Pastoral Life 44 (Nov. 1995): 2-7.

Celebrating Rahner's 'Liturgy of the World'

by Mark E. Ginter

Several years ago, when I was teaching high school, a friend asked, "Mark, why should I
go to Mass? It just seems to be an empty ritual. I don't see how it has anything to do with my life
anyway." I nodded my head in agreement, sympathizing with those same feelings.
My answer at that time was something like this: Mass was the primary way to get grace.
Using John's Gospel story about Jesus' meeting the woman at the well (John 4:4-42), I explained
that the Mass is like that water which Jesus offered to the woman. Just as that woman had to go
to the well everyday to get her jug filled with water, so we need to go to Mass to get our supply
of grace to meet the needs of everyday life.
Now, years later as a theologian, I realize that my explanation of the woman's encounter
with Jesus at the well falls short of what may actually be a better understanding of the Mass. At
that time, I still carried with me the idea of God being in some places, like in the church building,
but not in other places, especially not in the "real world."
Since then, I have gone through a lot of changes in my life. Both from my academic
training as well as my own experiences, I have gradually come to understand that there is more of
a continuity between what happens in my daily life and what happens at Sunday Mass than a
discontinuity. I have come across a concept which has uniquely put into focus alot of these loose
ends in my thinking.

Liturgy of the World
During my Ph.D. program, I read about Karl Rahner's understanding of worship. He used
a phrase called "liturgy of the world."
1
Fr. Rahner recognized the same disillusionment my friend
had identified concerning the contemporary relevance of the Mass. Consequently, Rahner was


1
Michael Skelley, The Liturgy of the World: Karl Rahner's
Theology of Worship. Collegeville: The Liturgical Press, 1991.
trying to explain the Christian faith, and especially the necessity of something like the Sunday
Eucharist, for modern people who seem unable to relate to all the ceremony and symbolism of
what appears to be by-gone days.
But the most important development was understanding that God is not limited to a
particular place, no matter what religious symbols may be attached to God. Rather--here is the
important point--God is as close to me while I sit here typing as God is in church. A result of this
idea is that Sunday Mass is intimately related to my everyday life. That's the radical idea that I
have to deal with now.
But why should you care if I have a new way of attending Mass? Because we all want to
feel important. And one of the ways we feel important is by having the ordinary events and
happenings in our daily lives accepted and confirmed by someone else. Therefore, if it's true that
someone as important as God, who at least is in church, wants to be messed up with my everyday
life, then we can all benefit from understanding Rahner's ideas about the "liturgy of the world."
Hopefully, this will lead to greater renewal in our own lives, as well as in our formal worship.

Grace: God's Self-communication
Fr. Rahner's main idea is that the world, the "real world," is always and everywhere
permeated with God's gracious self-communication. In other words, he taught that the experience
of God is primarily found in the midst of our ordinary lives. God is hidden there. "God's self-
communication" is another word for "grace."
Sometimes we hear talk about grace as if it were a thing. We might speak of the
sacraments almost as if they were immunization shots which give us a certain amount of grace.
Or, we might even use a crude way of speaking about the Mass like it was a gas station. We
drive in on Sundays to have our spiritual tanks filled for the week. Whenever we go to confession
it might have the appearance of getting our oil changed. It was just enough maintenance to get us
by for one more week "out there in the real world."
I don't claim to know all the answers now, but I have gone through some changes in the
way I think about how all-pervasive God's grace is. I am especially fond of understanding God's
self-communication as the Gift of the Holy Spirit.
God's presence among us, in us, and around us is the Holy Spirit. The more I have
studied theology and prayed about what I am studying the easier it is for me to relate to a Person
who is God present to me than to some abstract idea like "grace." Therefore, God's Self is
offered to everyone, everywhere. As a result, people can and do, unreflectively, interact with God
anytime, anywhere.
Let's go back to that Gospel story about Jesus with the woman at the well. I was wrong
about how I had first explained that passage because I didn't grasp the big picture. The exact
point that Jesus is making in that encounter with the woman is that through Him we become a
well of life-giving water. He is making the point that we don't need to limit God to a particular
place, like the mountain the Samaritans worshipped on or the church buildings which we worship
in. We also don't need to limit God to a particular time, like just Sunday mornings. Rather, Jesus
says, "God is Spirit. His worshippers will worship Him in spirit and truth" (John 4:24). It's the
Holy Spirit who is this life-giving water.
We often take water for granted. It is so available to us in North America. Usually, we
don't have to think about getting enough water for the day, do we? How absolutely essential
water is! Yet, how unreflectively we think about it! That's how close the Holy Spirit is.
Let me use one more image for the Holy Spirit - air. This is a very old and common image
which works so well. Since my bout with pneumonia at the beginning of graduate school, I have
greatly come to appreciate my lungs. I try to treat them with tremendous care. But most of the
time, they work just fine on their own without my being aware of their activity. Furthermore, I
unthinkingly expect to have air available for me to breathe. I don't think about breathing. That's
how near God - the Holy Spirit - is to us.
Both images limp somewhat, but Fr. Rahner was trying to stress the idea that in the most
routine moments of our everyday lives God is as close to us as God is in the Sunday liturgy.
That's really quite a shift from the older view which sees such a discontinuity between our
"weekly" lives and our "Sunday" lives. Fr. Rahner uses the unique phrase, "liturgy of the
world" to describe the enterprise of worshiping God. Granted, that is not a very common phrase
among us Catholics. He himself did not use those specific words very often, but his whole
understanding of worship projects this idea. I should try to spell that out in more detail.

Sunday Liturgy
To paraphrase the words of Fr. Rahner, to substantially alter our way of approaching the
Mass by becoming more aware of God's all-embracing presence in the ordinariness of life is the
key to renewing our worship. Where we once thought about going to Sunday liturgy to fill our
jugs, we now need to see that our jugs are running over. We have a need to come together to
worship because we are so grateful for God's grace. Where we once thought of weekly Eucharist
as filling our gas tanks, now we realize that we have an abundance of spiritual fuel; our reason for
joining with other members of God's family in a church building is to offer praise for the greatness
of this gift. Where I once thought of the sanctuary lamp as symbolizing God's presence only in
the church building, now I understand that this candle represents the absoluteness of Christ's
presence as the fire of the Holy Spirit in, among, and around us and the whole world.
The implication for us is that we should gather to worship together on Sunday, then, not
because our lives are devoid of God's grace, but because we humans need to express all of the
grace-filled moments of our lives which we so readily overlook or ignore. In other words, it is
part of our nature - when we are really being ourselves - to offer praise and thanksgiving to the
God who envelopes us, literally, with every breath we take.
The radical position Rahner espouses, which has been a way for me to get a handle on my
own experiences, is to acknowledge that the Holy Spirit permeates our lives even more
fundamentally than those times which we set aside for God. The experience of God is so utterly
inescapable, Fr. Rahner believed, that it is very difficult to catch ourselves in the act of experienc-
ing God. In other words, God is so obvious in every aspect of our human lives that we usually
can't recognize God's presence.
A little experiment: Do you see the paper this article is printed on? Yes, you do. But you
weren't focusing on the paper until I mentioned it, were you? As you are thinking about the
paper, are you aware of the chair which you are presently sitting on? Now that I have drawn your
attention to it, you are aware of it. What if we were to approach the Mass this way?
What I mean is, what if, instead of going to Mass to get something out of it like a spiritual
supermarket, we felt compelled to celebrate the Eucharist because we know that it is the most
fitting way to praise and thank God for God's ever-abiding presence in our daily lives? Why
couldn't the Mass become the most excellent visible symbol of what we unthinkingly know God is
doing in our midst every moment of every day?
For a while now, I have been going to Mass with this in mind. It has provided me with
some specific insights. The liturgy of the world we celebrate in our everyday lives. This is the
first liturgy, first in order and first in the sense of the most basic, the most fundamental. The
Church's liturgy we celebrate most formally on the Lord's Day. This is the second liturgy,
following the liturgy of the world in order and practice. Theologically, we would describe the
liturgy of the world as a celebration of God's first act of creation, and the Church's liturgy as
God's second act of creation - our redemption, the new creation.
So, now, Mass on Sunday morning is no longer where God is exclusively. Rather, I'm
going from being with God in the world to being with God in church. Same God, different
location. Further, I'm not going from not participating in a liturgy to participating in a liturgy.
Instead, I'm going from participating in one kind of liturgy to participating in another kind of
liturgy.
Rather easily, I think, one could reflect on all the parts of the Mass to see how the liturgy
of the world is connected with the Eucharistic liturgy. A general principal to apply in this
translation is that by simply doing those human things which seem so ordinary (the liturgy of the
world) we are really doing divine things (Eucharistic liturgy). For example, in Matthew 25, Jesus
talks about feeding the hungry, sheltering the homeless, etc. just as if those people in need are
Jesus himself.
Below is a brief diagram of how the liturgy of the world might be represented in the two
main parts of the Mass: liturgy of the Word and liturgy of the Eucharist.

Liturgy of the Word
Liturgy of the World Eucharistic Liturgy
Saying, "Good Morning!" to my family. The Greeting
House rule: If you have hurt someone, you
must apologize. Then, that person must for-
give you.
The Penitential Rite
The cycle of living is a praise hymn. Glory to God
The Holy Spirit speaking to me through
conscience in daily life and decisions.
Readings
Our daily wishes, reactions to news stories,
wishing someone "good luck."
Prayers of the Faithful


Liturgy of the Eucharist
Liturgy of the World Eucharistic Liturgy
"Mysticism of Daily Life" - recalling simple,
"unreligious" events from the prior week
Preparation of the Gifts
Selflessness between spouses and in families Eucharistic Prayer: Christ's sacrifice
Family prayer times; our own litany of saints. Eucharistic Prayer: Unity
Experiences of fragility, limitedness, and need
for a Redeemer
Communion
Saying, "Good Bye." Closing Rite

The Church's liturgy draws to a close but the liturgy of the world goes on. Even though
the liturgy of the world is first, the Lord's Day celebration helps us to refocus on God's presence
in our daily lives. The Sunday liturgy meets that need to give praise and thanksgiving to a God
who is as near as our very breath. The liturgy of the Church helps us to recognize how much fuel
we already have, how full our jugs really are, and how bright that candle is that burns within us.
God dwells around, among and within us; it is the Church's liturgy which reminds us of that fact
as we continue in the liturgy of the world.