Posted on 07/09/2015 9:33:36 AM PDT by RnMomof7
The doctrine of Transubstantiation is the belief that the elements of the Lord’s table (bread and wine) supernaturally transform into the body and blood of Christ during the Mass. This is uniquely held by Roman Catholics but some form of a “Real Presence” view is held by Eastern Orthodox, Lutherans, and some Anglicans. The Calvinist/Reformed tradition believes in a real spiritual presence but not one of substance. Most of the remaining Protestant traditions (myself included) don’t believe in any real presence, either spiritual or physical, but believe that the Eucharist is a memorial and a proclamation of Christ’s work on the cross (this is often called Zwinglianism). The Roman Catholic Council of Trent (1545-1563) defined Transubstantiation this way:
By the consecration of the bread and wine there takes place a change of the whole substance of the bread into the substance of the body of Christ our Lord and of the whole substance of the wine into the substance of his blood. This change the holy Catholic Church has fittingly and properly called transubstantiation” (Session XIII, chapter IV)
As well, there is an abiding curse (anathema) placed on all Christians who deny this doctrine:
If anyone denies that in the sacrament of the most Holy Eucharist are contained truly, really and substantially the body and blood together with the soul and divinity of our Lord Jesus Christ, and consequently the whole Christ,[42] but says that He is in it only as in a sign, or figure or force, let him be anathema. (Session XII, Canon I)
It is very important to note that Roman Catholics not only believe that taking the Eucharist in the right manner is essential for salvation, but that belief in the doctrine is just as essential.
Here are the five primary reasons why I reject the doctrine of Transubstantiation:
1. It takes Christ too literally
There does not seem to be any reason to take Christ literally when he institutes the Eucharist with the words, “This is my body” and “This is my blood” (Matt. 26:26-28, et al). Christ often used metaphor in order to communicate a point. For example, he says “I am the door,” “I am the vine,” “You are the salt of the earth,” and “You are the light of the world” (Matthew 5:13-14) but people know that we don’t take such statement literally. After all, who believes that Christ is literally a door swinging on a hinge?
2. It does not take Christ literally enough
Let’s say for the sake of the argument that in this instance Christ did mean to be taken literally. What would this mean? Well, it seems hard to escape the conclusion that the night before Christ died on the cross, when he said, “This is my body” and “This is my blood,” that it actually was his body and blood that night before he died. If this were the case, and Christ really meant to be taken literally, we have Christ, before the atonement was actually made, offering the atonement to his disciples. I think this alone gives strong support to a denial of any substantial real presence.
3. It does not take Christ literally enough (2)
In each of the Synoptic Gospels (Matthew, Mark, and Luke) we have the institution of the Eucharist. When the wine is presented, Christ’s wording is a bit different. Here is how it goes in Luke’s Gospel: “This cup which is poured out for you is the new covenant in My blood” (Luk 22:20). Here, if we were really to take Christ literally, the “cup” is the new covenant. It is not the wine, it is the cup that is holy. However, of course, even Roman Catholics would agree that the cup is symbolic of the wine. But why one and not the other? Why can’t the wine be symbolic of his death if the cup can be symbolic of the wine? As well, is the cup actually the “new covenant”? That is what he says. “This cup . . . is the new covenant.” Is the cup the actual new covenant, or only symbolic of it? See the issues?
4. The Gospel of John fails to mention the Eucharist
Another significant problem I have with the Roman Catholic interpretation of the Eucharist and its abiding anathemas is that the one Gospel which claims to be written so that people may have eternal life, John (John 20:31), does not even include the institution of the Eucharist. Matthew, Mark, and Luke all tell the story of Christ giving the first Lord’s table, but John decides to leave it out. Why? This issue is made more significant in that John includes more of the “Upper Room” narrative than any of the other Gospels. Nearly one-third of the entire book of John walks us through what Christ did and said that night with his disciples. Yet no breaking of the bread or giving of the wine is included. This is a pretty significant oversight if John meant to give people the message that would lead to eternal life (John 20:31). From the Roman Catholic perspective, his message must be seen as insufficient to lead to eternal life since practice and belief in the Mass are essential for eternal life and he leaves these completely out of the Upper Room narrative.
(Some believe that John does mention the importance of belief in Transubstantiation in John 6. The whole, “Why did he let them walk away?” argument. But I think this argument is weak. I talk about that here. Nevertheless, it still does not answer why John left out the institution of the Lord’s Supper. It could be that by A.D. 90, John saw an abuse of the Lord’s table already rising. He may have sought to curb this abuse by leaving the Eucharist completely out of his Gospel. But this, I readily admit, is speculative.)
5. Problems with the Hypostatic Union and the Council of Chalcedon
This one is going to be a bit difficult to explain, but let me give it a shot. Orthodox Christianity (not Eastern Orthodox) holds to the “Hypostatic Union” of Christ. This means that we believe that Christ is fully God and fully man. This was most acutely defined at the Council of Chalcedon in 451. Important for our conversation is that Christ had to be fully man to fully redeem us. Christ could not be a mixture of God and man, or he could only represent other mixtures of God and man. He is/was one person with two complete natures. These nature do not intermingle (they are “without confusion”). In other words, his human nature does not infect or corrupt his divine nature. And his divine nature does not infect or corrupt his human nature. This is called the communicatio idiomatum (communication of properties or attributes). The attributes of one nature cannot communicate (transfer/share) with another nature. Christ’s humanity did not become divinitized. It remained complete and perfect humanity (with all its limitations). The natures can communicate with the Person, but not with each other. Therefore, the attribute of omnipresence (present everywhere) cannot communicate to his humanity to make his humanity omnipresent. If it did, we lose our representative High Priest, since we don’t have this attribute communicated to our nature. Christ must always remain as we are in order to be the Priest and Pioneer of our faith. What does all of this mean? Christ’s body cannot be at more than one place at a time, much less at millions of places across the world every Sunday during Mass. In this sense, I believe that any real physical presence view denies the definition of Chalcedon and the principles therein.
There are many more objections that I could bring including Paul’s lack of mentioning it to the Romans (the most comprehensive presentation of the Gospel in the Bible), some issues of anatomy, issues of idolatry, and just some very practical things concerning Holy Orders, church history, and . . . ahem . . . excrement. But I think these five are significant enough to justify a denial of Transubstantiation. While I respect Roman Catholicism a great deal, I must admit how hard it is for me to believe that a doctrine that is so difficult to defend biblically is held to such a degree that abiding anathemas are pronounced on those who disagree.
Yeah!
I think that our FEELINGS are disordered. An abortionist can suffer paroxysms of guilt for tossing a Kleenex out the window.
Remorse may be a normal part of coming to terms with one’s deeds and need for amforgiving savior. But when the feeling looms larger than the Gospel, we’ve lostmour perspective.
You posted an article which was a serious attempt to argue against the dogma. I took you, the article, and its author seriously and posted a response to the claims and argumentsmof the article.z I thought it was wonderful that the author went to the Chalcedonian Definition. That's an attempt at some pretty high thought.
But then the conversation decayed into silliness, abuse, and even a kind of a rejection of conversation. It's not adult.Does this build up the body of Christ?
You participate in Catholic Mass where you believe you eat the real, substantial present body, blood, soul, and divinity of The God of the Universe, and you call this ‘beneath human dignity’? LOL Magic Thinking appears to have many levels, up and down.
I wonder if they even know what that means.
I don’t think any Protestant .org accepts transubstantiation.
You're persuaded I'm wrong. I believe I'm not wrong. So shall we just hang around and make stupid remarks about one another’s opinions? Is that how we should act?
Corollary question: How many Bible passages display all three persons of the Trinity in the same scene?
Duplicitous?
Replacing the old hypocritical.
Both too often used where “seemingly inconsistent” would be proper.
Duplicitous denotes double dealing, intent to deceive. I defy you to show an intent to deceive on my part.
Many people have believed and written on transubstantiation for centuries. They may have been wrong, but they were not duplicitous. The martyrs of Gorkum preferred death at the hands of Calvinists to denying it. Is that duplicitous?
Again, maybe they were wrong, but I doubt they went to the gallows for the sake of intentional deceit.
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Speaking of duplicity, I answered some of your questions. Now answer some of mine:
In your own words, what do the terms “real” and “substantial” mean?
It doesn't matter what I think those terms used int Catholic catechism mean, it matters that the Vatican uses that wording to teach catholics that they eat and drink Jesus The Christ by command of the catholic priest for The Christ to come down to the catholic altar and be continuously sacrificed in a cannibalistic fashion.
Let's check your oil. Here's a paragraph from an early edition of John O'Brien's catholic instructional guide which carries the nihil obstat from the Vatican. See if there is anything which you would disagree with as being at least bordering on blasphemous:
page 27, Faith of Millions:
“When the priest pronounces the tremendous words of consecration, he reaches up into the heavens, brings Christ down from his throne, and places Him upon our altar to be offered up again as the victim for the sins of men. It is a power greater than that of monarchs and emperors; it is greater than that of saints and angels, grater than that of Seraphim and Cherubim. Indeed it is greater even than the power of the Virgin Mary. The priest brings Christ down from heaven, and renders Him present on our altar as the eternal Victim for the sins of man – not once but a thousand times! The priest speaks and lo! Christ, the eternal and omnipotent God, bows his head in humble obedience to the priest's command.”
Ugh, make that page 270, not 27. The later editions somehow shuffled it to around page 255.
In the years I've been here we've discussed the nihil obstat. The Catholic Church gets yelled at for being too rigid and controlling AND for not being sufficiently rigid and controlling. And the amount of rhetorical tripe that gets past the censor librorum amazes me again and again.
But that's a matter of style. That ain't hardly theology.
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But cannibalistic? This is why the technical terms matter: RnMomof7 thinks some refutation of transubstantiation is given by arguing that the disciples must have eaten some part of IHS’s body at the last supper.
Respondeo:
Once, Jesus’ body had only one, then two, then four cells. It had organelles, yes, but no organs. But it was his body.
Consequently, with respect to the “substance” — as the term is used in “transubstantiation” -— arms, legs, liver, etc. are “accidental.” They are not of the “esse”, “quiddity”, or “substance” of the body of Christ.
As I developed earlier, cannibals eat ONLY accidents. The esse of Christ has no parts. It would be good to consider what the substance of a human body is. RnMomof7, speaking casually, spoke of the body as something IHS was “wearing” at the time. That's hard to reconcile with the anthropology of Gen 2:7.
It's so hard that it tends to Docetism or to a gnostic and pagan view of the body. In fact, the Aristotelian — Thomistic account is far easier to reconcile with Gen 2:7 than any talk of “wearing.”
As a, highly inadequate, beginning I offer these suggestions, for “color”, not for rigor. Because we have bodies, we can tell where I stop and where you begin. Bodies “define” us, in the sense of setting limits to us. Because we have bodies, we can communicate. We make noises, gestures, and marks. We activate pixels in significant (sign-making) ways. And we perceive the signs, marks, gestures, and significant noises made by others.
If you were able to spark thoughts in my mind without corporal means, how would I know they were not MY thoughts?
...
For Genesis 2:7, the living body IS the human self, as limited and as capable of community and communion — or so I propose, as a jumping off point.
The criticism of transubstantiation, therefore, seems to be based in an unscriptural, but rather materialist (as contrasted with “Realist”), view of the body. And that's at least part of the explanation for the way the counter-arguments fly right by us.
...
You may remember Quix, of happy memory and many colors. When he began to “get” what “substance” denotes, he was angry! He saw that we were not talking about muscle and organs but about something a lot closer to “spiritual” than he realized. But the opponents of transubstantiation come blundering into the debate with Howitzers firing when it's a matter far more suited to scalpels.
And then the get mad at us because their huge explosive shells fail even to touch our position.
“When the priest pronounces the tremendous words of consecration, he reaches up into the heavens, brings Christ down from his throne, and places Him upon our altar to be offered up again as the victim for the sins of men. It is a power greater than that of monarchs and emperors; it is greater than that of saints and angels, grater than that of Seraphim and Cherubim. Indeed it is greater even than the power of the Virgin Mary. The priest brings Christ down from heaven, and renders Him present on our altar as the eternal Victim for the sins of man – not once but a thousand times! The priest speaks and lo! Christ, the eternal and omnipotent God, bows his head in humble obedience to the priest's command.”
Meant to ping ya’ll tot he paragraph and Mad Dawg’s answer, if he reads it.
I “get”it just as I get it when Louis de Montfort (whom I personally call, “crazy Louie”) talks about “worshiping” Mary. My edition has a footnote hastily clarifying that language.
My fury comes from the interference with the apologetical task. I might say to my wife, “I adore you.” I might use other excessive language. But I would be prepared to clarify the difference between exuberant and poetic language and technically precise language.
If this were theological language I would condemn it. If you like, I will try to express what is wrong and what is (barely) tolerable about it.
Here (since I'm at chapter meeting, I can't spend time on this) I'd like to say that if you look at most of the prayers of consecration, they are not at all in the form of conjuring or commanding God. They are ... in the over all context and form an extended blessing of the Hebrew Form; but in language they are principally a plea.
So the language in the quote can only be redeemed if it is understood as similar to the confidence of a very young child who might say,”Wow! Looka that! When I call mom, she comes, every time!
So then they that are in the flesh cannot please God. But ye are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you. Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his.Does this passage imply, under Thomas' (faulty) anthropology, that Christ must also be with us physically, else we are none of His?
(Romans 8:8-9)
Therefore it follows that the accidents continue in this sacrament without a subject. This can be done by Divine power: for since an effect depends more upon the first cause than on the second, God Who is the first cause both of substance and accident, can by His unlimited power preserve an accident in existence when the substance is withdrawn whereby it was preserved in existence as by its proper cause, just as without natural causes He can produce other effects of natural causes, even as He formed a human body in the Virgin's womb, "without the seed of man" (Hymn for Christmas, First Vespers).
Available here: http://www.newadvent.org/summa/4077.htmAs I have discussed elsewhere, Aquinas here invents "real accidents," accidents he claims are capable, by miraculous power, of existing without a proper subject. But in so doing he devolves those "real accidents" into something very like true substances in their own right, at which point we have ceased using the terms "substance" and "accident" in any meaningful way - we descend into gibberish.
The word “substance” as used by Scholastic Realists has little if anything to do with “physicality.”
It's a lot to ask, I know, but please read my other posts on this thread. I have, here and before now, repeatedly repudiated “phsyical” as a term useful in understanding our teaching.
In the Corinthian correspondence, in the discourse on the resurrection, Paul uses an interesting word about the body before (death and) resurrection: psychikon. This suggests “animated”, while the raised body is “pneumatikon.”
(I'm “listening” to a lecture and can't research right now.)
But that's a very provocative usage.
But PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE, believe me: transubstantiation is NOT about a PHYSICAL change. Most, if not all, of what modern discourse calls “physical” I would call “accidental,” while the dogma is about the what-it-is-ness of the body, the human body, the reasoning body, the praying body.
Again, the difference between what a thing IS and what it is MADE of is HUGE in our thought and in the dogma. “Physicality” pertains more to that the body is made of ... before its resurrection.
The priest speaks and lo! Christ, the eternal and omnipotent God, bows his head in humble obedience to the priest's command ...
Dawg, that sends chills down my spine. The absolute arrogant foolery to assert that a man, a man in need of justification from sin, has assumed such power that he can command the obedience of The Almighty God of the Universe, well that is blasphemy ... UNLESS, the god of Catholicism is not The Almighty God of the Universe, the One Who manifests as three personages! And that is but one of many reason some call Catholicism 'another religion' having 'another Jesus' than the Jesus Christ of the Word of God.
Meant to ping you guys ... I don’t have a ping list, so the old-man memory takes a moment longer to dig out the pingable from the little gray cells.
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