From the Waters of Worship

This past summer I traveled to Silver Lake Camp one sunny Saturday in July. I went down to the waters to celebrate the baptism of my cousin, and dear friend, James. It was a lovely service that took place across the field, over the fence, and down on the beach. The minister spoke about the spectacle of the sacrament of baptism, and reminded all of us, the Church in witness and support, of the great mystery of communion. “As James goes down into the water,” he said, “he will die. And as he is raised up, he will be born again into the Kingdom of Heaven. In that moment we are going to lay hands on James and pray for him, to bless him as he takes his next step into the Kingdom, and we will be joined by all the saints who came before us in prayer.” And that’s what we did. As James came back up from where it was deeper, we went down to meet him in the water.

               “James will die to the Kingdom of Men,” said the minister, “and return to us from the world of mystery as a child in the Kingdom of God.” As I sat there, across the field, over the fence, and down on the beach, thinking about the mystery of communion, I was reminded by the presence of jet-skis on the lake how strange a thing a sacrament is to the enlightened mind. It is an ancient ritual which breaks past the boundaries of time and space to bring the Church together in Christ. To be effective, baptism requires faith; the one must say ‘I believe’ and the Church ought to echo back ‘we believe’ lest we abandon the one to live out their faith in private. Baptism is a communal mystery, something which is shared. In this way, baptism based on belief is a leap into faith.

               There are two moments which are shared in the version of the baptismal rite in popular use today: the testimonial moment of belief, and the sacramental moment of mystery. First, the one gives witness to their belief by telling the story of how they came to it and how it has begun to change their life. By way of testimony, the moment of the one’s justification is shared and celebrated. Then, the Church joins with the one as they go across the field, over the fence, and down to the waters of mystery. “We are here at the threshold,” said the minister, “the place where we can peak for just a moment into the Kingdom of Heaven.” Baptism has been called salvific; it is one of the ways in which sanctification occurs, a step in the long process through which one is remade, created anew for the Kingdom of God. This salvific moment of communion is the sacramental mystery.

               To the enlightened mind, the way toward baptism is folly. One must, while standing in the field of phenomena, acknowledge not only the fence, but the truth of things past it. To celebrate the sacrament, one must go over the fence to stand on the threshold of noumena. One has to convince oneself to go beyond the comfortable, empirically knowable field and approach the unknowable waters, which are by their very nature rocky. In baptism we are immersed in those waters – filled up and restored in the presence of, as the minister put it, “an intimate stranger.”

               There are several stories of Jesus handed down from the apostles which involve going out on the waters. In the most impressive, Jesus walks on the stormy sea, and Peter steps out to meet him. But on a much more normal day, Jesus stood in a boat, where it was easy to hear him, teaching a crowd. This was in the unenlightened days before we built the fence and called the waters ‘unknowable’, but the fact remains that to hear Jesus, we must approach the waters.

               When James came back from where it was deeper, not everyone stepped into the waters to meet him. Some, for practical reasons, stood on dry land, and others held out their hands from the beach. Still others though, who were new and unacquainted with the steps toward the waters, stayed back and sat on the fence. It is a blessed thing to sit on the fence; it is perhaps the biggest step of all. The fence is there to mark what the enlightened world calls the edge of knowledge, the end of fact, and start of speculation. Jesus is out on the rocky waters, bringing about the Kingdom of Heaven. The sacraments bring us to the edge of the waters, the Kingdom’s threshold, but outside of ritual, the life of the Church is on the fence, where the Kingdom of Heaven can be clearly heard, and the Kingdom of Men clearly seen. The one who has faith is the one willing to sit on the fence.

               The other day, I set my enlightened life aside and went across the field, over the fence, and down to the waters of mystery. I’ve made the trip many times before, alone and with a group; I am accustomed to life on the fence, but this time was special because my dear friend was making the trip spectacularly – publicly and declaratively – for the first time, and I got to be there with him. The Church is faithful, and she sings to herself from the edges of time and space: “O sinners, let’s go down – let’s go down, come on down – O sinners let’s go down, down to the waters to pray.”