Consuming Liturgy

The consumerist catechism says purpose is “To acquire stuff with the illusion that I can enjoy it forever.”

Every liturgy, we’ve said, is oriented toward a telos–an implicit vision of flourishing that is loaded into its rituals. Those formed by such liturgies then become the kind of people who pursue and desire that end. So if we are unreflectively immersed in the liturgies of consumerism, we will, over time, “learn” that the end goal of human life is acquisition and consumption. “What is the chief end of man?” the consumerist catechism asks “To acquire stuff with the illusion that I can enjoy it forever.” – James K. A. Smith, You Are What You Love, 86

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