70 percent of U.S. Catholics don't believe in the Real Presence!?

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Afaik, official Lutheran belief is consubstantiation.

Obviously, the Orthodox have a valid Eucharist and believe in the Real Presence even if they don’t use the term transubstantiation (which iirc St. John Chrysostom used the term metaousion which means "change of substance* - it’s practically the same meaning as transubstantiation).
 
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Gorgias said:
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HomeschoolDad:
It’s not going to occur to people with a contemporary mindset, that something can “be” anything other than what it “looks like”. That’s not the way the modern mind works. That’s why single-celled and multi-celled newly conceived entities aren’t really regarded as human persons. They don’t look human. They’re nothing more than fodder for stem-cell harvesters.
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Nah. I disagree. There are folks who are perfectly willing to look at a man and say “not a man”, or a woman and say “not a woman.”
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Point well made. It might be more accurate to say that moderns call things what they want them to be. It is very inconvenient for pro-choice people to call a pre-born conceived entity a “baby” (unless, of course, it is “wanted”), so they call it anything but that.
 
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You noticed that, right? Especially with Chrissy Teigen’s miscarriage at about 19-20 weeks, during the second trimester when many abortions still occur. She was having a baby who was wanted and she called it a baby, not a ‘fetus’. But if Nancy Nobody-Special was having an abortion at the same point in time, everybody would be referring to ‘it’, ‘the fetus’, and ‘Nancy’s choice. And if a person expressed sympathy for the loss of a baby there would be OUTRAGE.
 
stpurl said:
You noticed that, right? Especially with Chrissy Teigen’s miscarriage at about 19-20 weeks, during the second trimester when many abortions still occur. She was having a baby who was wanted and she called it a baby, not a ‘fetus’. But if Nancy Nobody-Special was having an abortion at the same point in time, everybody would be referring to ‘it’, ‘the fetus’, and ‘Nancy’s choice. And if a person expressed sympathy for the loss of a baby there would be OUTRAGE.
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Well, I didn’t want to bring it up — my wife and I went down the same miscarriage road — but when I learned of the sad news with Chrissy and John, I thought of precisely that. Chrissy has been a passionate advocate for the pro-choice movement. (And, no, I am not suggesting that “she got paid back”. I don’t do “payback”.)
 
Have you read In Sinu Jesu? Private revelation, but Jesus speaks frequently about his Eucharistic Face, and even says that he likes us to come before him in adoration because he likes to see our faces. Pretty amazing.

But again, private revelation, so take it as you will.
 
How does the Church handle this in love? Behave as though the Real Presence is in fact real. Leave the churches unlocked so we can visit Jesus. Create more adoration chapels. Hold regular adoration with Exposition and Benediction. My church does these things (well, the church is locked outside business hours by longstanding Bishop’s order, but everybody has a key). The pastor also preaches the Real Presence on a regular basis; a little after the churches reopened from covid and we all began to get our bearings, he started asking us why the people in walking distance (the diocese was watching for cars in the lot) weren’t there at Mass when it was closed, socially distanced standing outside at the end of the church where the altar was or outside the doors. Why wasn’t everyone doing what some did, and using their keys to visit Jesus alone at hours other than Mass livestreaming? Why did so many of us abandon him?

When a priest takes it seriously, so does his parish. In a survey taken by the diocese last year, our parish was either one of or the top parish in the state in terms of the percentage of parishioners who believe in the Real Presence.
 
MrsAngelala said:
In a survey taken by the diocese last year, our parish was either one of or the top parish in the state in terms of the percentage of parishioners who believe in the Real Presence.
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Well then, the only logical conclusion is for me to teleport over there every Sunday XD
 
WillC said:
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I am Byzantine Catholic and our Divine Liturgy includes this, so to say it without believing it makes one a liar, so how could one receive an increase of grace through reception:
O Lord, I also believe and profess, that this,
Which I am about to receive,
Is truly your most precious Body, and your life-giving Blood,
Which, I pray, make me worthy to receive
For the remission of all my sins and for life everlasting. Amen
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So I was not challenging your belief in the real presence. I am sure you believe as you say. I was challenging your belief that, for a Catholic, it is possible to ‘see Jesus’ in transubstantiated bread. If the bread still appears to be bread (an essential part of the doctrine of the real presence) then Jesus, by definition, cannot be seen. Only bread.
 
Gorgias said:
It’s no longer bread. It has the appearance of bread.

So, strictly speaking, you’re not looking at bread.
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If it has the appearance of bread then (given what the word ‘appearance’ means) you are indeed looking at bread, whatever you believe the ‘substance’ of it to be.
 
More power to you Cajun. Unfortunately atheists cannot understand spiritual things, they walk in darkness.
 
I accept that this is how you understand things.

But can you explain this. As a Catholic you believe that the bread maintains the form (the ‘accidents’) of bread. Therefore it looks exactly like bread and nothing else.

Yet you say you ‘see’ something else and appear to mean this literally ‘just as if He came and touched me physically’.

Surely this is the opposite of Catholic teaching, which is that transubstantiated bread appears (i.e. is seen) as bread.

Indeed if it does not have the appearance of bread my understanding is that Catholics think the real presence cannot be there.

I’m suggesting you cannot have it worth ways. Transubstantiation and ‘seeing’ Jesus are logically incompatible.

I should add that it seems to me that were it to be correct that you ‘see’ Jesus this would be testable - you would be able to tell the difference, merely by appearance, of consecrated and unconsecrated bread.
 
FiveLinden said:
I should add that it seems to me that were it to be correct that you ‘see’ Jesus this would be testable
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That’s been tried already… :

Matthew 4: [5] Then the devil took him up into the holy city, and set him upon the pinnacle of the temple,

[6] And said to him: If thou be the Son of God, cast thyself down, for it is written: That he hath given his angels charge over thee, and in their hands shall they bear thee up, lest perhaps thou dash thy foot against a stone. [7] Jesus said to him: It is written again: Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God.
FiveLinden said:
  • you would be able to tell the difference, merely by appearance, of consecrated and unconsecrated bread.
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Not “merely by appearance”:

Sight, taste, touch in Thee are each deceived,
The ear alone most safely is believed…
  • Pange lingua by St. Thomas Aquinas
However, some Saints were given the gift of discerning unconsecrated hosts from the Holy Eucharist.

St. Alphonsus was sick and requested that the Blessed Sacrament be brought to him. The next day the priest came to give St. Alphonsus Holy Communion. He exclaimed: “What have you done? You have not brought me Jesus but an unconsecrated host!” The matter was investigated and it was discovered that the priest who offered Mass that morning was so distracted that he omitted most of the Canon, including the consecration!
 
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Reason is the handmaid, not the mistress, of Faith.

In Dante’s Divine Comedy, Virgil (the voice of reason) takes Dante through Limbo, Inferno and Purgatorio all the way up to Mount Purgatory. However, that is as far as Virgil can go. He cannot guide Dante through Paradiso and returns to his place in Limbo. Beatrice comes down from Heaven to guide Dante through Paradiso.

Reason has its limits. If it goes beyond those limits and crosses the Rubicon into the province of Faith, then spiritual battles commence in the soul.
 
I’m not quite sure what you are saying Margaret_Ann. Is it, in Catholic thought, possible to use your physical eyes to see Jesus in the eucharist or not? And if it is, as you say St. Aphonsous experienced, then surely transubstantiation has not taken place, since the form (accidents) has changed as well as the substance?
 
Every properly catechized Catholic knows that at the first consecration, the substance of the bread is changed into the Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of Christ under the appearance of bread.

At the second consecration, the substance of the wine is changed into the Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of Christ under the appearance of wine.

So one sees Him under the appearances of Bread and Wine which have been changed into His Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity.

Pange lingua by St. Thomas Aquinas

1. Sing, my tongue, the Savior’s glory,
Of His Flesh the mystery sing;
Of his blood, all price exceeding,
Shed by our immortal King,
Destined, for the world’s redemption,
From a noble womb to spring.



    • Of a pure and spotless Virgin
      Born for us on earth below,
      He, as Man, with man conversing,
      Stayed, the seeds of truth to sow;
      He then closed in solemn order
      wondrously his life of woe.
    • On the night of that Last Supper,
      Seated with His chosen band,
      He the Pascal victim eating,
      First fulfills the Law’s command;
      Then as Food to His Apostles
      Gives Himself with his own hands.
    • Word made Flesh, the bread of nature
      By His word to Flesh He turns;
      Wine into His Blood He changes:
      What though sense no change discerns?
      Only be the heart in earnest,
      Faith her lesson quickly learns.
    • Down in adoration falling,
      Lo! the sacred Host we hail;
      Lo! o’er ancient forms departing,
      Newer rites of grace prevail;
      Faith for all defects supplying,
      Where the feeble senses fail.

  2. To the everlasting Father,
    And the Son Who reigns on high,
    With the Holy Ghost proceeding
    Forth from Each eternally,
    Be salvation, honor, blessing,
    Might and endless majesty. Amen.
 
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