“Confirmation is not the same as graduation.”
I just got back from a lovely confirmation ceremony at my parish, at which our dear bishop exhorted the newly confirmed with the above phrase: “Confirmation is not the same as graduation.” I thought this was excellent. Too many Catholics’ education in the faith comes to a screeching halt within minutes of shedding their red, fire-retardant confirmation gowns. Hopefully, the souls wearing the gowns aren’t Fire-retardant…
Father Corapi has a great line in one of his talks in which he suggests that the charismatic renewal in the church wouldn’t have been necessary if the sacrament of confirmation was doing what it was meant to do. Why is it that the laying on of hands and anointing by the bishop no longer results in powerful phenomena as in the days of the early church?
Perhaps it’s because they didn’t administer sacraments to people until they were truly converted. In modern times, one could argue that many people who receive the sacraments are not converted at all. They receive Baptism, Confirmation, and Holy Matrimony for cultural reasons and not because they and their families actually believe this stuff.
In the Gospel there’s an episode where the people of a certain town lacked faith to such an extent that Jesus could not work any miracles there. I guess if a minister of the church confers one of the sacraments upon someone who doesn’t really believe, that sacrament and its graces could be pretty much nullified by that person’s lack of faith or lack of conversion. Yet, by faith, we believe that the Sacraments do what the Church promises. It’s a great mystery…
Pray for all the newly confirmed, the soon-to-be confirmed, and for those who were confirmed many years ago. May God fan into flame the gifts of the Holy Spirit within our hearts and grant us the gift of unshakable faith and true conversion to the Lord!
