P. Gorazd Cetkovský, O.Carm.
Our bishops have called us to a three-year preparation for the 1150th anniversary of the arrival of Saints Cyril and Methodius to Great Moravia, which we will celebrate in 2013. The basic theme of the preparation has been chosen to be the three initiation sacraments: baptism, confirmation, and Eucharist. In 2011, our attention is to be focused on baptism, reflecting on it, deepening our relationship with this sacrament. For us Carmelites, the fact that Saints Cyril and Methodius are the patrons of our delegation may also encourage us to engage in this preparation. Therefore, I would like to reflect on baptism together with you now, and I have titled this reflection with a quote from Article 20 of the Rule of the Carmelite tertiaries: “By the sacrament of baptism, the tertiary is called to holiness.”
In the Carmelite tradition, very little is said about baptism. In 1998, we published in our magazine (in the first issue of that year) an article by the Discalced Carmelite Sister Zdislava titled “The Perception of the Sacrament of Baptism in St. Therese of Lisieux.” In addition, Edith Stein also wrote about baptism, but discussing her text would be too complicated and demanding for us at this moment, and it is also not available in Czech translation. Why do the saints of Carmel speak so little of baptism? Probably because in their times, baptism was something completely taken for granted. The whole society was composed of baptized individuals (except for the Jews), and they were baptized shortly after birth.
In this context, let us mention that already since St. Jerome's time, dedication to God for a specific form of life according to the Gospel (ascetics, Christian virgins) has been considered a kind of “second baptism” and was also referred to as such. This perspective continued, and we encounter it again in St. Therese of Lisieux. Religious vows were often compared to baptism, which we probably would not do today. On one hand, this shows that baptism was still well in consciousness, but on the other hand, it reveals that the irrepeatable strength of baptism was not considered incomparable...
Today, our view of baptism has been renewed through the development of theology and piety to such an extent that we do not compare it with anything else. Baptism is a unique event in the life of a Christian. However, before that, for centuries, the perception of baptism was weakened. Even the fact that upon entering a religious order, one received a new name was related to this. I still remember from my time in Frýdlant nad Ostravicí, where next to us lived a community of Missionary Sisters of Donum Dei, that these sisters, who came from Africa and Oceania, each had two names.
One in the native language of their tribe, i.e., “pagan,” which only their family knew, and then a Christian name that they received at baptism and by which they were commonly addressed in public. Thus, in their home environment, the pre-Christian culture and Christian faith still intertwined. St. Paul writes: “If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation” (2 Cor 5:17). And if a new name was received upon entry into the order, the individual manifested both a renunciation of oneself (the abandonment of the former civil name; individual records of this custom date back to the 6th century) and the general conviction of the time that religious profession has similar effects to the sacrament of baptism...1
Our view of baptism is now greatly deepened. The thoughts that I will now mention were taken from a book written during the time of the Second Vatican Council, nearly fifty years ago.2 Yet much of what is written remains relevant even today.
As we focus on the effort for spiritual life, we notice that various saints and great figures of spiritual life applied their ways of prayer and emphases in piety. St. Frances of Rome had a close relationship with her guardian angel, St. Teresa of Avila was a great devotee of St. Joseph, etc. We, who strive to learn from the saints, gather these inspirations and try to adhere to them – as much as possible all at once. We add one prayer to another, trying to encompass many. Moreover, the authority of the Church has officially recommended many of these individual prayers, litanies, and forms of piety and furthermore granted indulgences...
“It is understandable that the mentioned adding often takes on strange forms in the life of a simple believer. (Such a person) stands behind everything that the Catholic faith teaches, fulfills all Christian obligations, attends Mass and receives communion, but at the same time anxiously and conscientiously looks for where greater certainty can be obtained: [and thus] performs every new devotion, belongs to several brotherhoods, wears scapulars of different orders, strives to obtain every attainable indulgence, is interested in the latest visions and revelations, undertakes long journeys to capture some guiding word from the lips of a mystically gifted girl... – and lives in constant anxiety about whether his soul will be saved. And it is only a natural consequence that there is absolutely no proportionality, and one cannot speak of any delicacy in the area of piety.”
To this delicacy, I think, belongs precisely the ability to discern what is important and what is added. What must I hold on to, and what is truly unnecessary to encompass. The Christians of the early centuries grasped their spiritual life, their reception of the Gospel, and the knowledge of Christ as a whole, they did not break it down into individual devotions. And our task is to not proceed in our effort for a thorough spiritual life through “additions,” but through “concentration” – focusing on the center. On what is at the core. Thus, J. A. Jungmann prophetically perceived and pointed out: generally, it holds that only when something is perceived in its parts (part by part), is selection (from them, among them) possible and additions are possible. With all due respect to the individual expressions and forms of piety, it will still be necessary to strive for concentration (focusing on the center, not on further additions).
Even though our richly diverse traditional piety, which surrounded him and of which he speaks, was eradicated by communism and also, as I said, more than forty years have passed, it is still beneficial for us to return to his thoughts.
What we are talking about is also evident regarding various dedications: to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, to the Virgin Mary, to the Holy Spirit, to the Heart of Mary, etc. Here too, wisdom is necessary. Otherwise, one piles one upon another, and while the content (significance) of these acts is emptied. Yes, all these individual dedications are approved and recommended by the Church. “But ultimately, a Catholic Christian must first and foremost remember that his dedication occurred substantially in the sacrament of baptism and that it is sacramentally strengthened and confirmed by every conscious participation in the sacrifice of the New Covenant, i.e., the Eucharist.”
“That some devotion or form of piety was approved by the Church does not mean that it should become a cornerstone in the construction of our life with God.” “You cannot pile several ‘cornerstones.’ There is only one – Christ – and on Him stands the whole building.” And we aim towards God, as we profess every time at the end of the Eucharistic prayer: “through him (Christ) and with him and in him.” Christ is the way for us, as He himself says about himself in the Gospel.
So for us: it is good that we dedicate ourselves through the tertiary profession, it is good that we wear the scapular, but let us be well aware that all of this only adds to our fundamental dedication, which belongs to Christ through baptism. Our dedication to Christ occurred sacramentally in baptism and is sacramentally strengthened and confirmed by our participation in the holy Mass.
With this introduction, I wanted to prepare the ground for our contemplation that baptism is our fundamental surrender to Christ. And even though it perhaps took place in early childhood for many of us, where our memories do not reach, it remains throughout our lives something on which we build, which is the cornerstone of the relationship between God and us.
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