I’ve got a question for you….and I want you to think about this question for a minute:
“How do you communicate love to someone?”
Whatever your answer, you probably choose to express love in a way that the person you love can see or hear or touch.
Love is something real. We can experience it. But it’s not a physical object. You can’t hand someone a piece of love.
So, you can say it with flowers or balloons or whisper sweet nothings (Romeo, Romeo, wherefore art thou Romeo), or you can give someone a hug.
All these ways of communicating involve the senses. Words are heard. A hug is felt. Flowers are seen.
This is the way it’s got to be. We are physical beings, and we live in a physical world. When we communicate we must do it in a physical way through our senses.
Physical expressions of your love are not the same as your love. But your love is conveyed through them. Words, gestures, and physical objects become signs of love.
Now, here’s another question:
“How does Jesus communicate love?”
Jesus used physical signs to convey love, too. Scripture says: “He was like us in all things, but sin.” Recall the Gospel story of Lazarus. When Martha informed Jesus that Lazarus had died and He went to the tomb, Jesus wept. So the Jews said: “See how he loved him!”
Jesus is still using physical signs today to communicate his love in the signs of love we call the sacraments. That means that ordinary people like us can make contact with Jesus just like the disciples did!
“The sacraments are not only signs of God’s grace but actually give us grace.”
Beyond signs and symbols; beyond ritual – the sacraments fill us with God’s grace, they raise us up and enable us to share in the Divine Life of Jesus Christ and the Intimate Communion of the Holy Trinity.
They sanctify us and make us holy.
The sacraments are efficacious – they effect a profound change within us – they conform us to Christ our Head.
The sacraments give us “supernatural” grace - “Divine empowerment” - they are supernatural means that allow us to obtain a supernatural end.
And that supernatural end is Salvation – Eternal Life.
These are Jesus’ own words:
“Amen, Amen, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you do not have life within you. Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him on the last day.”
Again in reference to Baptism He says:
“Truly, Truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the Kingdom of God.”
The Sacraments unite us to Christ:
In Baptism we become members of His body the Church, when we go to Confession we are reconciled to the Father, and that Communion is restored and renewed.
The Mass is Heaven on Earth and in the Eucharist we receive Christ; we are united with Him in Holy Communion.
Confirmation increases the gifts of the Holy Spirit within us and strengthens the bonds of unity we experience with the Church and thereby it unites us more closely to the Lord.
And
Although God is not bound by these efficacious sacred signs instituted by His Son, in general they are the privileged channels where He touches the lives of His faithful.