Saint Thomas and Joseph Ratzinger / Pope Benedict XVI on the Body and Adoration

Abstract

Saint Thomas and Joseph Ratzinger / Pope Benedict XVI on the Body and Adoration Kevin E. O'Reilly O.P. The argument put forward in this brief article is straightforward. In brief, both Saint Thomas and Joseph Ratzinger / Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI espouse the logic of hylomorphic anthropology, that is to say, the understanding that we are body–soul unities, as well as a participatory metaphysics. With regard to their respective views on the role of the body in adoration, therefore, there is a striking similarity. For both theologians, human worship of God is necessarily embodied worship. This view, moreover, extends to the role of the cosmos in worship, since the cosmos assumes a symbolic significance precisely on account of the fact that embodied existence is spatially and temporally determined by it. The hylomorphic liturgical anthropology of both theologians stands in stark contrast to the dualistic liturgical anthropology that has become dominant in the West in our own time. Ratzinger/Benedict of course offers a critique of these contemporary liturgical trends. If Thomas were alive today, his critique would arguably be substantially the same as that of the Pope Emeritus. Since what is at stake in the case of the celebration of the Mass is the penetration and shaping of the soul by the Word, there is good reason for attempts at renewal to range Thomas and Benedict side by side against those forces that undermine the majesty and mystery of Catholic liturgical worship. In order to make this argument, however, a brief account of hylomorphic anthropology is in order. This account is drawn from the teaching of Saint Thomas, since Ratzinger/Benedict, to my knowledge, offers no systematic treatment of this subject. While hylomorphic anthropology is a philosophical construal of human nature, Aristotelian-Thomistic in its provenance, it has [End Page 613] nevertheless been adopted by the Church's magisterium. Most recently John Paul II, in his encyclical Veritatis Splendor, emphasized this point, referring to "the Church's teachings on the unity of the human person, whose rational soul is per se et essentialiter the form of his body."1 "The spiritual and immortal soul," John Paul II continues, "is the principle of unity of the human being, whereby it exists as a whole—corpore et anima unus—as a person."2 Having clarified the concept of hylomorphic anthropology, the article will then turn to an exposition of the thought both of Saint Thomas and of Ratzinger/Benedict on adoration. Both theologians consider bodily gestures to be a physical manifestation of an internal attitude. By the same token, bodily gestures such as prostration and kneeling for their part cultivate a spirit of adoration. Both Thomas and Benedict deal with the issue of orientation in the liturgy. Their agreement in this regard, which is grounded in the Church's ancient Tradition, is the fruit of an understanding that we are psychosomatically constituted. Our worship can therefore never be purely spiritual and thus prescind from space and time. A brief account of the contemporary liturgical situation, however, shows it to be Cartesian in its dynamics. In other words, it cultivates a kind of liturgical practice that is disembodied (inasmuch as this is possible for human beings). The overwhelming creativity that one encounters at times in the liturgy and which constitutes a break with Tradition is the fruit of this philosophy. There is therefore good reason to engage with the reflections of Thomas and Benedict concerning the body and adoration. Saint Thomas's Hylomorphic Anthropology3 [End Page 614] Thomas's understanding of the human body is inseparable from his teaching concerning the intellectual soul as man's sole substantial form.4 "The soul is the very nature of the body,"5 he proclaims provocatively in his commentary on the Sentences, thereby emphasizing the intrinsic and intimate connection that obtains between soul and body. We can well assert that the body's actuality derives from the intellectual soul, an assertion that is in accord with Thomas's metaphysical teaching to the effect that matter "has actual existence by the substantial form, which makes it to exist absolutely."6 Completely ruled out in this view is the possibility of experiencing one's body...