The Eucharist: The Body of Christ? ("Respectful Dialogue" thread)

The Catholic Church teaches that in the Eucharist, the communion wafer and the altar wine are transformed and really become the body and blood of Jesus Christ. Have you ever met anyone who has found this Catholic doctrine to be a bit hard to take?

If so, you shouldn't be surprised. When Jesus spoke about eating his flesh and drinking his blood in John 6, his words met with less than an enthusiastic reception. "How can this man give us his flesh to eat? (V 52). "This is a hard saying who can listen to it?" (V60). In fact so many of his disciples abandoned him over this that Jesus had to ask the twelve if they also planned to quit. It is interesting that Jesus did not run after his disciples saying, "Don't go — I was just speaking metaphorically!"

How did the early Church interpret these challenging words of Jesus? Interesting fact. One charge the pagan Romans lodged against the Christians was cannibalism. Why? You guessed it. They heard that this sect regularly met to eat human flesh and drink human blood. Did the early Christians say: "wait a minute, it's only a symbol!"? Not at all. When trying to explain the Eucharist to the Roman Emperor around 155AD, St. Justin did not mince his words: "For we do not receive these things as common bread or common drink; but as Jesus Christ our Savior being incarnate by God's word took flesh and blood for our salvation, so also we have been taught that the food consecrated by the word of prayer which comes from him . . . is the flesh and blood of that incarnate Jesus."

Not many Christians questioned the real presence of Christ's body and blood in the Eucharist till the Middle Ages. In trying to explain how bread and wine are changed into the body and blood of Christ, several theologians went astray and needed to be corrected by Church authority. Then St. Thomas Aquinas came along and offered an explanation that became classic. In all change that we observe in this life, he teaches, appearances change, but deep down, the essence of a thing stays the same. Example: if, in a fit of mid-life crisis, I traded my mini-van for a Ferrari, abandoned my wife and 5 kids to be beach bum, got tanned, bleached my hair blonde, spiked it, buffed up at the gym, and took a trip to the plastic surgeon, I'd look a lot different on the surface. But for all my trouble, deep down I'd still substantially be the same ole guy as when I started.

St. Thomas said the Eucharist is the one instance of change we encounter in this world that is exactly the opposite. The appearances of bread and wine stay the same, but the very essence or substance of these realities, which can't be viewed by a microscope, is totally transformed. What was once bread and wine are now Christ's body and blood. A handy word was coined to describe this unique change. Transformation of the "sub-stance", what "stands-under" the surface, came to be called "transubstantiation."

What makes this happen? The power of God's Spirit and Word. After praying for the Spirit to come (epiklesis), the priest, who stands in the place of Christ, repeats the words of the God-man: "This is my Body, This is my Blood." Sounds to me like Genesis 1: the mighty wind (read "Spirit") whips over the surface of the water and God's Word resounds. "Let there be light" and there was light. It is no harder to believe in the Eucharist than to believe in Creation.

But why did Jesus arrange for this transformation of bread and wine? Because he intended another kind of transformation. The bread and wine are transformed into the Body and Blood of Christ which are, in turn, meant to transform us. Ever hear the phrase: "you are what you eat?" The Lord desires us to be transformed from a motley crew of imperfect individuals into the Body of Christ, come to full stature.

Our evangelical brethren speak often of an intimate, personal relationship with Jesus. But I ask you, how much more personal and intimate can you get? We receive the Lord's body into our physical body that we may become Him whom we receive!

Such an awesome gift deserves its own feast. And that's why, back in the days of Thomas Aquinas and St. Francis of Assisi, the Pope decided to institute the Feast of Corpus Christi.

Remember Scriptural Tourette's Syndrome.

A sufficient volume of selections from Scripture of indeterminate relevance to the question are proffered. When their relevance is questioned or the chain of reasoning which leads from the quotes to the point they are supposed to support is asked for, the answer is that if you had the Holy Spirit guiding you you'd see that the scriptures proved the point. Your failure to see it is, by implication, explained as a lack of inspiration.

This thread has achieved terminal silliness. I would say post #29 , with its presentation as fact the conjecture that the priesthood comes from people craving power, was the beginning of the rot. Before it reached #50 the harpies had come out to play, and the feast was fouled. Soon we have the old trick of presenting the opinions and actions of the opponents in the worst possible light combined with huffing and puffing because the opponents actually dared to say one might be wrong.

Gost 2 in #145 finally let the cat out of the bag (I'll try to define the cat later)

Right. Well Roman Catholicism is an affront to me. I’m sorry if you can’t stand that fact. Roman Catholicism is not respectful of Protestantism. Every time I see the Pope my gorge rises. I’m sorry. That’s just the way it is. That you can’t respect my heartfelt feelings on this subject is equally disrespectful.

This comes down to
"Your mere existence causes me pain and offends me. I have such strong FEELINGS about the Catholic Church that I cannot be reasonable but must be offensive in my discussion of that entity. The most important fact is not what the Catholic Church actually teaches or does but that I have a very strong feeling about it http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/religion/2007572/posts?page=138#138based on what I think (but do not know -- and do not care to know) it teaches and does."

The cat is that in Protestantism generally reason is views as a whore (I'm told Luther said that) and so corrupt that it is really not valuable in any important way. To the full-blown, "hard-shell", total depravity Protestant there really is nothing to be gained by being or attempting to be reasonable. In the absence of reason, passions (which would seem to me to be at least as corrupt as reason) are exalted and given the place which I try (sometimes -- on my good days) to give to reason in my choices and actions.

In my opinion this is a failure in understanding the relationship between faith and reason. And this failure, again IMHO, had a centrifugal effect on the bodies which separated from the Catholic Church (it's hard to negotiate unity when what's on the table is whose feelings are the strongest), and quite naturally led to to the excesses of pietiesm, quietism, and what I think of as nouveau Montanism.

These, in their turn called forth the reactions of stolid and sterile broad church Anglicanism, Deism, and what I think of as New England rationalism, which in it's turn lead to transcendentalism and the invasion of New England by Hinduism, Buddhism and their degenerate cousin, Theosophy. (Which was shortly followed by the Kennedys whose nominal Catholicism is pretty much negated by their enthusiastic embrace of most of the mortal sins - but this IS a political forum ....)

But the real deal is that when reason is no longer considered a gift which works in concert with faith, revelation, and other graces, then sooner or later it comes down to calling one another names.

Now hosepipe in #138 articulates his objection to our Eucharistic thinking. I think he misses that while in the "I am the Bread" discourse IHS talks about flesh, in the Synoptic last supper he says body. I would take "body" to adumbrate and "flesh out" (little joke there) the Eucharistic doctrine. I would go on to say that it is the risen Body whose substance is now in the consecrated what-used-in-our-opinion-to-be-bread and there is good reason, based on Paul's discourse about resurrection, to think that that is a "spiritual body".

I would go on to want to explore with hosepipe our differing ecclesiologies and Eucharistic theology because, from MY POV he "over-spiritualizes" both "Church" and the Sacrament. (I would venture to guess he thinks I over-"flesh-ize" both of them.) I think this would be a good conversation.

Unfortunately, in this environment it would be very difficult to carry on, because every few minutes somebody would fell impelled by his passions or conscience or the Spirit or something to burst in and tell somebody else how very wicked and evil his thinking and the group from which it comes are.

Earlier I said,

I don’t think some of our interlocutors are capable or desirous of discussing differences without showing disrespect. I don’t think they know or want to know about the kind of argument in which both sides lose to the truth. And seem neither to know or to care to know about the politeness and gentleness with which deeply held beliefs must be discussed if understanding is to be possible.

I think I have presented an explanation for this what-seems-to-me-to-be-an-incapacity and given an example of what I think it its cost, namely a useful and informative disagreement on both Church and Eucharist.

And so, buh-bye! When reason and courtesy are despised, no good talk or fellowship is likely.

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