Eucharist; Real Presence; Multi-location

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how can Christ’s specific spacial/temporal substance exist in many different spaces at the same time?

Because a substance is not “spatial/temporal”…those are ACCIDENTS of a substance.

Space and time are only qualities subjectively relative to other things. Place is only defined in terms of other things. In terms of some coordinate system or comparison to things around it. The time of something is only defined relative to events surrounding it. Time is relative, both philosophically AND scientifically.

But as for temporal, it is not HIS temporal existence that is existing in the accidents of bread and wine. They happen to be the same (namely, in the present) but this itself is merely coincidental…

When we recieve the Eucharist in the PRESENT, it is because the accidents of Bread and Wine are in the present…the fact that Christ is also in the present is just a coincident. He COULD potentially transubstantiate foreward or backward in time by taking on the accidents of bread and wine that are in his past, but we just dont believe he does.

Christ Himself is in one place under his own accidents, but he has taken on many different sets of bread and wine accidents. But the location of those places are not his own intrinsic accident, any more than he is round, edible, or doughy. He is present SUBSTANTIALLY, not locally.

A substance exist in and of itself, not relative to anything else.
 
You mentioned that location is an accident, but then you state that substance is specific to space and time; isn’t that a contradiction?
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I’m sorry.

What I should have rather said, is that there may be different substances of the same general group (like “tree”) in which different accidents inhere.

That is, there is a difference between the substances of “this tree” and “that tree”. Between the substances of all trees in the world. Even at each different moment, it could be said in an even more specific sense. There are different levels of being able to group things and concieve of them. “species”, “genus” etc…

But I should have clarified: these accidents (place, time) are different BECAUSE the substances are different. Not the other way 'round.

The accidents FOLLOW substance logically…not the other way around.

“substance” itself is not specific to time and space, but its accidents are.

For example. When recieve Jesus NOW, we recieve a substance which is the Christ…and which has the accident of being in the present. It is not being in the present which defines the accident, however. Again, accident follows substance. Being in the present inheres in that substance. But the substance can, by a miracle of God, take on OTHER sets of accidents that are not essential or intrinsic to the substance. That do not inhere in the substance, they do not flow from the nature of the substance like its intrinsic accidents, but rather a miraculously united and connected with it, those accidents themselves being sustained miraculously by God without a substance in which to inhere, for their substance has changed into that of Jesus.

For example, Jesus-in-the-Present, could take on a second set of accidents that include being in the past. Then Present-Jesus is in the past Substantially…but NOT under his own accidents, but under those of Past Bread and Past Wine.
 
Think of the following everyday example.

Take a mirror and look in it. How many refelctions? One reflection of one person right?

Now drop the mirror and smash it. How many reflections now? Many, many reflections but still only the one person. The number of refelctions will equal the number of pieces the mirror has broken up into.

If it is possible in the physical world with light, then how much more possible is it for God to do it with His body
 
Nice, Fergal – very St. Patrick/Trinity/Shamrock-ish. 🙂

I seem to recall that or a very similar explanation that has been kicking around for a thousand years or so in order to help explain this mystery of Christ’s real presence. I’m not sure if it was a mirror or something else. Anyone know?
 
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stbruno:
That’s where we get the term…
“We walk by faith and not by sight.”

Pray on it always…I still can’t figure out how a FAX works…but that doesn’t mean it can’t happen
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:clapping:

Amen to that.

Reminds me of the Book of Job:
Then the LORD addressed Job out of the storm and said:

Who is this that obscures divine plans with words of ignorance?

Gird up your loins now, like a man; I will question you, and you tell me the answers!
Where were you when I founded the earth?
Tell me, if you have understanding.
Who determined its size; do you know?
Who stretched out the measuring line for it?
Into what were its pedestals sunk, and who laid the cornerstone, While the morning stars sang in chorus and all the sons of God shouted for joy?. . . .
Have you comprehended the breadth of the earth?
Tell me, if you know all.
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batteddy:
The real answer is a simple one:

LOCATION IS AN ACCIDENT.

That is the correct answer.

Christ is not in multiple locations, only the accidents of bread and wine are…
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I agree. Location is an “accident,” part of the “appearances” of bread and wine which remain.

The accidents of bread and wine are multiplied, and are in many locations. But CHRIST is not multiplied or in many locations.

Instead of trying to view it from a human perspective, try to view it from Christ’s perspective. He makes US present at that historical event which marked our salvation. The Eucharist is a time machine; you are there. He looks out from the cross and sees all of us in every age gathered at the one sacrifice.
 
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JimG:
Instead of trying to view it from a human perspective, try to view it from Christ’s perspective. He makes US present at that historical event which marked our salvation. The Eucharist is a time machine; you are there. He looks out from the cross and sees all of us in every age gathered at the one sacrifice.
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Jim, I think that is a beautiful thing to keep in mind. I recall Bishop Fulton Sheen said that if you are at a mass and you close your eyes you are experiencing the exact same thing someone at calvary would experience with their eyes closed!

But you are speaking only of the Holy Sacrfice of the Mass, no? The Blessed Sacrament, is Our Lord really and substantially *present *and alive (Glorified Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity) as He is now– not Our Lord on the cross.

I think the distinction is important. Or am I misunderstanding something?

Thanks,
VC
 
Verbum Caro:
Jim, I think that is a beautiful thing to keep in mind. I recall Bishop Fulton Sheen said that if you are at a mass and you close your eyes you are experiencing the exact same thing someone at calvary would experience with their eyes closed!

But you are speaking only of the Holy Sacrfice of the Mass, no? The Blessed Sacrament, is Our Lord really and substantially *present *and alive (Glorified Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity) as He is now– not Our Lord on the cross.

I think the distinction is important. Or am I misunderstanding something?

Thanks,
VC
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Well, it’s a distinction which I didn’t address, but I’m sure there had been much theology written on this point. I just don’t have the heological expertise to do it.

Yes, I think that Jesus as we receive Him in the Eucharist is in his glorified body. But Jesus is just One Person, and that Person is the same person who dies on the cross, who instituted the Eucharist at the Last Supper, who rose from the dead in a glorified body, and who now reigns from heaven. So I don’t think it is improper to say that in the Eucharist we can be present at Calvary and also receive the glorified body of Christ in heaven.

Calvary is more than a static point in history. It is the hinge-point at which history meets eternity. And the exact same thing can be said of the Eucharist.

That’s an idea which I would think about while viewing Salvador Dali’s painting Corpus Hypercubus, with it’s attempt at a 4-dimensional cross. Or his The Sacrament of the Last Supper which tries to do the same thing for the Eucharist. But Dali was never too popular; his “religious” paintings did well, but most of his stuff was just plain weird.
 
But you are speaking only of the Holy Sacrfice of the Mass, no? The Blessed Sacrament, is Our Lord really and substantially *present *and alive (Glorified Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity) as He is now– not Our Lord on the cross.
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Yes, its not like we go “back in time” to Calvary. The Sacrafice on Calvary was bloody sacrafice of Christ’s mortal body. On Calvary he both WON the merits, and offered them and himself to the Father for our redemption.

At the Mass it is an unbloody sacrafice of Christ’s immortal body. He offers Himself once again to the Father, and once again offers the merits of our redemption. In this way they are re-presented and applied to our specific time and place. But he does not WIN the merits again, like he did on Calvary, he simply offers them to the Father again.
 
Thanks for your patient explanations, batteddy and JimG. I think I need to mull this over some more though, do you have any books or articles to recommend?

I still can’t figure out how, if I have this french fry here in one hand, and a stone in the other is miraculously turned into the substance of that same french fry but under the accident of the stone which previously existed there—why is there still only one french fry and not two? Why isn’t the first french fry ‘invisibly cloned’ under the appearance of the stone?
Location is an accident… okay… but still, the substance exists in two different places after transubstantiation, unconnected. How is that physically possible, without admitting that the substance itself is either multiplied or at least enlarged? I feel that I’m missing a really important fundamental understanding.
If Christ is fully physically present in each and every Host substantially… isn’t that–if not creating more than one Body–extending the matter of His Body 100% for every consecrated Host? But matter is by nature unextendable…
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Fergal:
Take a mirror and look in it. How many refelctions? One reflection of one person right?

Now drop the mirror and smash it. How many reflections now? Many, many reflections but still only the one person. The number of refelctions will equal the number of pieces the mirror has broken up into.

If it is possible in the physical world with light, then how much more possible is it for God to do it with His body
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It’s interesting that you use the analogy of light, because light is not matter; it has no mass. I would accept this if we were dealing only with Christ’s glorified Body, but at the Last Supper, it was His mortal Body which was transubstantiated. A Human Body is physical matter and is, by nature, unextended. How did Christ transubstantiate the Host without extending the physical substance of His mortal Body?

Still confused… :confused:
 
Us humans (“we humans” ??) keep trying to relate to God in HUMAN terms. We inevitably unconsciously try to wrap our minds around the concept of God by making God into OUR image and likeness. Instead of accepting God in HIS terms.

I have had numerous arguments with Jehovas Witnesses (actually only one, but it was a long one)… about the Real Presence. How can it possibly be, they ask.

Well, let’s start with Jesus. Back to the fundamentals.

Either Jesus was (IS !) God or he wasn’t / isn’t.

If Jesus is God, then Jesus is INFINITE… the Creator - the Son of the Creator. God, the Son of God.

If God says in exhaustive detail (John 6: 20 - 70 ) that the bread and wine are now His Body and His Blood. And when so many disciples and followers turned and walked away (the guy is crazy; we were crazy to believe him)… and Jesus did not call them back and say “just kidding”.

Then maybe, just maybe, the bread and wine really are now His actual Body and Blood.

And that’s good enough for me.

I’m not about to try to figure out the physics and chemistry of the whole business.
From time to time, some little miracle happens… revolving around blood and the eucharist… Joan Caroll Cruz wrote an amazing book: Eucharistic Miracles. Read and study that book… There is a saint, Saint Januarius, I believe, – I’m doing this from memory… whose dried dessicate blood re-liquifies once a year. Every year. Go figure.

God created the physics. He can change physics to suit His own purposes.

We really and truly don’t understand much about physics anyway. OUR bodies are 99.999999% empty space. The rest, the .000000001% is just a bunch of artfully arranged electrical charges.

Go figure.

If Jesus says it’s His Body and Blood. I can accept that.

Someday, visit a church when there’s “nobody” around. And just listen quietly and you can actually feel the presence of another person. It’s kind of uncanny. And I’m not the only one who has said that.
 
Location is an ‘accident.’ Mass (in the sense of 1 gram of mass) is an ‘accident.’

With respect to the Eucharist I would use the analogy of a hologram.

Compare a holographic slide to a photographic slide.

With a photographic slide, if you snip it in two and then project it, you will see only half the picture. Same if you snip it into 4 or more pieces.

With a hologram, an image is not focused on the slide. Rather, the hologram captures the diffusion pattern of light as it passes a particular point in space. Project the slide, and the light continues on from that point.

If you snip the hologram in two, then project it, you will see the whole picture, not half. The same would occur if you snipped it into 4 or 8, etc, with some loss of resolution.

Each part of the hologram contains all of the picture information.

I compare the Eucharist to a hologram, only there is never a loss of resolution.

Christ has but one body. You receive him in holy communion. When you receive him next Sunday, you do not receive a different body of Christ than you received last Sunday, but the same one.

You do not receive a different body of Christ than me, or than others at today’s Mass, or last month’s Mass. You receive him under different (multiple) appearances, but we each receive one and the same Body every time.

In a very real sense, because we each receive one and the same body, we are united with each other–and with every one who receives the one body of Christ at any time or place. It is a real communion–a common union–in a nearly physical sense, with one another, because we all receive the very same Body.

In the same way I do believe that it is very similar to going back (or forward) in time–because Jesus Christ is one body, one soul, one divinity, and whenever we receive, we receive only that one.

Wherever and whenever the consecration is effected, the one body of Christ is present. The accidents of location and other sense experience are just that–accidents.
 
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batteddy:
Try this article:

catholic.net/rcc/Periodi…tantiation.html
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Awesome! Thank you, this is exactly what I was looking for…
"Think of quantity. It is the fundamental accident, as we have noted. Normally it is the accident whereby its substance occupies a place; but the essential thing it does is to give the substance parts. And in the Eucharist all the parts of Christ’s body are present and are situated relatively to each other. But because of the unique way in which the quantity is there—in the manner of substance—the parts are not spread out in relation to the surrounding place. To put it another way: substance as such is distinct from quantity, and it occupies a place only because of its quantity. But when quantity becomes present through transubstantiation it exists in the manner of substance, and therefore without actual extension."
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Eureka! Brilliant, just brilliant. It’s incredible to think how the Church came up with this amazingly enlightening philosophical explanation of a supernatural mystery… that’s something about Christianity–it contains ideas which no human mind on its own could ever conceive of, which are perfectly reasonable and logical. Like Descartes’ said, the Christian view of things has more objective formal reality than our own minds have, which demonstrates the reality of Revelation–a higher power is teaching us.
Al Masetti:
…] I’m not about to try to figure out the physics and chemistry of the whole business.
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I totally get what you’re saying, we can’t rely on our reasoning, but God endowed us with an intellect, and I believe He appreciates it when we use it to glorify Him. We aren’t trying to totally figure Him out, but only to our finite extent; always humble, always with holy fear. Like the article batteddy linked to says:
“A right understanding will dissipate the errors and show that reason need not be embarrassed by transubstantiation, even though it far transcends reason. Not only that, but exploration of the doctrine makes it more real to us. We realize more clearly that the physical body and blood of Jesus Christ are as truly present as they are in heaven, or as they were when he labored in his workshop in Nazareth. While that realization is dominant, every genuflection will be a conscious act of adoration of the Incarnate God; the Consecration will always absorb our attention; we will never want to hurry out of church as soon as Mass is over.”
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Transubstantiation shows us, ironically, that our own human reasoning and logic is absolutely worthless without the light of God. May He have mercy on skeptics!!! With that said, Transubstantiation also allows us to grasp something with our finite understanding at least to a point where we have to either have faith in it or not. We cannot argue with reason against the Real Presence, because it always comes to a point of indefinite conclusion on matters of faith.
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JimG:
Wherever and whenever the consecration is effected, the one body of Christ is present. The accidents of location and other sense experience are just that–accidents.
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Thanks Jim! There always is that little hurdle of ‘intellect’ that we all have to overcome in order to see with the eyes of faith–thanks for helping me make that leap.

God Bless!
 
Such a feeble way to think…Why is it that people try to define God or understand God in human terms? Why do they put God in a box and try to examine Him in such a finite way??? I will never know…Just an FYI, all things are possible through God and it will not do you any good to try and limit God to the physical world as we know it…we are not capable of even beginning to understand God and how He works…It comes down to Faith…Got Faith?
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Neithan:
One obstacle of faith in the Real Presence for me has always been the conundrum of multi-location: how can Christ be fully, physically present in multiple Hosts at the same time? This defies all our understanding of the natural world at its most basic level. God must act at least logically, if not plausibly, and Transubstantiation just seemed too fantastic to chalk up as ‘mystery’.

I brought this concern to my Priest, who admitted that this point was a common difficulty in accepting the reality of the Real Presence, for himself as well as many others. He explained to me that Christ is not merely physically human any more, but that He is glorified, and in a glorified state, the spiritual dominates the physical. Since this has not been fully revealed to us, but Christ demonstrated an ability to suddenly appear, and walk through walls and such, the possibility of multi-location exists, especially when one considers that the heavenly dimension is outside of time. For a while this satiated my understanding.

The intellect always comes up with new problems for faith. It suddenly occured to me that at the Last Supper, Christ was not yet in a glorified state, but He stated quite plainly “This *is *my body” at the Institution of the Eucharist. How are we meant to understand this? Was His Body present in the bread in a glorified state, previous to His Resurrection? How could He be *fully *physically present, sitting there in plain human flesh, and also *fully *physically present in the Host… simultaneously?

Any help much appreciated! (please don’t answer with ‘it’s a mystery, just accept it and stop thinking’–the purpose here is not to question the validity of established dogma, but to examine it in detail for the greater glory of God).
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Relax, brother. Please read my last post, and pay careful attention to the closing statements of the original post which you quote.
As I said, God has endowed us with intellect, and it does no good to say that we should not use it. We never presume to imagine that we will ever comprehend the awesome power of God, but we do what we can to understand Him to the best of our ability, on His terms, and not our own. As Christ commanded us, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind (Mt. 22:37).” Too many of the faithful condescend to those who reason through doctrine, as if theirs is an inferior, as you say “feeble way to think.”

Your judgment would condemn all the efforts of theologians who have worked out the doctrine of Transubstantiation, and all the philosophical schools which form the intellectual richness of Christian Tradition. It would be better to cease assuming that we are trying to bring God down to our level, when in reality we are trying to raise our minds to Him in His infinite glory.

Reason does not harm Faith, but strengthens it and vice versa.

Peace
 
I wish I had seen this thread earlier. Very very good and insightful.

We cannot understand it because with our minds we cannot even conceive of the principle behind it let alone how it actually happens, in complete and utter defiance of all natural laws.

If I could say something that I remember hearing many many years ago. It’s from the Bible but I honestly don’t know where

FOR MY THOUGHTS ARE NOT YOUR THOUGHTS NOR MY WAYS YOUR WAYS

I think that kind of says it all, and is the best answer possible.
 
“Brilliant, just brilliant. It’s incredible to think how the Church came up with this amazingly enlightening philosophical explanation of a supernatural mystery… that’s something about Christianity–it contains ideas which no human mind on its own could ever conceive of, which are perfectly reasonable and logical.”

Well, actually, a lot of this is perfectly pagan Aristotilean Metaphysics which Saint Thomas Aquinas “baptized” as it were to suit our purposes.

The difference between substance and accident, prime matter and form, essence and existence, etc…are philosophical principals that can be perfectly secular if not used to enhance theology.

BUT the questions of Church dogma did indeed help us to investigate this metaphysics more and show applications of it that others had never thought of without Revelation.
 
Al Masetti:
…

If Jesus says it’s His Body and Blood. I can accept that.

Someday, visit a church when there’s “nobody” around. And just listen quietly and you can actually feel the presence of another person. It’s kind of uncanny. And I’m not the only one who has said that.
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:amen:

Al, you reminded me of a situation that I once heard of, two women were going to Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament, a friend of their’s showed up just as they were getting ready to go, they had just recently been trying to explain different things to her about the Catholic faith. They had not yet explained anything to her about Adoration but they invited her to go with them to the Church for some silent prayer. She agreed to go and said, “but what am I suppose to do”? They told her only that she was to remain quiet and to just pray and listen, she knew nothing about it, went with them and they stayed for an hour, after they came out, she said-“Who was that”?? Amazing isn’t He? Of course she eventually converted.
Also, someone else asked earlier about something that had to do with something that wasn’t a mirror, sorry, i forget who asked, it was in regard to something fergal said, was it a prism you were wondering about??
 
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