Signs and Wonders

In 2022, Pope Francis wrote an Apostolic Letter entitled Desiderio desideravi, addressed to the Bishops, Priests, Deacons, and the Lay Faithful on the topic of the liturgical formation of the People of God (i.e. all baptized members of the Church). In this letter, our late Holy Father asks the everyone to join in rediscovering the beauty and truth of the Liturgy of our Lord, and emphasizes to the clergy the importance of offering the Most Holy Sacrifice of the Mass in the exact manner that our Lord and his Church has commanded us to offer it, for not doing so would be “robbing from the assembly what is owed to it; namely, the paschal mystery celebrated according to the ritual that the Church sets down” (D.d., 23). He calls for celebrating a Mass that is filled with rich symbolism that points to the paschal mystery and invites us to engage with this transcendent liturgical action. He says, “Wonder is an essential part of the liturgical act because it is the way that those who know they are engaged in the particularity of symbolic gestures look at things.” (D.d., 26)

The changes we have made, and will continue to make, to always move forward and not stay stuck in the past, are meant to help open the eyes of our souls to the Heavenly realities through engaging with the signs and symbols of the Paschal Mystery. We have a duty, especially to the youngest members of our parish family, to guide them in the way of the faith and help get them on the path to Heaven.

In the same letter, Pope Francis addresses how even the smallest actions to engage with the prayer of the Mass helps to form us. “I have in mind parents, or even more perhaps, grandparents, but also our pastors and catechists. Many of us learned the power of the gestures of the liturgy from them, as, for example, the sign of the cross, kneeling, the formulas of our faith. Perhaps we do not have an actual memory of such learning, but we can easily imagine the gesture of a larger hand taking the little hand of a child and accompanying it slowly in tracing across the body for the first time the sign of our salvation. Words accompany the movement, these are also said slowly, almost as if wanting to take possession of every instant of the gesture, to take possession of the whole body: “In the name of the Father… and of the Son… and of the Holy Spirit…. Amen.” And then the hand of the child is left alone, and it is watched repeating it all alone, with help ready nearby if need be. But that gesture is now consigned, like a habit that will grow with Him, imparting to it a meaning that only the Spirit knows how.

From that moment forward, that gesture, its symbolic force, is ours, it belongs to us; or better said, we belong to it. It gives us form. We are formed by it. Not many discourses are needed here. It is not necessary to have understood everything in that gesture. What is needed is being small, both in consigning it and in receiving it. The rest is the work of the Spirit. In this way, we are initiated into symbolic language. We cannot let ourselves be robbed of such richness. Growing up,