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Course 21 · Lesson 1.4

Word, sacrament and sign across the traditions

11 minute read

Lessons in this course

Course 21 outline

Module 1: The Theology of Worship

  1. What liturgy is: the word, the idea and the debate
  2. Worship in the Old and New Testaments
  3. Praying and believing: how worship shapes doctrine and doctrine shapes worship
  4. Word, sacrament and sign across the traditions

Module 2: How Christian Liturgy Developed

  1. The earliest descriptions: the Didache, Justin Martyr and the early church orders
  2. The liturgical families of East and West
  3. The Reformation and the revision of worship
  4. Liturgical renewal in the twentieth century

Module 3: The Christian Year: Calendars, Feasts and Fasts

  1. Sunday, the week and the hours of the day
  2. Easter, Holy Week and the dispute over the date
  3. Advent, Christmas and Epiphany
  4. Lent, the Orthodox fasting seasons and Protestant approaches to fasting
  5. Saints days and the second cycle of the calendar

Module 4: Sacred Space and Sacred Images

  1. From house church to basilica: the development of church buildings
  2. The meaning of church buildings: altar, table, orientation and the Orthodox and Gothic examples
  3. Icons and the Incarnation: John of Damascus and the Second Council of Nicaea
  4. Images and the Reformation: Lutheran, Reformed and Anglican approaches

Module 5: Material Signs: Incense, Water, Oil and Blessings

  1. Incense: Scripture, temple worship and its use in the churches
  2. Water: baptism, the renewal of baptismal vows and holy water
  3. Oil: anointing of the sick, chrismation, confirmation and ordination
  4. Blessings: what the church means when it blesses a person, a house or an object
  5. Sacraments and sacramentals: the Catholic, Orthodox and Protestant vocabulary

Module 6: Popular Piety and Devotional Practice

  1. What popular piety is, and why scholars take it seriously
  2. Pilgrimage, relics, medals and pious objects
  3. The rosary, the Stations of the Cross, litanies and akathists
  4. How the churches have regulated and corrected popular devotion

Module 7: Telling Tradition from Superstition

  1. What the theologians mean by superstition, and why the line is hard to draw
  2. A method: source, date, doctrine, authority and consequence
  3. Case studies: apocryphal legends, magical formulas and invented history
  4. Honesty and respect in judging other people’s devotion

All courses

Program / Course 21: Liturgical Theology / Lesson 1.4

What you will learn

  • Define sign, sacrament, mystery and ordinance, and say how traditions use each term.
  • Describe the relation between the preached word and the sacraments in Catholic, Orthodox, Lutheran, Reformed, Anglican and Baptist teaching.
  • Explain the main positions on how Christ is present in the Lord’s Supper without claiming one is correct.
  • State what a person can do alone, such as reading the word, and what the churches say needs a minister and a congregation.

The big idea

Christian worship has always joined words and actions. Scripture is read and preached, and water, bread and wine are used. The churches agree that Christ is at work in both, but they disagree about what the actions are and what they do. Catholics and Orthodox speak of sacraments or mysteries that give grace. Lutherans and Anglicans keep two chief sacraments. Reformed and Baptist Christians stress signs and seals or ordinances. The differences are deep, and each side has a reasoned account.

Key terms

Sign
A visible thing or action that points to something else. In worship, water points to cleansing and new life, and bread and wine point to Christ’s body and blood.
Sacrament
From the Latin sacramentum. In Augustine’s well-known description it is a visible sign of an invisible grace. Churches differ on how many there are and what they do.
Mystery (Greek mysterion)
The Eastern term for the sacraments. It stresses that God’s action is beyond full explanation.
Ordinance
A term used by many Baptist and free churches for baptism and the Lord’s Supper, stressing that Christ commanded them.
Real presence
The teaching that Christ is truly present in the Lord’s Supper. Churches explain how in different ways.
Transubstantiation
The Catholic teaching that the substance of the bread and wine becomes Christ’s body and blood while the outward appearances remain.
Spiritual communion
A Catholic and some Anglican practice of praying for union with Christ when one cannot receive the sacrament. It is not regarded as a replacement for it.

Background

The New Testament does not use the word sacrament for rites. The Latin church used sacramentum to translate the Greek word mysterion, which the New Testament uses for the hidden plan of God (Ephesians 1:9; 3:3). Augustine described a sacrament as a visible sign of a sacred thing. The medieval church, especially under Peter Lombard in the twelfth century, fixed the number at seven: baptism, confirmation, the Eucharist, penance, anointing of the sick, ordination and marriage. The Council of Trent defined this list.

The Reformers reopened the question. They asked what Christ himself instituted and where the word of promise was attached to a sign. Luther at times counted baptism, the Lord’s Supper and, for a while, penance. The Lutheran confessions generally teach two sacraments and treat absolution as closely related to them. Reformed churches teach two. The Church of England, in the Thirty-Nine Articles (Article 25), names baptism and the Supper as sacraments of the gospel and says that five others commonly called sacraments are not of the same kind. Orthodox theology does not give the number seven the same dogmatic precision, though in practice it recognizes the same seven and many other holy acts as mysteries.

Step-by-step explanation

Step 1: Word and sign together

Augustine taught that the word is joined to the element and makes the sacrament. Luther and Calvin repeated the thought and made it central: a sacrament is a promise of God plus a visible sign. The Augsburg Confession (Article 7) and Calvin’s Institutes define the church by the gospel rightly preached and the sacraments rightly administered. Catholic teaching, especially since Vatican II, speaks of two tables, the word and the Eucharist, both belonging to one act of worship. The Orthodox Liturgy likewise reads the Gospel and then celebrates the Eucharist.

Step 2: What the sacraments do

The Catholic Church teaches that the sacraments give grace by Christ’s action, for those who do not put up an obstacle (the traditional phrase is ex opere operato, meaning from the act performed). The Orthodox likewise hold that the mysteries convey grace, with more stress on participation in divine life. Lutherans teach that the sacraments are means of grace through which God gives forgiveness and faith. Reformed teaching, in Calvin and the Westminster Confession, calls them signs and seals of the covenant, by which the Spirit confirms the promise to those who believe. Zwingli, an early Reformer, stressed the sign as a memorial and a public pledge, and many Baptist and free-church Christians follow a similar emphasis.

Step 3: How Christ is present in the Supper

Catholic teaching: the bread and wine become Christ’s body and blood, described by the term transubstantiation. Orthodox teaching affirms a real change and typically declines to define the manner. Lutherans teach that Christ’s body and blood are truly present in, with and under the bread and wine. Calvin taught that Christ is truly present to the believer by the Holy Spirit, who lifts the communicant to Christ in heaven. Many Anglicans accept a range of views, from real presence to a spiritual feeding. Baptist and many evangelical churches generally hold that the Supper is a memorial and a sign in which Christ is spiritually present among his people. These positions arose from disputes in the sixteenth century, and they remain distinct.

Step 4: Who administers

Catholic and Orthodox churches hold that the Eucharist needs a validly ordained priest or bishop. Lutherans and Anglicans require a minister called and ordained by the church for ordinary use. Reformed churches require a called minister of word and sacrament. Many Baptist and free churches authorize a pastor, though they often hold that the ordinance belongs to the whole congregation. In case of necessity, many churches allow baptism by any baptized person, including Catholic, Orthodox, Lutheran and Anglican practice. No tradition teaches that a believer alone may celebrate the Lord’s Supper as a private act.

Step 5: What can be done alone

A person alone can read and pray the word, memorize Scripture, sing, and meditate on the meaning of baptism and the Supper. A baptized person can renew their baptismal promises in prayer. A Catholic unable to attend Mass may make a spiritual communion. These acts are real, but the churches do not count them as the sacraments. For the sacraments themselves, the churches teach that the person needs a community and an authorized minister. A student who is cut off from a church should be honest about that limit and not invent a private rite to fill the gap.

  1. Which words and which actions make up this act of worship?
  2. What does the tradition say the action does?
  3. Who is authorized to perform it, and why?
  4. How many sacraments or ordinances does this tradition recognize, and on what grounds?
  5. What does the tradition say about how Christ is present?
  6. Which parts of this can I do alone, and which would require a church?

Examples

Two tables in a Catholic Mass

A Catholic Mass has a Liturgy of the Word, with readings and a homily, followed by the Liturgy of the Eucharist. Catholic teaching presents them as one act. A person who reads the Gospel at home has met the word but has not taken part in the Eucharist.

A Reformed communion Sunday

A Reformed congregation hears the Supper explained in the sermon, hears the words of institution (1 Corinthians 11:23-26), and receives bread and wine from the elders. They believe that Christ feeds them by the Holy Spirit. A Baptist family visiting may hold the memorial view, and may agree that the service is reverent.

Emergency baptism

A nurse baptizes a dying newborn with water and the Trinitarian words because no minister can arrive in time. Catholic, Orthodox, Lutheran and Anglican teaching accept this in necessity. Many Baptist churches would not baptize an infant at all, because they baptize only those who profess faith. (A constructed example with real teaching in each tradition.)

Different perspectives

Catholic

The seven sacraments are efficacious signs of grace instituted by Christ and entrusted to the church. In the Eucharist Christ is present body, blood, soul and divinity. The preached word and the sacraments are joined.

Orthodox

The mysteries are the church’s participation in Christ, celebrated chiefly in the Liturgy. Orthodox theology avoids a narrow definition of the mode of presence and speaks of a change effected by the Holy Spirit at the invocation.

Lutheran

Word and sacrament are the means of grace. Baptism saves by God’s word joined to water, and in the Supper Christ’s true body and blood are received in, with and under bread and wine, by all who eat, to blessing or judgment.

Reformed and Anglican

Reformed teaching sees the sacraments as signs and seals, with Christ spiritually and truly present to faith. The Anglican formularies give a restrained account in the Articles and the Prayer Book, and Anglicans today hold a range of views on presence.

Baptist and free-church

Baptism and the Supper are ordinances commanded by Christ. They testify to the believer’s faith and to Christ’s work, and are practiced within a gathered congregation. Differences between congregations are considerable.

Why it matters

The way a church joins word and sign settles much of what a service looks like: how long the sermon is, how often communion is held, who may preside and what is done with the bread and wine. It also settles what a student can and cannot do privately. Knowing these distinctions prevents a person from treating a private devotion as if it were a sacrament, and from treating a sacrament as if it were only a private feeling.

Common misunderstandings

Misunderstanding: Protestants have no sacraments.

Correction: Lutheran, Reformed and Anglican churches have two sacraments. Many Baptist and free churches prefer the term ordinances, but they too keep baptism and the Supper.

Misunderstanding: Catholics think the sacraments work like magic.

Correction: Catholic teaching says the sacraments act by Christ’s power and not by the minister’s merit, and that fruitful reception depends on faith and disposition. The Catechism rejects any magical view.

Misunderstanding: The memorial view means Christ is absent.

Correction: Memorial theology holds that Christ is spiritually present to the gathered believers, though it does not hold that the elements are changed.

Misunderstanding: A person can make their own communion at home with bread and wine.

Correction: The churches teach that the Supper is the act of a gathered church with an authorized minister. A private meal in remembrance of Christ can be sincere, but it is not what any historic church means by the sacrament.

Knowledge check

What is the relationship between the Greek mysterion and the Latin sacramentum?

The Latin church used sacramentum to translate the Greek mysterion. The New Testament uses mysterion for the hidden plan of God. Eastern churches keep the word mystery for the sacraments, while Western churches use sacrament.

How many sacraments do Catholic, Lutheran, Reformed and Anglican churches recognize?

Catholics recognize seven. Lutherans and Reformed recognize two, baptism and the Lord’s Supper, and Lutherans connect absolution closely with them. Anglican formularies name two sacraments of the gospel and list five other rites as not of the same kind.

Describe two views on Christ’s presence in the Supper.

Catholics teach transubstantiation, in which the substance of bread and wine becomes Christ’s body and blood. Lutherans teach that his body and blood are present in, with and under the elements. Calvin taught a spiritual feeding by the Holy Spirit. Memorialist churches stress remembrance and spiritual presence.

What can a person do alone, and what is generally not done alone?

A person can read Scripture, pray, sing and meditate on baptism and the Supper. A baptized person may renew baptismal promises in prayer. The churches teach that celebrating the Supper requires a gathered church and an authorized minister, so it is not done alone.

Think it through

  1. How do you tell the difference between a sign and the thing it signifies?
  2. What reason might a Baptist and a Catholic each give for the other’s view of the Supper?
  3. Why might a church place the sermon before the sacrament, or the sacrament before the sermon?
  4. If you cannot attend a church, what honest steps can you take to stay connected to the word and to others?

Independent assignment

A comparison chart

In your own notebook, build a chart with these rows: number of sacraments or ordinances, name for the Lord’s Supper, view of Christ’s presence, who may preside, and role of the sermon. Fill it for Catholic, Orthodox, Lutheran, Anglican, Reformed and Baptist traditions using at least two sources from the course library. Add 200 words noting where you were unsure. Do not send this to anyone.

Further study