Baptist Sacramentalism?

In other posts on "Bapto-catholicism", I outlined what I believe to be the basic trajectory of this conversation which seeks a retrieval of the broadly "catholic" Christian tradition for Baptist life and thought.  In my own ministry as a Baptist Christian working primarily (thus far) among Episcopalians, Lutherans and Methodists, I have had lots of time to consider the more sacramental understandings (or lack thereof) of church life present among these traditions.

Among other Baptists (conservatives, moderates and liberals alike), I think my views on Baptists and the sacraments may be fairly unique.  Many of the earliest Baptist confessions of faith speak of baptism and the Eucharist as sacraments and in Towards Baptist Catholicity, Steven Harmon claimed that Bapto-catholic Christians (or catholic Baptists) were advocates of a broadly sacramental theology.

A sacramental understanding of church life for Harmon would certainly mean a fuller appreciation of Christ's presence in our celebration of the Lord's supper.  Such an understanding would, of course, be quite a shift from the "traditional" Baptist understanding of the Supper (which is more akin to the Zwinglian tradition).  For Harmon, the appreciation for Christ's presence in the Eucharist (for example) has its root in "a theology that understands the sacraments of baptism and the Eucharist as paradigmatic of the relation of God to the material order that is disclosed in the Incarnation" (TBC, 13).

Call me naive, but - given the historical basis of sacramental language in the earliest baptist confessions - I find it ironic that a "sacramental" understanding of baptism and the Eucharist would most likely represent shift from what many (if not most) Baptists in North America believe about baptism and the Eucharist.  One has to wonder what the earliest Baptists meant when the wrote about the "ordinances" as sacraments given that to use such language today in most any "traditional" Baptist church would certainly invite scorn (at least) and possibly bar one from ministering in a Baptist context at all.

Though I am not an expert in Catholic theology, I am the happy beneficiary of a long "love affair" with Catholicism.  Translation: I read the Catechism for fun.  Although I'm sure the earliest Baptists didn't read the Catechism for fun, I wonder if the present antipathy toward sacramentality has something to to with voluntarism and the efficaciousness of the sacraments in Catholic understanding.

"Christ now acts through the sacraments he instituted to communicate grace.  The sacraments are perceptible signs (words and actions) accessible to our human nation.  By the action of Christ and the power of the Holy Spirit they make present efficaciously the grace that they signify" (¶ 1084).

Moreover, in ¶ 1127, the Catechism states that

"Celebrated worthily in faith, the sacraments confer the grace that they signify. They are efficacious because in them Christ himself is at work: it is he who baptizes, he who acts in his sacraments in order to communicate the grace that each sacrament signifies."

Again, I am no expert in Catholic teaching but I would imagine that the use of the word "efficaciously" would give pause to many Baptists.  In fact, I think one would be hard-pressed to find within any of the historic Baptist confessions language of the sacraments which even hints at the idea that the sacraments (or ordinances) "do anything" to the person receiving them.

In the earliest Baptist confessions, the sacraments (or ordinances) are - almost uniformly - presented as something which we do either to memorialize Christ's sacrifice and resurrection or to symbolize our covenanting with the community of faith to live as obedient disciples of Christ.  It would appear that Baptists are a people who hold great antipathy toward the idea of being acted upon. Thus some would say that, from a Baptist perspective, the sacraments are our response to something that we have believed of our own volition as opposed to an experience in which we receive what God is doing in, for an to us.  I think this discussion of the nature of the sacraments points to a couple more important questions regarding the retrieval of sacramental language among some Baptists in North America:

First, what (both practically and theoretically) would a Baptist understanding of baptism and Eucharist as sacraments look like.  Is it enough to simply point to the mystery of Christ's presence and God's grace at work in the sacraments?  Moreover, if Baptists are to retrieve a sacramental understanding of church life, by what authority would such a retrieval take place?  Is simple appeal to the broadly "catholic" tradition enough?  The question of authority is especially daunting given the importance of congregational polity in the Baptist tradition.

Given all of this (and more to come), the big question is "Is there really a place for a more sacramental understanding of church among Baptists in North America?"  I am inclined to hope that this is the case but I am uncertain how such a retrieval might take place with integrity and consistency.  Any ideas?