False and True Worship: How the Occult Reveals the Truth of Catholicism Part 2

Anthropology of Religion and Ritual

From the dawn of time, spiritual activities have been embedded in cultures across the globe. Sacrifice--whether of humans, animals, or crops--is almost second nature to many tribes and peoples for thousands of years. And, as discussed in part 1, occult practices as well.

One could argue that these traditions would have been merely to explain or control natural phenomena that could not be scientifically understood yet. But why would primitive man have the capacity to raise his heart and mind to things beyond the natural world...even as his main concern was physical survival?

Something within told him that there was more than what he could observe with his five senses. But how could he commune and have a relationship with the unseen?

This relationship could not simply be in his mind. It needed to be visible and concrete. Therefore, the solution was sensible: intentionally using creation as means through which he could open himself into a relationship with the Divine. In other words, religious rituals.

This preaches volumes about the identity and purpose of the human person: one, that man is an earthly creature, but with a rational soul. Second, that he must acknowledge that which transcends him and the natural, created order. This acknowledgement, which begins from the intellect, must be made tangibly present.

Thus, spiritual rituals are not meaningless activities that attempt to understand the unseen, but rather a logical response to an intuited call. They are not vain or unnecessary; they are an exercise of man's nature and role in the cosmos: as a creature who lives by his natural senses in the physical world, but also as one capable of sharing in the transcendent, especially when his earthly life ends.

Relationship, or Religion?

It has only been a recent belief that religious, ceremonial activities are outdated and unnecessary. Certainly this mindset has pervaded secular culture, but has also been adopted by many Christian Protestants. Relationship, not religion, has been the mantra at play for the last 10-15 years.

When it comes to Judeo-Christian tradition, the books of Leviticus and Deuteronomy often are glossed over by many because of the highly detailed, and seemingly nonsensical precepts. It also doesn't help that as time went on, the religious leaders were using these things to marginalize the very people they were meant to lead to God.

Yet spiritual abuse by sinful humans do not change the fact that the Law was given by God Himself. Even before these regulations were explicitly laid out, there were many instances in which the intentional, religious use of creation, and physical actions become a means for God to act in the world, and signal a relationship with Him: the making of the covenant with Abraham through ceremonial slaughter of animals; Moses being commanded to remove his sandals in the presence of the burning bush; painting the doorposts of the Hebrews with sacrificial lambs' blood, to deter the angel of death from killing their firstborn.

All of these were sanctioned by God. How can one denigrate that which He set forth for the good of His people, to invite them back into relationship with Him?

Of course, animal sacrifices and other rituals were not satisfactory in bridging the gap between man and the Divine. However, God worked with the very nature with which He bestowed His people, preparing them for the fulfillment that these practices were hoping to achieve.

God could have simply announced from the Heavens that He had forgiven the debt owed by humanity to Him, and that religion--at the heart of which is total sacrifice of body and soul--would be abolished. Why go through all the trouble of becoming man and dying a brutal, bloody death to atone for sin?

But He worked with the system and perfected it. In His Incarnation, the Son of God "filled in" what man could not achieve in his fallen, finite state; He chose to be born under the Law, and be obedient to it, even as He was its giver (Galatians 4:4); being a pleasing Son to the Father on behalf of all, that all may once again be called His sons and daughters! This culminated in His Passion and Death on the cross, a blood sacrifice for sin so perfect--"for the wages of sin is death" which He paid out of love (Romans 6:23)--that it births a New Covenant between God and mankind.

Christ, being fully man and fully God, completely satisfied the justice humanity owed to the Father: worship, adoration, unreserved gift of body and soul, and obedience to His will and design--all intentionally done in the fleshly nature He assumed, in time and space, in creation.

This is perfect religion and relationship.

No longer are we required to adhere to the Old Covenant, for Christ fulfilled it in Himself. Instead, He establishes a New Law, a New Covenant, with His blood in which we are invited to fully participate.

However, He does not disregard our human nature, and still the ways in which we relate to the Divine. As His once-and-for-all Sacrifice happened at a specific place and time in history, there must be ways in which people down through the ages can receive this salvific grace. Truly, the gift of faith one comes to receive in his heart is the catalyst for relationship with Christ. But again, it is not enough that this relationship is in our heads.

Cue the seven Sacraments of the Catholic Church: Baptism. Confirmation. Reconciliation. Anointing of the Sick. Marriage. Holy Orders.

And perhaps most importantly, the Eucharist and the Sacrifice of the Mass.

In all of these, God uses, blesses, and elevates creation--water, wine, oil, man and woman, bread--to transmit His grace to rational creatures who experience reality primarily through their five senses.

The desire to commune with the transcendent through created things is not evil; it is inherent to human nature. What determines its rightness is to whom the worship is directed, the disposition of the heart, and that it is what God has established in His Word and His Body, the Church.