The Word that Comes to Us
On why participation trumps juxtaposition in the liturgy
In the liturgical movement, there has been an emphasis on the ordo of the liturgy.1 But where some have emphasised the metaphysics of participation, such as Alexander Schmemann,2 Lutheran theologian Gordon W. Lathrop, has a structuralist approach, which has been very influential on reforms, particularly in the Lutheran tradition.3 For Lathrop,4 the nature of liturgy concerns structure and he is very concerned with what the ordo means. And for him, the key word to understand the ordo, and the liturgy as a whole, is what he calls juxtaposition: “Meaning occurs through structure, by one thing set next to another.”5 The focal point is not the actions themselves but how they relate to each other. And as a theological rationale for this, he cites St. Augustine’s famous dictum: accedit verbum ad elementum, et fit sacramentum,6 translated by Lathrop as “the word comes to the element and so there is a sacrament.”7 John Gibb translates it as “the word is added to the element, and there results the Sacrament”,8 while Laurence Shapcote, himself translating Thomas Aquinas, translates this as “the word is added to the element and this becomes a sacrament.”9 I have come to prefer Lathrop’s rendering of accedit, as “comes to”, because it seems more accurate on a purely grammatical level, as accēdere means “to go to”, “to come toward”, “to approach”, or “to reach”, while “to add” would be a more natural translation if the verb was addere,10 but also on a theological level, as it better captures the nature of the liturgy as divine gift.
God Himself is sending His word to the element, through the work of the Holy Spirit. While the priest does add the words to the elements, by speaking them, he does so in the name of Christ or in the person of Christ, in persona Christi.11 The word of God, which is God, comes, then, to the elements and creates the sacrament. The problem I have, however, is that this seems to be undermined by Lathrop’s view of liturgy.
In some sense, he is correct. Every element of the liturgy is interpreted in context. If, for example, you add a poem that is not explicitly Christian to a liturgical celebration, it is perfectly natural to interpret that text in the context and to “baptise” it, to use one of C. S. Lewis’ phrases.12 But Lathrop’s use of the verb “comes” in the translation illustrates the problem with his approach. As I have noted, “Lathrop presents the liturgy in terms of a set of relations and juxtapositions”, which presupposes “a structuralist (and consequentially immanentist) philosophy.”13 He should, rather, follow someone like Schmemann, who emphasises “the primordial relation to Christ.”14
And this is precisely where I find Lathrop’s view self-contradictory. Juxtaposition presupposes that the various elements are related horizontally, which they may do to each other, while St. Augustine’s dictum presupposes that they are related vertically to God, who comes through His word. The important element here is that this is a gift. The main direction of travel is neither side to side, between creatures, nor upwards, from creatures to God, but downwards, from God to creatures. The priority is on grace, coming to us.
As French ressourcement theologian Yves Congar notes: “Before being latreutic, and in order to be latreutic, the Christian sacramental cult is theurgic and soteriological: it does not consist at first in offering, in making something rise up from us to God, but in receiving the effective gift of God.”15 A theurgic approach, which underscores the divine work over human achievement, emphasises that the liturgical elements, whether words or objects, participate in the divine. And they do so not by being related to it horizontally, as if they are on the same level, nor by stretching upwards to God, but by receiving their liturgical being from God. In the liturgical act, which is God’s, God creates. He transforms the elements – and us.
See Gordon W. Lathrop, Holy Things: A Liturgical Theology (Minneapolis, MN: Augsburg Fortress, 1998), 33–83; Martin Modéus, Menneskelig gudstjeneste: Om gudstjenesten som relation og ritual, trans. (from Swedish to Danish) and comm., Anita Hansen Engdahl (København: Alfa, 2011), 96–103; Martha L. Moore-Keish, “The Importance of Worship that Centers on the Ordo” (Liturgy, 21:2, 2006): 15–23; Alexander Schmemann, Introduction to Liturgical Theology, trans. Asheleigh E. Moorhouse (Crestwood, NY: St Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 2003), 49–89.
See Kjetil Kringlebotten, Liturgy, Theurgy, and Active Participation: On Theurgic Participation in God (Eugene, Or: Cascade Books, 2023), 172–173, cf. David W. Fagerberg, Liturgy outside Liturgy: The Liturgical Theology of Fr. Alexander Schmemann, Kindle ed. (Hong Kong: Chorabooks, 2018), 63–76; Alexander Schmemann, For the Life of the World: Sacraments and Orthodoxy, 2nd ed (Crestwood, NY: St Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 1998), 67, 129.
This is evident, as I have shown, in the reforms of my own church, the Church of Norway, which I have criticised. See Kringlebotten, Liturgy, Theurgy, and Active Participation, 164–193, esp. 170–178.
The following discussion is based on, but also expands on, my discussion in Kringlebotten, Liturgy, Theurgy, and Active Participation, 170–178, esp. 171–174.
Lathrop, Holy Things, 33.
Augustine, In Iohannis Evangelium, tractatus 80:4, Opera 8, Corpus Christianorum 36 (Turnhout: Brepols, 1954), 529. For a translation of the tractate, by John Gibb, see Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, First Series, vol, 7, ed. Philip Schaff (Buffalo, NY: Christian Literature Publishing Co., 1888; reprinted, Peabody, MA: Hendrickson Publishers, 1995), 343–345.
Lathrop, Holy Things, 164, cf. 164–169. s.
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, First Series, vol, 7, ed. Schaff, 344.
Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae III, q.60, a.4, sed contra; q.60, a.6, sed contra. For Aquinas’ works, see Opera Omnia of St. Thomas Aquinas, Latin and English (Lander, WY: The Aquinas Institute for the Study of Sacred Doctrine, 2012), https://aquinas.cc/.
I will say, however, that I prefer Shapcote’s rendering of the rest of the phrase, as Lathrop’s seems rather clunky.
For a Lutheran perspective, see Rev. Rodney L. Eberhardt, “The Pastor as In Persona Christi”, lecture at the Society of the Holy Trinity General Retreat, 29th September, 2009.
Lewis talks of “baptising” imagination. See Arthur W. Lindsley, “C.S. Lewis: His Life and Works”, at C.S. Lewis Institute, 14th January, 2010.
Kringlebotten, Liturgy, Theurgy, and Active Participation, 173, 174, cf. Lorenz Bruno Puntel, Structure and Being: A Theoretical Framework for a Systematic Philosophy, trans. and in collaboration with Alan White (University Park, PA: The Pennsylvania State University Press, 2008); Nicholas Rescher, Philosophical Reasoning: A Study in the Methodology of Philosophizing (Oxford: Blackwell, 2001).
Kringlebotten, Liturgy, Theurgy, and Active Participation, 173.
‘Latreutic’ means being service-minded, in the sense of serving or praising God, from Gk. latreutikós, ‘servile,’ which has bad connotations in English, and in Norwegian (servil), from Gk. latreía, ‘service’ (cf. Romans 12:1). ‘Soteriological’ means something pertaining to salvation, from Gk. sōtēría, ‘salvation’. For a good primer on ressourcement (or Nouvelle théologie), see Gabriel Flynn and Paul D. Murray, eds., Ressourcement: A Movement for Renewal in Twentieth-Century Catholic Theology (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012).