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hn160
Guest
If you mean actual when you say literal, then literal.
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The_GreyPilgrim
Guest
If literal, then answer this:
**Did Jesus say that the bread He would give us to eat, which, if we ate we would live for ever, was the flesh that He would give for the life of the world? Yes or no? **
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Deo_Volente
Guest
Grace & Peace!
Grey Pilgrim, I question your agenda here. It seems like you want to use a Catholic understanding of the Eucharist (with which I agree, by the way, though I quibble with attempts to over-define that understanding in philosophical/scholastic terms) to bulldoze the faith of your brothers and sisters in Christ who may not share that understanding.
I don’t think you will convince anyone of the Catholic position by making scripture and dogma into a billyclub. You’ll alienate a lot more people than you think. A recent correspondent here is a Missouri Synod Lutheran who is probably unlikely, however much you prod, to agree to Transubstantiation, but will affirm the reality of the Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of Christ actually, literally and truly present in the Eucharist. The Lutheran idea of Consubstantiation by which the reality of Christ’s Body and Blood are believed to be in, with and under the forms of Bread and Wine is not as different from Transubstantiation as you might think–but centuries of bickering seem to have made the words more important than the reality they attempt to describe. After tons of pushing, you may wind up thinking that your Lutheran brother or sister was a lost cause…when in fact he or she has more in common with you than you think!
You might do better, if your intention is conversion, to begin with the Resurrection of Jesus and show how Catholic theology reveals the fullness of the joy of the Risen and Forgiving Lord of Life and Love. That’s where the Apostles started–not with a dogmatic argument, but with the reality of the forgiving love of God. Otherwise, I’m afraid you’ll wind up getting into an “I’m right, you’re wrong” sort of conversation, which has more to do with an assertion of your Catholic identity over against your brothers and sisters, but which does nothing whatsoever to build up the Body of Christ.
Under the Mercy,
Mark
All is Grace and Mercy! Deo Gratias!
Grey Pilgrim, I question your agenda here. It seems like you want to use a Catholic understanding of the Eucharist (with which I agree, by the way, though I quibble with attempts to over-define that understanding in philosophical/scholastic terms) to bulldoze the faith of your brothers and sisters in Christ who may not share that understanding.
I don’t think you will convince anyone of the Catholic position by making scripture and dogma into a billyclub. You’ll alienate a lot more people than you think. A recent correspondent here is a Missouri Synod Lutheran who is probably unlikely, however much you prod, to agree to Transubstantiation, but will affirm the reality of the Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of Christ actually, literally and truly present in the Eucharist. The Lutheran idea of Consubstantiation by which the reality of Christ’s Body and Blood are believed to be in, with and under the forms of Bread and Wine is not as different from Transubstantiation as you might think–but centuries of bickering seem to have made the words more important than the reality they attempt to describe. After tons of pushing, you may wind up thinking that your Lutheran brother or sister was a lost cause…when in fact he or she has more in common with you than you think!
You might do better, if your intention is conversion, to begin with the Resurrection of Jesus and show how Catholic theology reveals the fullness of the joy of the Risen and Forgiving Lord of Life and Love. That’s where the Apostles started–not with a dogmatic argument, but with the reality of the forgiving love of God. Otherwise, I’m afraid you’ll wind up getting into an “I’m right, you’re wrong” sort of conversation, which has more to do with an assertion of your Catholic identity over against your brothers and sisters, but which does nothing whatsoever to build up the Body of Christ.
Under the Mercy,
Mark
All is Grace and Mercy! Deo Gratias!
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Radical
Guest
I don’t know why you and Lyrikal have such a hard time seeing the difference between to the two claims. Here are the two scenarios that we are contemplating:
Scenario One (the Jesus Scenario):
Jesus is standing in front of us (you, a non-believer and me) in a room. Like Thomas we can see his body, talk to him and touch his wounds. We are also blessed in that Jesus has healed a leper in front of our eyes. The claim is that Jesus is both man and God.
Scenario Two (the Eucharist Scenario):
The Catholic Eucharist (the bread after consecration) is sitting in front of us (you, a non-believer and me) on the altar. The claim is that the substance of the bread is not present and that the substance of Christ’s body is present.
That one claim talks about “substances” and the other doesn’t should give you a hint that the claims are not of the same type. Anyhow, I’ll enumerate some of the differences (in the process I’ll attribute to you what I believe are standard Catholic beliefs…sorry if they are not yours):
** Difference 1**:
In the Jesus Scenario everyone agrees that the human body of Jesus is really present (based on what we sense). In contrast, in the Eucharist Scenario two of us agree that the human body of Jesus is not really present and that bread is really present (based on what we sense)…you disagree, b/c you have changed your approach.
** Difference 2**:
In the Jesus Scenario you and I agree that a miracle has occured (based on what we sense…symptoms of leprosy were there and are now gone…the non-believer will agree that his senses reported symptoms of leprosy that were there and that are now gone, but he will likely look for an alternate explanation). In contrast, in the Eucharist Scenario two of us agree that no miracle has occured (based on what we sense)…you disagree…b/c you have changed your approach and assert that a miracle has occured despite what you sense.
** Difference 3**:
In the Jesus Scenario you and I agree that the presence of a human body does not preclude the presence of a supernatural being/nature in front of us too (besides Jesus’s divine/human nature thing we could refer to demon possession)…if the non-believer believed in demon possession I don’t know why he would think that the presence of Christ’s human body would preclude the existence of a divine(supernatural) nature (In any event, besides Mormons who attribute a grand body to God, I don’t know of any one who would expect that the presence of God (or his divine nature) must be detectable by human senses)… I expect all three of us would be in agreement. In the Eucharist Scenario, you declare that the real presence of Christ’s body precludes the real presence of bread (despite what is sensed) b/c a transubstantaition has occured (again you have changed your approach).
I could name some more differences, but surely three dramatic differences should be enough to show that you are not merely comparing apples to oranges, but actually you are comparing apples to orangutans.
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Radical
Guest
here is where you come closest to making a valid point. I accept the evidence wrt the miracles performed by Christ as evidence validating his message, but I don’t accept the miracles wrt the Catholic Eucharist as evidence validating a real bodily presence. If the miracles were of the same sort and were presented in the same fashion, you could properly say that I am being inconsistent, but again there are dramatic differences. Here are some of those differences:
Difference I
With Jesus, he knew when he would perform a miracle and when he wouldn’t. One could see Christ doing things to exercise his miraculous power. He presented a message through his ministry and pointed to his own miracles as validation of his message. With the Eucharist “miracles”, they happen w/o any one controlling where or when…No doubt you would say that Christ is still in control, though he is not present to be seen exercising his miraculous powers, so that is a significant difference and your claim that Christ is the miracle worker is also begging the question. There is an undeniable difference between Christ’s miracles ( predictating that he will rise again and then rising again, or, telling the lame man to get up and walk and then the lame man does just that) and the hit and miss of the extremely infrequent Eucharistic miracles.
Difference II
Jesus did not have a reputation of passing off fabricated miracles. The CC, particularly in the Middle Ages, when Eucharistic miracles were most plentiful, had a reputation of forgeries and fakes as its churches housed multiple shrouds, dozens of nails from the cross and who knows how many bits of the true cross (to name but a few)…When this became apparent, a explanation that these relics “multiplied like the loaves and fishes” had to be produced. We are not asked to swallow that type of contrived excuse to salvage Jesus’s reputation and that contrived excuse doesn’t salvage those relics which are proven to be fakes by dating and other objective means. Unlike Catholics, Jesus did not have a reputation of faking things.
Difference III
With Jesus’s miracles there is no inconsistency. If he healed a leper, the leprosy was gone (accidents and all). The result matched the claim. With Eucharistic miracles that doesn’t happen. The claim is that the entire body of Christ is in each and every bit. This has been a significant claim b/c it justified not giving the congregation both elements. The Eucharistic miracle, however, doesn’t have an entire body appear, it is typically a bit of flesh or a few drops of blood. So contrary to the claim that the whole body is present, the Eucharistic miracle produces a very small fraction of it. The result does not match the claim and therefore, there is a problem in saying that the Eucharistic miracle validates the claim.
Difference IV
When a doubting Thomas demanded validation, Jesus responded by offering Thomas to conduct the exact “test” that Thomas proposed. Science now stands in a position to conduct DNA tests on the products of the Eucharistic miracles and those tests would show if the blood and flesh samples all came from the same Semitic male. This doubting Thomas proposes that test for the samples of the Eucharistic miracles. Run the tests and if all the samples come from the same body, then the previously described Differences fade into the background. Until then, your eucharistic miracles are of the same calibre as those claimed by the various Charismatic Christians…where the grand miracles (resurrections from death) occur in the third world where verification and validation is problematic and the local miracles tend to be of the “the soft-tissue injury to my back is healed” variety (impossible to objectively validate).
I could name some more differences, but surely four dramatic differences should be enough to show that you are not merely comparing apples to oranges, but you are comparing apples to orangutans
I haven’t argued this…we all know that on occasion, people mistake what their senses report, suffer from delusions or are a victim of an illusion. That being said, more than 99.99% of the time we treat our senses as accurately reporting reality…it is how we must conduct ourselves to function. In the Jesus Scenario, no one is suggesting that are senses are mistaken, that we are deluded or that we are the victim of an illusion. In the Eucharist Scenario, our senses are also working properly and reporting the presence of bread. You take a different approach than the rest of us and declare that although our senses are properly reporting the features of bread, the bread isn’t actually present b/c only the accidents of bread are present and the substance of bread has been transubstantiated…this whole accidents present/substance gone bit is Greek Philosophy and has nothing to do with the Jesus Scenario. In no other case (that I know of) do we face a claim that “the accidents remain, whilst the substance has gone” .
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Radical
Guest
implying?..I stated it.
was there ever a doubt?
Why not just quote John 6:51? It reads, in the NIV:
I am the living bread that came down from heaven. If anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever. This bread is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world.
if you can, just quote scripture and then we won’t have to deal with any paraphrasing that might occur on your part …John 6:51 accurately reflects what Jesus said that day.
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Radical
Guest
Hello Mark…nice, intelligent post. I don’t think any one here has the intention of conversion. This is an offshoot from another thread where a Catholic Canuck nicely and sincerely asked why (certain) Protestants don’t believe in a real bodily presence. I have no desire to convert any Catholic to my POV, but am happy to explain why I believe what I believe and defend criticism of my beliefs. The conservative Catholics, don’t seem to be able to help themselves…they simply cannot leave it at that…they are compelled to tell me why my beliefs are so very wrong. That, I suspect, is GreyPilgrim’s purpose. Cheers.
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CaptainPicard
Guest
Yeah, I agree here. The way you share your faith is just as important as the content of what you are sharing. People don’t like being tricked, yelled at, or talked down to. It will make people antagonistic to you and by extension will close people off from what you are saying no matter how well you make your case.
The John Martignoni question and answer style of apologetics has it’s place, I suppose, but should be used with great care. For instance, instead of one question at a time, I would have preferred you coming right out and saying what your thread was about and going through the entire sequence of what you were trying to say – something along the lines of “did Jesus give his literal flesh? I think all of us Christians would say yes, therefore it follows that… etc.” and then down through to the end. That way, people wont be wasting their time writing long posts about things that don’t have anything to do with the actual topic and wont hate you by the end of the thread. It’s also easier to determine the validity of your logic if it is all together in one place.
I would do something similar if I were talking face to face. I would try to focus on walking people step by step through my arguments instead of setting up to be “zinged”. If I thought that it was absolutely necessary to follow the step by step ask questions and wait for an answer approach, I would at the very least tell them “Hey, I’m going to ask you this question with the purpose of revealing abc about xyz teaching” and try to be as respectful as possible about it.
Just my two cents. Take care.
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Heuchler
Guest
I don’t mean to sound like a poor loser or anything, but I really don’t care to deal with this. Oh well. Christ’s miracles were very few. The few times He performed miracles are very similar to the miracles of the Eucharist in that they hardly happened in His life. The Eucharist is very similar to Christ. If you saw Christ as a kid, would you know He was God? The whole town of Nazareth didn’t know and even tried to throw him off a cliff when He claimed He was God (not positive about that though can’t remember how exactly they were going to do it though). No one but his family knew that Christ was the savior. So, you couldn’t tell by living around him that He was God except by His words and His miracles. In the same way, you can’t look at the Eucharist and tell that it is Christ. You could receive the Eucharist every sunday and not know it was Christ until you are taught about it. That is exactly the same as Christ for He lived with people for years who never knew He was God. And to provide you with an ample example of a Eucharistic miracle you should look into the Eucharistic miracle of Lanciano.
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Radical
Guest
you don’t, you aren’t…take care and may God bless you.
I will (again)…it seems to bee one of the favorites…thanks.
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Heuchler
Guest
Thank you one thing I don’t like at all about the internet is that we can’t convey what we really mean so I hope you understand I just meant I’ve been having a long day. I also don’t mean to seem obnoxious or mean when I post so I’m sorry if it might come across as very cold.
And Lanciano is a favorite because it is the most irrefutable in our opinion and has been backed up by scientific studies. It really is an amazing miracle.
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The_GreyPilgrim
Guest
Not at all. The the Bible is objective, not subjective, and protestants claim that it is their sole rule of faith. Truths of the Faith are not dependent on the individuals “understanding”.
It’s about the truth, and there is such a thing as the law of non-contradiction. If the questions make protestants pause or they find them offensive then that says more about them and their “understandings” than about the questions, or the questioner.
Deo Volente:
Truth is offensive to those who love what they love more than the truth. I don’t believe I will “convince” them of anything. I’m merely planting seeds, I’ll let God do the work.
Deo Volente:
I’m not “bickering” anything. I’m asking questions based in the Book which they claim is their sole authority. The questions are simple and straightforward and only require simple and straightforward answers.
Again, if you don’y like the questions, it says more about you than about the question.
Deo Volente:
I don’t “convert” anyone. God is the one that changes hearts. Either the heart accepts His truth when it is confronted with His presence, or it becomes hardened because it loves itself and its pleasures and desires more than God.
While I appreciate your suggestion for method, that might work for others who have not heard the Gospel, but that hardly applies to protestants. We all agree on the Resurrection, we all agree that the Bible is authoritative, we all have the same data. So we should all have the same conclusions based on that data.
The probelem is that reason is infallible de jure, reasoners-which protestant theology and its subjectivist approach to scripture proves-are not de facto.
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The_GreyPilgrim
Guest
I was wondering how long it would take for you to try and deflect the issue by making it about “translation”.
RSV:
[51] I am the living bread which came down from heaven; if any one eats of this bread, he will live for ever; and the bread which I shall give for the life of the world is my flesh."
KJV
[51] I am the living bread which came down from heaven: if any man eat of this bread, he shall live for ever: and the bread that I will give is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world.
Nowhere did I “paraphrase”. I established a principle by asking a simple question. And then following upon that established principle I asked another question based from scripture.
A simple “yes” or “no” answer would suffice.
Hi Mark,
You are quite right in your post here, so much so that I would point out that Lutherans even reject consubstantiation, in part on the philosophical/scholastic grounds you mention above.
While we don’t express the RP in terms of Transubstantiation, I believe I’ve seen where hn160 has written that it is not the stumbling block for him as some might think, and I agree.
Jon
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Swiss_Guy
Guest
Flesh is REAL, not “symbolic”. I don’t know what you mean by this, but Jesus dies on a Cross to save us. Try severing your arm off and see the blood. Then you will realize that it was REAL! 
Sorry if this came off as harsh. I have no idea what you mean though.
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Sorry if this came off as harsh. I have no idea what you mean though.
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Sufjon
Guest
While I think that both the literal or figurative interpretations each hold some truth, I think both are rather limited or primitive understandings. But let’s go ahead and go with the literal interpretation. I have a question that has intrigued me for a long time, and I am dead serious, although you might not take it that way. Regardless, it’s something I want to know. So, you are eating the Body of Christ and drinking the Blood of Christ. Now, if I am a Christian, this is perhaps among the most sacred of things. Not something to be trivial with. Now, in regard to what we eat and drink, we know that some of it is used to build cells that become part of us, but even this is only temporary because our bodies change out all of their cells and particles over time. Eventually it is all shed or expelled in one way or another. Since you are very interested in exacting understandings of things, I have always wondered about this and would like to know if there is some theory in the case of the Body and Blood of Christ that circumvents the natural bodily processes in regards to what it eats. Is there some point before a cell is shed or food is expelled that it is no longer the Body and Blood of Christ? Is there some point before this happens when the “Christness” in it leaves? Every cell in our bodies eventually gets tossed out in some way or another eventually, and becomes a part of other things like plants and dogs and what have you. It’s a serious question – one that I have often wondered about, so I am hoping that I can get a serious answer. I am asking you in particular because you seem to have a penchant for having a very precise understanding of things, and I thought perhaps you could help me here. We are talking about eating an actual physical body, so how does this jibe with other actual physical things we eat? I am not denying that it’s real and physical or any of the things you hold dear. I just want to know what happens to it after it’s no longer a component of my fingernail, and becomes part of another animal or something. It’s probably crossed a lot of people’s minds, but I wonder how many have asked.
Does it somehow adhere to us like nothing else we eat, and therefore if I were to receive the Eucharist every day for 70 years, all the particles in my body get changed out eventually for Jesus particles, and hence my body literally becomes 100% the Body of Christ, (in which case you should be respectful in how you answer my question). Or do they get expelled like everything else and get swam in by fish, absorbed by plants and soil and become part of other living things, or does the Jesus fly out of them at some point before all t hat can happen? Is there a doctrine on that?
Of course, I know that Jesus actually had a much larger and mystical meaning in saying “this is my body” and “this is my blood,” than what this discussion you have started gives it credit for, but since we are crawling around on the bestial floor of possible understandings, we are accordingly left with all the beastly details to reckon with here, are we not?
Your friend
Sufjon
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Heuchler
Guest
Well Sufjon the Catechism of the Catholic Church says
So, essentially, Christ held up the bread and said that this is my body. So, it is only when it is bread that it is his body. Once the substance is digested and is technically no longer the Eucharist, it isn’t the Eucharist. Feces is not the body of Christ because feces is not consecreated bread. So, the Eucharist only remains for about the 15 or so minutes that it takes to digest what seems to be bread and after that it is no longer Eucharist. So, it doesn’t become a part of you in the sense it goes into your cells, because your cells aren’t bread. However, you are right in that it is very serious and that we do need to be careful with what we do with the body of Christ. But a really great question really got me thinking
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hn160
Guest
First of all, Lutherans do not believe in Consubstantiation, we just believe Christ’s Words, it is a mystery. We believe that we receive Christ’s very Body and Blood in, with, and under the bread and wine. It is our belief that in bread, we receive Christ’s Body and in the wine, we receive His Blood. This id different from the Roman Catholic understanding of Concomitance.
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JesusTheOnlyWay
Guest
Symbolic, of course.
Does anyone truly believe that they’re actually eating Jesus? lolwat.
Jesus told us to do this in remembrance of him.
Does anyone truly believe that they’re actually eating Jesus? lolwat.
Jesus told us to do this in remembrance of him.
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