The liturgy is comprised of many elements including words, music, and silence; time and space; people; and ritual and symbol. I will be writing on each of these essentials over the next weeks in the hope that I can affirm what you know and/or add to your experience of these parts of the liturgical action beginning with symbols and what we do with them.
We don’t assign meaning to a true symbol. A symbol represents something else, but that meaning is not made up by people. For example, in written language, punctuation marks represent something. Once we know the code, we can communicate what we are trying to write down. A period or a comma doesn’t have an intrinsic meaning. We learn the definition, and then we can use the character.
The symbols used in the Mass have innate multiple meanings. Water maybe the easiest to understand. Take a moment to think about all the ways you have encountered water today. Did you brush your teeth, take pills, make coffee, make instant oatmeal, all with water? Did you take a shower or wash your hands? Did you wash your clothes or your car? Water the lawn or plants? Did you drive over a river bridge or near a lake? Did you go swimming or fishing or boating? Did you encounter puddles (or snow or ice when it is not August)? Did you hear about flooding or hurricanes on media? Have you ever had flooding in your house or have you been in some other extreme “water event”?
While on vacation a few years ago, my hot water heater malfunctioned, and I came home to a wet basement carpet and quite a bit of damage. But it was nothing compared to what many have experienced from a levee breach, tsunami, or other disaster.
All the reasons you may have done the above are involved in the meaning of the symbol of water. Water is necessary to sustain life. Our bodies need it, and it is used in the process of growing our food. Water cleans and purifies. We like looking at the water in nature, and it provides recreation for us. But it has a down side: water erodes soil, destroys things that get in its way, and can cause death.
The water of baptism refreshes us and cleanses us. We drown in the water, dying to our old life of sin and rising with Christ to new life in the Spirit. We enter a church and bless ourselves with holy water to remind ourselves of that baptism, to renew our call to discipleship, and to imprint that cross on our lives.
Most parishes have a system for parishioners to take blessed water home with them. We can bless ourselves and our children daily. We call this substance “holy water” and it has been blessed by a priest. Of course, all water is a gift from God, a kind of miracle in itself, needed in so many facets of life. All water can remind us of the cleansing and refreshment that God gives to our lives. Notice water; give thanks to the Creator; remember that life is blessed.
