I’d just like to take a few minutes here to reflect on the Church as the Body of Christ because this understanding of the Church has been jumping out at me a lot recently and proving itself an incredibly useful metaphor.
In his First Letter to the Corintians, St. Paul writes…
“As a body is one though it has many parts, and all the parts of the body, though many, are one body, so also Christ…. Now the body is not a single part, but many. If a foot should say, “Because I am not a hand I do not belong to the body,” it does not for this reason belong any less to the body. Or if an ear should say, “Because I am not an eye I do not belong to the body,” it does not for this reason belong any less to the body. If the whole body were an eye, where would the hearing be? If the whole body were hearing, where would the sense of smell be? But as it is, God placed the parts, each one of them, in the body as he intended. If they were all one part, where would the body be? But as it is, there are many parts, yet one body. The eye cannot say to the hand, “I do not need you,” nor again the head to the feet, “I do not need you.” Indeed, the parts of the body that seem to be weaker are all the more necessary, and those parts of the body that we consider less honorable we surround with greater honor, and our less presentable parts are treated with greater propriety, whereas our more presentable parts do not need this. But God has so constructed the body as to give greater honor to a part that is without it, so that there may be no division in the body, but that the parts may have the same concern for one another. If (one) part suffers, all the parts suffer with it; if one part is honored, all the parts share its joy.”
It amazes me how this 2000 year old wisdom of St. Paul still speaks so perfectly to the situation of our Church today! Take the liturgy, for example. If every member of the Church wanted to be an ordained priest, then the liturgy would involve a ton of priests concelebrating Mass and no community to join with them in raising prayer and praise to the Lord. Non-ordained members of the Church are needed precisely because they are not ordained and therefore are free to fill other needs. Similarly, without ordained priests, we couldn’t celebrate the Eucharist, but without the community of believers, celebrating the Eucharist would have no meaning or purpose. Or, if every member of the community wanted to be a lector and nothing else, then we’d never have music in the liturgy or someone to gather the assembly’s prayers into a united petition to God. Every member of the Body is needed, then, to fulfill their role within the Body. Three feet and no hands will keep the Body from fulfilling its mission as the hands of Christ. Five ears and no eyes will prevent the Body from correctly seeing the path they are to walk.
Let us keep this metaphor in mind, then, as we consider the call that we have been given as members of the Body of Christ. And may we all have the courage and commitment to fulfill our purposes in the Church, even when we don’t think that what we do is appreciated or important. When one part of the Body is weak or absent or hurting, the whole Body suffers! And Christ has suffered enough.
