Posted on 07/08/2008 7:02:41 AM PDT by NYer
Orange County, FL -- One week after a University of Central Florida student snatched something sacred from church, armed UCF police officers stood guard during Sunday Mass to protect what Catholics call "The Body of Christ."
Minutes before the Mass began, Student Senator Webster Cook returned the Holy Eucharist he was holding hostage in a Ziploc bag ever since smuggling the blessed wafer of bread out of the Catholic Mass service Sunday June 29.
Carol Brinati with the Diocese of Orlando said the Catholic community was "concerned about the possible desecration of the Eucharist," and pleaded for its safe return.
Cook, who was raised Catholic, said he decided to bring the Eucharist home after a church leader tried to physically pry it from his hand. Cook broke Church rules by failing to consume it immediately during communion and then removing it from his mouth once seated.
Cook said he just wanted to show the Eucharist to a friend he brought with questions about Catholicism before consuming it. But outraged Catholics across the globe didn’t believe him and suspected he intended all along to steal the Eucharist and bloggers sent out e-mail messages damning him to Hell.
"I am returning the Eucharist to you in response to the e-mails I have received from Catholics in the UCF community," Cook wrote in a letter to the church. "I still want the community to understand that the use physical force is wrong, especially when based on assumptions. However, I feel it is unnecessary to cause pain for those who are not at fault in this situation."
Cook said some threatened to break into his dorm room to rescue the Eucharist. Brinati said the Diocese of Orlando didn't condone those threats, but was happy Cook had a change of heart and returned it.
"We've been praying about that," she said.
It's still not clear if the controversy is over. There is no word yet if either the Catholic students or Cook will drop their separate complaints filed against each other with UCF's student court. The violations each side accused the other of could result in suspension or expulsion. Cook still disagrees with the more than $40,000 in student funds distributed annually to support Catholic and other religious groups on campus, but seemed conciliatory in his letter.
"I want to thank the individuals who explained the emotional and spiritual pain my possession of the Eucharist caused them to experience," he wrote. "They have demonstrated that the use [of] reason is more effective than the use of force."
Cook said he still hopes to meet with the local Bishop to discuss prohibiting the use of force to recover the Eucharist. He also wants an apology.
Simply enumerate the natural effects of the Fall (a failure of bodily capacities culminating in mortality; a darkening of the intellect; a twisting of the will; the abruption of the lower passions in mutiny against intellect and will, etc.) and you can see that even in the natural realm we are damaged goods; but remove these effects and you can see a sketch, at least, of what "Human Nature Plan A" would have been if our First Parents had's screwed things up.
That's my rendition of it. A better summary is here, at The Glorified Body: The Promise of Christ's Resurrection and more resources here, here, and here.
The angels, both holy and fallen, have preternatural powers. Their intellect, speed, etc., are far greater than the corresponding human powers, but they are finite.
Preternatural power is sometimes seen in its negative aspect, e.g. demonic possession, one symption of which is that the sufferer is quite obviously possessed by a being with extrahuman powers, for instance a cunning, diabolical intelligence, the ability to do things which are physically impossible for a mere human like throwing a much heavier person across the room.
Adam and Eve originally received the preternatural gifts of immortality, impassibility, freedom from concupiscence, ignorance, and sin, and lordship over the earth. If Adam had not sinned, we all would have inherited these preternatural gifts, together with the supernatural gift of sanctifying grace. The souls in heaven will recover these gifts at the end of time.
Because earlier someone asserted that I hate the RCC. I was responding to that person. I don't "hate" the RCC. Neither do I venerate it. But the notion that Jesus is a wafer, the theft of which is punishable by eternal damnation seems to go beyond what the scriptures teach, in my estimation.
In my view, Jesus Christ is God, The Son, and therefore omnipotent. That wafer isn't omnipotent, else it would get itself out of that ziploc bag and present itself as alive from the dead.... like the real Jesus did from the tomb.
LOL. Amen!
I'm sorry I missed so much of this thread. The alchemy of transubstantiation errs in so many ways, not the least of all Scripturally...
From henceforth expecting till his enemies be made his footstool. For by one offering he hath perfected for ever them that are sanctified. Whereof the Holy Ghost also is a witness to us: for after that he had said before, This is the covenant that I will make with them after those days, saith the Lord, I will put my laws into their hearts, and in their minds will I write them; And their sins and iniquities will I remember no more. Now where remission of these is, there is no more offering for sin." -- Hebrews 10:12-18"But this man, after he had offered one sacrifice for sins for ever, sat down on the right hand of God;
To threaten violence over the theft of some congealed flour and water is satanic.
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