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.
Leviticus 3:17 'It is a perpetual statute throughout your generations in all your dwellings: you shall not eat any fat or any blood.' That wording is PERPETUAL STATUTE. As far as we know, Jesus IS in the generations of those descended from Abraham, so this statute is upon Him also.Leviticus 7:26 And wherever you live, you must not eat the blood of any bird or animal.
Leviticus 17:10 'I will set my face against any Israelite or any foreigner residing among them who eats blood, and I will cut them off from the people.
In the first great church council the issue of drinking blood was specifically addressed, and we know this refers to the Laws of Moses because James states: Acts 15:21 "For Moses from ancient generations has in every city those who preach him, since he is read in the synagogues every Sabbath."
Acts 15:20 Instead we should write to them, telling them to abstain from food polluted by idols, from sexual immorality, from the meat of strangled animals and from blood. 21 "For Moses from ancient generations has in every city those who preach him, since he is read in the synagogues every Sabbath."
Then the Jews began to argue sharply among themselves, "How can this man give us his flesh to eat?
That is not the reaction to a metaphor. This is the stark, amazed, horrified reaction to Christ's command that His disciples must eat His Body and drink His Blood.
Many of His disciples could not bear this hard teaching. They demurred: but Christ stood by His words. He did not retract or clarify them.
And then they left Him, unable to reconcile themselves to His stark and obvious meaning. Again, why would they do that if the command to eat His Body and drink His Blood was mere metaphor?
Right or wrong, they believed that Christ wasn't speaking in metaphor. His teaching shocked them into leaving. They could not accept it.
Do you believe that Christ was somehow hinting at metaphor?
If that were true, why then did so many disciples leave? Did Christ just not do a very good job of explaining His meaning?
Let's look at His words. Remember that He responds to the stark unbelief of his audience not once but twice.
Christ said this to the disciples:
I am the living bread that came down from heaven. Whoever eats this bread will live forever. This bread is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world.”
And the Jews argued among themselves saying:
“How can this man give us his flesh to eat?”
Then Jesus said to them
Very truly I tell you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you.
Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise them up at the last day. For my flesh is real food and my blood is real drink.
Does that sound like metaphor? For my flesh is real food and my blood is real drink?
Carrying on to the second statement of unbelief:
On hearing it, many of his disciples said,
This is a hard teaching. Who can accept it?
Aware that his disciples were grumbling about this, Jesus said to them,
Does this offend you? Then what if you see the Son of Man ascend to where he was before! The Spirit gives life; the flesh counts for nothing. The words that I have spoken unto you, they are Spirit, and they are Life
Christ backs up His words by saying that they are Spirit and they are Life.
At this point his audience could only have understood that Christ was standing behind his earlier words. Jesus made no changes to His words, no clarifications - because none were needed.
Are you saying that his faithful disciples were able to parse Christ's words - realizing that when He stated that His words were 'Spirit and Life' and that "His flesh was real food and His blood was real drink" that this meant that they didn't have to take them seriously?
But the unfaithful disciples left - because why? Because they didn't understand that He was speaking metaphorically? Did Christ let them walk away without explaining His meaning?
I hope that this is not what you believe. That would be insane. Christ is not some kind of divine Clinton whose words are not supposed to be taken literally, especially when He most insists on them.
Christ stood by His words. He declared them to be Spirit and Life. He declared that His flesh was real food and His blood was real drink.
No-one who heard Him was in any doubt that He meant what He said. His disciples left Him because He wasn't speaking metaphorically.
There are simply no other ways to take the John 6 narrative. Like those people in Capernaum we must accept that Christ literally means for us to eat His Flesh and drink His Blood.
And again - how could it be possibly against the Levitical law for Christ to perfectly fulfill the Passover? Christ is the Passover Lamb.
He is what all those centuries of Passovers and sacrifice were all about - they reached towards His Death and His Resurrection - His Living Sacrifice - at the center of all history.
When God commands you to eat His Body and Blood, how is it cannibalism?
Is God a corpse? Is His body mere dead flesh?
Or is He Life itself?
Try to look at what Jesus told His disciples, the real disciples who did not leave when he used sarcasm on them, what He told them when He actually instituted the Communion of remembrance. If you insist on seeing only the John 6 scene, you will affirm the cannibalizing and be in spiritual violation of the Levitical command to NEVER eat the blood. If you look at the Upper Room scene you will read that Jesus called the contents of the REMEMBRANCE CUP wine, wine to be consumed in REMEMBRANCE of His blood to be shed for them the next day on the cross.
The Mosaic Law forbade unclean foods.
But Christ's Body and Blood is not an unclean food.
Christ is both God and Man. He is the Second Person of the Holy Trinity. When we eat His Body and drink His Blood we are nourished by the living God Himself.
God is not to be likened to some ritually unclean meat. Being nourished by and upon God Himself is neither unclean nor evil.
Think of a baby with his mother. Is a baby nourished at the breast unclean, because he eats and drinks of his own mother?
We wouldn't equate breast-feeding with cannibalism or ritual uncleanness - why then would anyone condemn God's gift of Himself as unclean?
Finally - and most importantly - God commands us to eat of Him.
Christ the Son of God instituted the sacrament of the Eucharist - the Bread and Wine becoming His Body and Blood - at the Last Supper.
Just to remind the thread about the institution of the Eucharist, and to show its provenance in the early Church.
From Luke:
And he took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it and gave it to them, saying, “This is my body, which is given for you. Do this in remembrance of me.” And likewise the cup after they had eaten, saying, “This cup that is poured out for you is the new covenant in my blood."
If any corroborating evidence were needed, St Paul speaks about the Eucharist in Corinthians.
And when he had given thanks, he broke it, and said, “This is my body which is for you. Do this in remembrance of me.” In the same way also he took the cup, after supper, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me.”
For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until he comes. Whoever, therefore, eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty concerning the body and blood of the Lord.
Which I quote at length because it shows that the Eucharist was celebrated in the extremely early Church.
In summary: Christ commanded us to eat His Body and drink His Blood: He also commanded us to re-enact the Eucharist.
Let us do as He commanded - not take refuge in a misapplied nostrum of the Mosaic Law.
You could find the answer to the questions you raise by looking at what wen t out of Adam and Eve when they sinned. Did they die immediately a physical death? No, but their once alive spirits realize they were suddenly dead and exposed in unrighteousness.
Where’s the twist?
I wasn’t defending the dogma. Not here. I already have a life. Im not going to spend too much of it on people who don’t know the difference between what a thing is and what it is made of.
I would add that to the person with a limited acquaintance with Euclid, Lobachevsky might seem to suffer from severely twisted logic. A person who can’t give a coherent account of what Trent means by “substance” can’t argue against the idea of transubstantiation. Not “shouldn’t”, can’t.
That’s not disrespectful. It’s just that if you’re going to play contract bridge, it’s not going to go well if you don’t know any bidding conventions.
True Christians have a real High Priest, and He is not placing His flesh and blood in your mouth for you to have His Life in you, He is sending His life into your dead soul by His Power of Spiritual Life. This is clearly illustrated at Pentecost and in the house of Cornelius. God's Life was placed in the believers not via transubstantiated break and wine, but B the ARRIVAL OF HIS HOLY SPIRIT!
Dear Lord.
You actually believe that Christ was speaking sarcastically when He spoke of His Body and Blood?
He just said all that to drive away unfaithful Disciples, those who didn't understand that He didn't mean it?
But his true Disciples were the ones given the grace to see through his little subterfuge?
That's insane. Think what you are saying!
Christ is not Clinton. The Holy One of God is Truth itself: He does not lie.
Please give up these ... gymnastics. The Truth stares you in the face.
+ May Christ lead us into all truth +
Amen.
Did Jesus and the apostles eat the real actual body of Christ at the last supper??
I see written that many walked away mumbling over what He said to them. NOT ONE left when He instituted the Communion of bread and wine IN REMEMBRANCE of His body to be sacrificed the next day and His blood to be shed the next day for us all. But if catholics want to focus upon the John 6 discourse, WHICH IS NOT THE INSTITUTING OF THE REMEMBRANCE, then their eucharist be upon them.
I don't know who this "who" is to whom you refer, but Thomas Aquinas says no such thing and even explains (by implication) why the doctrine does not say that. You are arguing against something we do not teach.
... said the Disciple of the Sarcastic Christ.
Christ commands us to eat His Body and Blood.
He instituted the Eucharist at the Last Supper.
St Paul speaks of this same Eucharist, making it very plain what it is:
Is not the cup of thanksgiving for which we give thanks a participation in the blood of Christ? And is not the bread that we break a participation in the body of Christ?
And also:
For those who eat and drink without discerning the body of Christ eat and drink judgment on themselves.
These are what lead us to the Eucharist: the Words of Christ and the inspired words of His Apostles.
It's late, and I must go home. Come, let us make this pact, in all charity to pray for one another this evening.
+ May Jesus Christ lead us into all truth +
Amen.
What’s the game?
I already said I’m not defending the dogma. I don’t recall referring to it as a “fact.” I argued not FOR the dogma but against the article.
It’s a waste of time to argue against something we don’t teach and insist we do teach it. If that’s a word game, let it be so.
I don’t know what “actual” means.
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