The Catechism in a Year (with Fr. Mike Schmitz) - Day 146: The Father’s Work in the Liturgy (2026)

Episode Date: May 26, 2026

Together, we begin Section One on the sacramental economy. Fr. Mike emphasizes that the sacramental economy is both what God has done for us and how we should participate in it. He also emphasizes the blessings we receive from the sacraments through the Father. We conclude with an examination on the dual dimension of the sacramental liturgy, that while we are praising the Father, we are praising the Father with his own gift, his own Son. Today’s readings are Catechism paragraphs 1076-1083. This episode has been found to be in conformity with the Catechism by the Institute on the Catechism, under the Subcommittee on the Catechism, USCCB. For the complete reading plan, visit ascensionpress.com/ciy Please note: The Catechism of the Catholic Church contains adult themes that may not be suitable for children - parental discretion is advised.

Hi, my name is Father Mike Schmitz, and you're listening to the Catechism in a Year podcast, where we encounter God's plan of sure goodness for us, revealed in scripture, and passed down through the tradition of the Catholic faith. The Catechism in a year is brought to you by Ascension. In 365 days, we'll read through the Catechism of the Catholic Church, discovering our identity in God's family as we journeyed together to our heavenly home. This is day 146. We are reading paragraphs 1076 to 1083. As always, I'm using the Ascension edition of the Catechism, which includes the foundations of faith approach, but you can follow along. with any recent version of the catechism of the Catholic Church.

You can also download your own catechism in a year reading plan by visiting ascensionpress.com slash C-I-Y, and you can click follow or subscribe in your podcast app for daily updates and daily notifications. Today is day 146. Again, as I said, paragraph 1076 to 1083. We're actually starting section one yesterday was the kind of a prolog-ish kind of a thing going on. But today, section one and the beginning of chapter one.

We're going to talk about what? The sacramental economy, remember. Remember economy. Oeconomia was the Greek word that we get economy from. And it's this God's plan of salvation, right? The story of God's interacting with us is that term economy, right? And so we have the sacramental economy, the way that God chooses to interact with us through the sacraments. He brings us his divine life through the sacraments. He gives us healing through the sacraments. He feeds us at the sacraments. So this is the sacramental economy. And paragraph 1076 highlights that first we're going to look at this. Again, the sacramental economy, how this all works, why it works like this.

And then we're going to dive into, that's chapter one. And then we're going to dive into chapter two, which is, it says here, the nature and essential features of liturgical celebration will then appear more clearly, meaning like the sacraments themselves, as we know the seven sacraments. So we're going to have this first chapter, chapter one on, okay, what is it to have the pascal mystery in the age of the church. How is it that what Jesus did for us, two thousand years ago, actually comes to us and its effects are transforming our hearts now in this day and age? Remember, as we launched through all of this stuff, the word liturgy, what does it mean? It means the work of God. So the liturgy is the participation of the people of God in the work of God.

So sacramental economy, here's what God has done for us. How are we called to participate in God's very work? This is not the work of man, right? This is our, participation in the work of God. So to prepare our hearts to do this today and to do this all our lives, we call upon our Father in heaven as we pray. Father in heaven, we thank you, we give you praise and glory. We thank you and praise your name. We bless your name, Lord God. We bless your name and we surrender and adore you in Thanksgiving. That is our blessing. Our blessing is a prayer of adoration and a prayer of surrender to you. in Thanksgiving. So we thank you. We ask you to please hear our prayer. Receive the blessing that we

offer you as little as we are, broken as we are and good as you are, Lord God. Receive our blessing. Receive our adoration. Receive our surrender to you in Thanksgiving. We make this prayer in the mighty name of Jesus Christ, our Lord. Amen. In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. It's day 146. We are reading paragraphs 1076 to 1083. Section 1. The Sacramental economy. The church was made manifest to the world on the day of Pentecost by the outpouring of the Holy Spirit. The gift of the spirit ushers in a new era in the dispensation of the mystery, the age of the church, during which Christ manifests, makes present, and communicates his work of salvation through the liturgy of his church until he comes. In this age of the church, Christ now lives and acts

in and with his church, in a new way appropriate to this new age. He acts through the sacraments in what the common tradition of the East and the West calls the sacramental economy. This is the communication or dispensation of the fruits of Christ's pascal mystery in the celebration of the church's sacramental liturgy. It is, therefore, important first to explain this sacramental dispensation, chapter one, the nature and essential features of liturgical celebration will then appear more clearly. Chapter 2. Chapter 1. The Pascal Mystery in the Age of the Church. Article 1. The Liturgy. Work of the Holy Trinity.

The Father, Source and Goal of the Liturgy. St. Paul wrote to the Ephesians, Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, even as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him. He destined us before him in love to be his sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will,

to the praise of his glorious grace which he freely bestowed on us in the beloved. Blessing is a divine and life-giving action, the source of which is the Father. His blessing is both word and gift. When applied to man, the word blessing means adoration and surrender to his creator in Thanksgiving. From the beginning until the end of God, end of time, the whole of God's work is a blessing. From the liturgical poem of the first creation

to the canticles of the heavenly Jerusalem, the inspired authors proclaimed the plan of salvation as one vast divine blessing. From the very beginning, God blessed all living beings, especially man and woman. The covenant with Noah and with all living things renewed this blessing of fruitfulness despite man's sin, which had brought a curse on the ground. But with Abraham, the divine blessing entered into human history, which was moving toward death, to redirect it toward life, toward its source. By the faith of the Father of all believers who embraced the blessing, the history of salvation is inaugurated. The divine blessings were made manifest in astonishing and saving events, the birth of Isaac, the escape from Egypt, Passover and Exodus, the gift of the promised land,

the election of David, the presence of God in the temple, the purifying exile, and return of a small remnant. The law, the prophets, and the Psalms interwoven in the liturgy of the chosen people, recall these divine blessings, and at the same time respond to them with blessings of praise and Thanksgiving. In the church's liturgy, the divine blessing is fully revealed and communicated. The Father is acknowledged and adored as the source and the end of all the blessings of creation and salvation. In his word who became incarnate, died, and rose for us, he fills us with his blessings. Through his word, he pours into our hearts the gift that contains all gifts, the Holy Spirit. The dual dimension of the Christian liturgy as a response of faith and love to the spiritual

blessings the Father bestows on us is thus evident. On the one hand, the Church, united with her Lord and in the Holy Spirit, blesses the Father for his inexpressible gift in her adoration, praise, and thanksgiving. On the other hand, until the consummation of God's plan, the Church never ceases to present to the Father the offering of his own gifts, and to beg him to send the Holy Spirit upon that offering, upon herself, upon the faithful, and upon the whole world, so that through communion in the death and resurrection of Christ the priest, and by the power of the spirit, these divine blessings will bring forth the fruits of life to the praise of his glorious grace. Right, there we have it. Barographs 1076 to 1083, this introduction, this very beginning,

Section 1, Sacramental Economy, Chapter 1. Okay, so, man, 1076, remember how back in the day, you're talking about here's the work of the sun and the work of the spirit. It's united. They're doing the will of the father, kind of a one-two punch. And in the sense of here, salvation brought to the world and changing our lives. Paragraph 1076 highlights this and highlights the fact that here we are in the age of the church.

It goes on to say, the gift of the spirit ushers in a new era in the dispensation of the mystery. And this is the thing. This is the age of the church where Christ manifests, really reveals, right, and it makes present and communicates his work of salvation through the liturgy of his church until he comes. So, man, in right now, as we're living, Jesus, he now lives and acts in and with his church through the sacraments. It further says that Jesus acts through the sacraments in what the common tradition of the East and the West calls the sacramental economy. So let's highlight the East and the West for just. just one second. Okay, as we know, you may not know this. In 1054, way back in the day,

in 1054, the one church split into two, right? You have the East and the West. You have the Roman Catholic Church in the West, and you also have the Orthodox Church in the East. You have the Eastern Church and the Western Church, which is called the Great Schism, 1054. Horrible. You know, Jesus, at the Last Supper, he prays that we all would be one. And here's this one example of the church experiencing the brokenness of its members. And so the church actually breaks, right, the great schism. Now, at the same time, there were numerous opportunities and numerous times where East and West came back together and there was reconciliation.

There was a couple different church councils where this happened. And so because of that, we have yet we still have East and West. But we also have Eastern right or non, we'll say this like this, there are rights in the Catholic Church that developed on their own. that are not Latin right, or they're not part of the Roman right. In fact, we have a ton of people listening, not only to the Bible any year, but also to the catechism in here, or part of those, there are actually 23 distinct rights in the Catholic Church. So the Catholic Church, one church, right, there it is. This is different than the Orthodox Church. The Catholic Church has in it

23 rights. Now, in those 23 rights, there are what you might call six major liturgical families. So there's the Latin right. That's the one most of us here in the West are, comes accustomed to. There's the Alexandrian right. There's the Antiochian right. There's the Armenian right. There's the Chaldean right and the Constantinopolitan right, which is also called sometimes the Byzantine right. Now, so those six major liturgical families, they're all Catholic. So they're all united to all the bishops and united to the pope, but they have their various rights. And that's, there's something so beautiful about that. There's a variety in these liturgical expressions. And there's also, variety and some governance kind of situations, but they're all united. We're all united as bishops

and with the Holy Father. In fact, again, there's so many people. Caldean right. I get reached out by the Chaldeans all over the time. The Armenian right as well. So, so beautiful, just really incredible. So, but both the East and the West calls what we're talking about today, the sacramental economy, that here is what God wants to do and is doing in our lives. That's why I just love the fact that we're diving into this. Now, now, a couple things to keep in mind. We heard that very long quote from Ephesians chapter 1 where blessed it be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. He blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places and he chose us this incredible. So why? So for the purpose of his will to the praise of his glorious grace.

And that's what we're going to do. We're going to praise God's glorious grace through the liturgy. Not only is this us blessing God and praising God, adoring God, thanking God, worshiping God. but we're also presenting ourselves to the Father and begging God to send us the Holy Spirit upon us, upon the faithful, upon the whole world so that our participation in the death and resurrection of Jesus, those blessings from God will come upon us, right? So there's this, there's this, we go out to the Lord, we just offer him praise, we offer him worship, we offer him adoration, we offer him, yeah, every good thing, we give God blessing. Now, let's highlight this for a second. Have you ever wondered why is it that what do we mean we say a bless God?

Like give God praise and blessing. Like wait a second. How is it that we bless God? Because isn't it God the one who blesses us? Well, maybe you caught this in paragraph 1078. It says blessing is the divine is a divine and life giving action, the source of which is the father. Like his blessing is both word and gift. And then there's a footnote that says eulogia and benedictio.

So, you know, it's word and gift. Those words refer to. When applied to us, the word blessing means adoration and surrender to our creator and Thanksgiving. So when we say, oh, we're going to bless God. What that means is we bow down in adoration and surrender to God and Thanksgiving. But when God blesses us, that's all that he does for us, right? That from the beginning until the end of time, all of God's work is a blessing. It's all gift.

It's all word. It's all gift. It's incredible. And it goes on to talk about in paragraph 1079, 1080, 1081. this here's the story that how God has blessed all living beings from the very beginning of Genesis right every day God makes something new and he says it's very good he blesses through his very word blesses the blesses the day and blesses man and woman the covenant with Noah all these blessings completely renewed and the faithfulness of God revealed it's just

amazing so when we apply the word blessing to man it means us adoring and surrendering to our creator. But when blessings apply to God, it's all of his gifts, all of his gifts and everything he gives us is a gift. So let's highlight this one more time and summarize that it'll be the very last thing we talk about today. Oh my gosh, you guys. I get too excited. We all know this. I am so sorry. I apologize. But it just, there's something so beautiful about this dual dimension of the Christian liturgy highlighted in 1083. So what's the dual dimension? On the one hand, here's the church united with Jesus and in the Holy Spirit.

We bless the Father for his inexpressible gift when we adore him, praise him, thank him. Like, basically, we offer the offer, we offer the Mass. What are we doing? We're offering up the great sacrifice of the Son to the Father, to the Father and the Power of Holy Spirit. So we're giving God every good gift. He's given, the best gift he's given us. We're giving to Him. And also we're uniting our hearts with what is the heart of the Son, right?

The offering, the self-offering of Jesus Christ. And we're just offering that to the Father. in adoration, in praise and Thanksgiving. On the other hand, we are also presenting ourselves to the Father, and we're presenting to the Father his own gifts, right? When you give the Father your heart, you're giving him his own gift.

When we give the Father, the Eucharist, and lifted up through Him with Him and the unity of the Holy Spirit, all glory and honor is yours, Almighty Father. We're presenting him with his own gift. We're presenting him with his own son that he gave to us. And when we're doing that, we're also not only adoring and praising and blessing God, but we're also asking him, begging him to send the Holy Spirit upon us

and upon all of us, upon the whole faithful and upon the whole world, so that as we participate and have communion with the death and resurrection of Jesus, those blessings will go out to the entire world. And so God has even more praised and God is even more glorified. Oh man, you guys, does that make sense? It just, oh my gosh, incredible. It's just bonkers tomorrow. We get to talk about, so today was obviously the father, the source and goal of the liturgy,

tomorrow Christ's work in the liturgy, which I'm telling you right now, it's going to sound familiar in the sense of, yeah, that's right. Christ continues to work in the liturgy. And then the next day, guess, yep, the Holy Spirit in the liturgy. And so we're going to dive deeply into that. Oh, my gosh, you guys, what a gift of a day. What a gift of a life to be able to be alive in the age of the church where Jesus continues to come to us,

continues to sanctify, redeem us, heal us, forgive us, and feed us through his sacraments. So to the praise of the Father and for our salvation.

Oh my gosh. You guys, this is our prayer. And so let's pray for each other. I am praying for you. Please pray for me. My name's Father Mike. I cannot wait to see you tomorrow.

God bless.