Hocus Pocus is a common enough term in our American version of the English language so as to be generally known to most of us. It means something akin to magic or make believe or trick, with the usual understanding being that it is not true, but, in addition, it really doesn’t matter much one way or the other whether it is true or not, because it’s not of great importance. It’s a trivial matter, insignificant, designed to evoke a smile or laughter. So it’s not of great moment, nor worth getting excited about.
The term HOCUS POCUS seems to derive from medieval England during the religious turmoil surrounding the separation of the church of England from the Roman Catholic church. Much ill will and hard feeling accompanied this rupture, and “hocus pocus” was a linguistic emergent of this raucous era. It was an instance of the victimization occurring during this tumultuous era when the abuse of things religious became rampant, and, from the Catholic point of view, it was especially the Catholic church doctrine on the Eucharist that came under attack. It is, of course, one of the seven sacraments Catholics cherish as centerpieces of their religious belief and practice.
But more likely than the other sacraments, the eucharist was especially subjected to ridicule during this era. And the centerpiece of the attacks made on it was the sacrifice of the mass. Catholics have traditionally venerated the eucharist, probably more so than any of the other sacraments. Regular attendance at mass, especially on Sundays, drew more Catholics than any other sacramental event, and reception of the eucharist has been a centerpiece of this practice over the centuries, though, admittedly, it has varied in frequency at different periods of church history. And the pivotal reason for Catholic veneration of and reverence for the eucharist is the strong faith belief that the bread and wine featured at each mass was changed into the Body and Blood of Christ. Catholics, of course, base this conviction on the bible with its accounts of Jesus’ institution of the eucharist at what is often referred to as The Last Supper (Mt 26.26, ff., Mk 14.22, ff., Lk 22.14, ff.).
Only a priest can celebrate mass, and only he can pronounce the formula, called the words of institution or consecration, during the course of the mass, which effect this change of bread and wine into the body and blood of Jesus Christ. This is the sacramental centerpiece of the eucharist within the mass. The words uttered by the priest are the versions found in the gospels, as spoken by Jesus Himself, and they are venerated as sacred. At the time of the Protestant Reformation, when the mass was celebrated in the Latin language (the Roman rite), the words for the consecration of the bread, repeated by the priest, were: “Hoc est enim corpus meum.” This means: “For this is my body”, that is, the Body of Christ. Of course, it is a faith belief that this statement is true.
To opponents of Catholicism, and there were many at this time, such faith in the veracity of this formula was lacking, and this constituted the groundwork for rejecting what would obviously seem ludicrous and beyond belief. So this formula, in its Latin version, became the occasion for ridicule, as, for instance, by taking the words: hoc est enim corpus meum, and, employing word play, transposing it into: hocus pocus, a twisted English version of the Latin, as it sounded to a non-believer, especially if he or she knew no Latin. So hocus pocus derived either from ignorance of Latin, or else from deliberate misreading of the words.
In this way hocus pocus entered the English language as a synonym for foolishness, make-believe, or trickiness. While all this happened several hundred years ago, during an historical period that has disappeared, the English language has been “enriched” with a new phrase that fits nicely into the intriguing arena of fun, jokes, tricks and magic. This is a far cry from the venerable origins of this sacramental formula: hoc est enim corpus meum. It is a descent from the sacred to the ridiculous.
This Sunday Catholics celebrate the liturgical festival of Corpus Christi (the Body of Christ). The English-speaking portions of the Catholic world have this variant (hocus pocus) in their language that the Latin original would hardly recognize. And the comical phrase, hocus pocus, is a far cry from its sacred origins. Fortunately, the passage of time has emptied this derivative of the mean-spiritedness and ridicule that surrounded it originally, and which is now likely unknown. The only salvageable emergent from it is a new phrase in the english language that enlarges our vocabulary for the “fun” or humorous, light-hearted side of our conversation.
Is it appropriate, then, to say that “all is well that ends well”?
We are a community of laymen and laywomen who, with vowed Passionists, seek to share in the charism of St. Paul of the Cross through prayer, ongoing spiritual formation, and proclamation of the message of Christ Crucified.
The use of the words hocus pocus reminded me of when I was a young girl, I had friends who were not Catholic and did not understand the Eucharist as the Body and Blood of Christ, only as bread and wine. I tried to explain the Catholic belief and the reference in the quote of Jesus, but still their were in disbelief. AS an end result I told them, that believing what was in scripture was the clearest/best answer. If they could not believe in Jesus or His self-giving gift (to do this In Memory of Me), then it must seem just as words spoken in Church.
Yeah, Nancy, but, What if, as Chuck Doe, Mother of Good Counsel 1962 et seq. is fond of asking , “What if the Hokey Pokey really is where it’s At?” Or,
As the Ven. Blessed Antonin Scalia regularly writes, “It is all Jiggery Pokery on the part of the left wing, Smoke and Mirrors, Blasphemous members of this very Court![;] It is simply not written into the Constitution.” Poor Blessed Fellow, he is a literalist, just like the Islamic State jihadists who believe that if they die for the faith, they will get 40 virgins in the next life. Poor Fellows! Muhammad, Peace be upon him, wrote in Sanscrit, Well, actually he was not literate, but everything was first transcribed in Sanscrit, and has come down to us, to transmogrify the English translation of the Koran: it was Vegans! Now please tell me again how there is no justice in the world to come. Or how poor Justice Scalia interprets, Jesus solemn admonition, “Call No Man Father.” Not to mention all that Protestant garbage about Him not being an Only Child. Come ON! What on earth do you suppose poor Blessed Antonin is expecting in the next life? He already has part of it engraved on the stone he has had prepared for himself and his darling (2nd?) wife: He was a true son of the Roman Church: but it has no Imprimatur, and unless he outlives Francis I (God Forbid) will never have a Nihil Obstat. But seriously, there is a site that anyone can go to and if you put in your name and bar number, it will tell you just exactly how he phrases his disdain for your most “ad hominem” character deficiencies, not to mention your inane legal reasoning ability. I don’t have it to send out, but I have it saved in some email somewhere. Peace, Sistern and Brethern, be upon us all.
P.S. Is Dan O’Donnell also from Mother of Good Counsel 1958 thru present? If anyone can answer this, please tell him to private message me on Facebook: Michael Wade Clark of the Sacred Heart.
OMG! I beg everyone’s pardon! I honestly thought that it was Dirty Dan who submitted this article; I am shaking as I write this “apologia pro verba meipsa” having seen Father Sebastian’s by line. [Father, I am just a tad disappointed that you left out the part about the Golliards, one of Fr. John Francis’ favorite “Dark Ages” religious orders, “Ecce Homo, Sine Domo” etc. etc. and gradually more ribald etcs., who renounced poverty and were required to make Last Wills and Testaments to the fact that they would die faithful Sons and Daughters of the Holy Roman Church, and to specify that the cause of each of their deaths would be Laughter, at its administration, and whose ranks included some first rate, though extremely premature Theologians, and the cream of the Canon Lawyer crop of those very days. They even, obscurely, introduced a cause of sainthood for +Bonafatius VIII, in gest, of course. Oh, and (Fr.) Joseph Mary, the erstwhile Dr. Connolly, has instructed me to send Sebbie his warmest and most sincere regards.
(Oh, technically, I ‘spose that should be ” the preter erstwhile Dr. etc, ..”) Well, you know Joe, he is nothing if not precise. God Bless All, and i am sorry, and praying that this has “ended well”
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