noah, Abraham, Sarah, Moses, and the promise of a "new covenant" in Jeremiah. Christians believe this new covenant is the coming of Jesus Christ. The covenant relationship is a fundamental aspect of biblical religion, emphasizing the communal nature of faith and the relationship between God and the chosen people
• The corporate nature of God's revelation to a chosen people and the corporate response of that people to God through conversion to biblical faith, ritualized in liturgy and sacraments, derives from the fundamental communal experience of faith found in the biblical witness. Israel's and the church's nature as corporate entities is an essential principle for understanding sacraments
• Scriptural Foundations

  • The biblical authors have written about aspects of liturgy and sacraments, either directly or indirectly emphasizing aspects of the biblical experience of God and the chosen people. This follows from the nature of revelation as the intervention of God in human history. The fulfillment of revelation is Christ, towards whom the Old Testament leads. Seven themes offer foundational aspects of the biblical witness grounding the church's experience of revelation and salvation in sacramental liturgy
• The Sacraments

  • Word of the Father, Jesus Christ, invites us into a covenant relationship within the communion of the church. The covenant relationship is highlighted in the Gospel of Matthew and the canticle of Zechariah. It is a relationship of faith and love, belonging to one another in the covenant relationship with God. The covenant relationship is articulated in the fourth Eucharistic Prayer at Mass
• We experience God together

  • We go to God together
  • We bear one another’s burdens because we are in this privileged, covenant relationship together
• Response of people to God through conversion to biblical faith, ritualized in liturgy and sacraments


  Derives from the fundamental communal experience of faith found in the biblical witness
• Salvation has its roots in a healing metaphor from the Latin salus, meaning “health, welfare, salvation”
• Remembering is pivotal throughout the Bible, liturgy, and sacraments
• Humanity inherited a separation from God due to the sin of our first parents, Adam and Eve
• Christ’s obedience is the antidote to the disobedience of Adam and Eve, restoring what was lost through them
• Salvation and redemption are found and experienced in the celebration of liturgy and sacraments
• Jesus Christ is referred to as “the second Adam” who overcame what was inherited from sinful Adam and Eve
• Redemption has its roots in an economic metaphor, meaning “to buy back”
• Human beings are made “good” in God’s image and likeness, but also share a certain distance and separation from God due to disobedience
• Salvation and redemption are used regularly in the Bible and in the prayer texts of the liturgy and sacraments
• Israel’s and the church’s nature as corporate entities

  • Essential principle for understanding sacraments
• In the sacraments, we experience the fullness of God’s salvation and redemption for us in Christ
• At the Last Supper, Jesus said, “Do this in memory of me,” articulating the inherent biblical ritual that comes to us in liturgy and sacraments
• Biblical ritual


  • Acts of liturgy and sacraments are essentially acts of memory
  • Engaging in an "act of remembrance" in the sacraments asks something specific of God
  • Asking God to act kindly toward us when making memory or engaging in an act of remembrance
• Present experience of salvation and redemption through acts of memory leads to yearning for their fulfillment in the future
• Zikkaron


  Hebrew term behind the biblical term anamnesis, which is Greek for "memorial"
• Liturgy and sacraments involve a biblical notion of time where saving events in the past can also be a saving event in the present
• Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy from Vatican II: 'At the Last Supper, on the night when He was betrayed, our Saviour instituted the eucharistic sacrifice of His Body and Blood. He did this in order to perpetuate the sacrifice of the Cross throughout the centuries until He should come again, and so to entrust to His beloved spouse, the Church, a memorial of His death and resurrection: a sacrament of love, a sign of unity, a bond of charity, a paschal banquet in which Christ is eaten, the mind is filled with grace, and a pledge of future glory is given to us. (no. 47)'
• Psalmist: 'In you I hope all day long because of your goodness, O Lord. Remember your mercy, Lord, and the love you have shown from of old. Do not remember the sins of my youth. In your love remember me. (Ps 25:6-7) [Breviary translation]'
• For Jews, the central act of their salvation is the Passover. For Christians, the central act of salvation is the entire event of Christ's obedient life, death, resurrection, and ascension to his Father's right hand in glory
• Perpetuation of saving actions of God on our behalf through liturgy and sacraments allows these actions to be experienced again and again in the present
• Saving events like the Exodus Passover and Christ's death and resurrection are perpetuated through the sacred rituals of Passover and Christian liturgy and sacraments
• Christian liturgy and sacraments: '“Thy kingdom come”'
• Covenants of biblical religion lead to the experience of the new covenant in and through Christ, our Savior and Redeemer
• People of Jewish and Christian traditions are people of the Bible
• Words do something in religions based on scriptures
• Experience dying and rising in our own lives here and now, and await our call from this life to life eternal
• Understanding of time in liturgy and sacraments

  Present experience of salvation and redemption through acts of memory leads to yearning for their fulfillment in the future
• Repeated proclamation of God's word through the Scriptures characterizes services of the word in Jewish synagogues and every act of Christian liturgy and sacrament
• Proclamation of the word in every act of Christian liturgy and sacraments is derived from the synagogue service
• Corporate ritual acts of memorial help recall God’s intervention in saving history as recounted in the Scriptures
• Jewish people: '“Next year in Jerusalem”'
• Central pillars of Jewish piety and ritual: synagogue, home, temple
• God spoke and acted among the chosen people of Israel through his proclaimed and revealed word