Luther's Consubstantiation .... or Catholicism's Transubstantiation

[Philthy]

No … I think the Cardinal mispoke in several instances. …scan it, and insert it into this Thread … so we can examine it.

Perhaps others will take you up on this, but I kinda think you simply don’t respect the opinions of others whom you should be able to trust. The Cardinal’s language with respect to the futility of subjecting the Eucharist to scientific examination is perfectly clear, and yet you simply claim that he “mispoke in several instances” without qualifying those errors, without indicating how they are relevant and without, demonstrating the basis for your claim.
I certainly don’t deserve more respect than he is owed, so I’m not sure what use there is in offering my opinion to you. You ask that I admit that I “could be wrong”. I am always ready to do that - as I already have in this post when I admitted that I was confused on whether Christ was in his glorified state after the Resurrection and prior to the Ascension. I can also admit that I don’t know all there is to know on this or any topic. What I will not do is claim I could be wrong on what the Cardinal clearly articulates: scientific tests will reveal NOTHING, ABSOLUTELY NOTHING with respect to an investigation of the substantial change that occurs at transubstantiation. And I’m not so delusional that I would consider myself intellectually superior to someone who has devoted his life to the study and practice of our faith. You have no proof that he is wrong, you have no Church document that indicates that he is wrong and yet you “think” that he mispoke. Perhaps you should accept him as a legitimate authority and “think” that perhaps he knows more than you until you can actually PROVE that he is wrong.

 

[wynnejj]

I just read the piece by Cardinal Dulles on the Real Presence, and was I ever off in my previous post. I should have realized it when the understanding of the Real Presence has always been Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity. The Divinity part should have really given it away. The substance of the Divinity of God encompasses the aspects of omni-potence, omni-presence, etc. We don’t get a snapshot of the Body and Blood of Jesus at a given moment in time. We get the Body and Blood of Jesus, including the aspects of His existence for all time.

Then there is the idea of substance and accidents in scientific study. Do we really know how to distinguish substance (matter) and accident (our ability to detect matter) in science anyway? What if the smallest particles of what we call “matter” (aka, substance) is really just a bundle of energy in a condensed form held together by the forces of magnetism which relate to energy movement. So all is just the inherent property of energy and its movement. What if what we detect as matter with our biological and technological instruments is just an accident of energy and movement. That all of the universe are recursive galaxies of galaxies of galaxies of particle/planet (nothing but bundles of energy) and void (spacing due to the play of magnetic forces). This could hold true regardless of the macroscope or microscope level measured.

I’m always amazed at the scalability of the universe. It’s like old style computers that requires rooms of hardware versus little microchips today that can do much more.

 

[Verbum_Caro]

wynnejj:

Do we really know how to distinguish substance (matter) and accident (our ability to detect matter) in science anyway? What if the smallest particles of what we call “matter” (aka, substance) is really just a bundle of energy in a condensed form held together by the forces of magnetism which relate to energy movement. So all is just the inherent property of energy and its movement.

wynnejj,

In fact the only thing we can detect ever through our senses are the accidents or properties of a thing. So, the distinction is pretty clear: our senses do NOT detect directly the bare underlying substance of anything.

We probably ought not call substance “matter” though, because it isn’t just matter. . . it is informed matter, i.e. matter plus form, i.e specified matter. The reason that this is important is because substance denotes things, like a “tree” , that arent the same as “matter”.

What I think you meant by “matter” is “material substance”, i.e. those things that we see around us, that are detectable through the senses. And in that case, “matter” (meaning material substances) might be said to be “substances” because, well, they are material substances.

But, it seems to me that we should be aware that there is a different kind of “matter” that is considered pure potentiality, a kind of amorphous “stuff” that never exists without being informed into some kind of stuff, i.e. matter PLUS form, i.e. substance.

Also, I think that just because we only detect accidents of something doesn’t mean that accidents are the same as “our ability to detect matter” as you said. Accidents are real things, and so are substances, which can exist independently of an observer. So, it would be true to say that our senses (and any detection equipment we have) is ordered towards detecting accidents and not substances. But, even if we cannot detect something in a certain case, it still would be an accident if it is kind of thing (a property) that would be called an accident.

The last part of your statement about the possibility of things being made out of bundles of energy seems significant but only possible, I think, as long as we realize that 1)if we can detect something what we detect are the accidents of that something. . . so if we detect different bundles of energy, we detect the properties of those bundles only and not the substance of the “bundles”; and 2) you can’t really approach substance in reductionist way. . . even if you find that the “elementary particle” is just a bundle of energy, a tree is a substance in itself, not just a pile of bundles of energy. When you consider a tree as a tree, that is a substance. I suppose if you consider a bundle of energy as a bundle of energy that would be substance.

VC

 

[wynnejj]

… I suppose if you consider a bundle of energy as a bundle of energy that would be substance.

VC,

My intent was to suggest that matter is simply identified substance at a given microscopic level, and at that level, there may be more accidents than what can be detected by our current instruments. I didn’t exactly articulate the form of substance at a given microscopic level, but my understanding would be that there are substances at the next microscopic level down whose interspatial positions are given form by the interplay of competing magnetic forces which relates to the movement of substances.

From a matter/detection standpoint, the statement “When the lights are out, there is no such thing as a blue pen and red pen” would be true. From a substance/accident standpoint, the statement would be false.

Underlying much of my thinking is that as we approach the most infinitely small microscopic level, all substance and form will be related to energy and its movement … that is, God’s thought and movement of thought. That is, real substance and form relate to God’s Law & Order.

 

[Verbum_Caro]

VC,

My intent was to suggest that matter is simply identified substance at a given microscopic level, and at that level, there may be more accidents than what can be detected by our current instruments.

That seems plausible to me, especially since historically we kept finding evidence (i.e. accidents) of smaller particles, and also historically we have discovered new qualities of things, that were undetectable until we augmented our senses.

My point was that categorically empirical science NEVER detects the bare substance of something because our senses never detect the bare substance of something.

This is why the erroneous notion that our senses of scientific instruments should detect change of substance in the Eucharist is flawed. Even in a run of the mill substantial change, we only detect the change of accidents. Since in the Eucharist, de fide, the accidents DO NOT CHANGE then we can say, without doubt, that we should not detect a change whatsoever in the Eucharist.

VC

 

[brb3]

We don’t get a snapshot of the Body and Blood of Jesus at a given moment in time. We get the Body and Blood of Jesus, including the aspects of His existence for all time.

Then there is the idea of substance and accidents in scientific study. Do we really know how to distinguish substance (matter) and accident (our ability to detect matter) in science anyway? What if the smallest particles of what we call “matter” (aka, substance) is really just a bundle of energy in a condensed form held together by the forces of magnetism which relate to energy movement. So all is just the inherent property of energy and its movement. What if what we detect as matter with our biological and technological instruments is just an accident of energy and movement.

The key is how God defines himself … as LIGHT. The BigBang was one tremendous explosion of matter … into energy. As the energy cooled in the first nanoseconds, low M.W. Hydrogen & Helium elements were formed … and photonic / bosonic energy began its transit @ light-speed. Light photons have no mass, yet when absorbed by an opaque object, that object gains mass from them. Later, that object can lose that mass equivalent, and a photon of light is released again.

Quantum mechanics is still the research interest of scientists. Its DUALITY, of wave and particle properties, is very mysterious. When mankind fully understands light PHOTONS & the STEM CELL … we will perhaps solve the Transubstantiation puzzle of the Eucharist.

 

[wynnejj]

Since in the Eucharist, de fide, the accidents DO NOT CHANGE then we can say, without doubt, that we should not detect a change whatsoever in the Eucharist.

Yes, it is futile to try to uncover that which God intends to veil from our senses.
It is our call to duty to trust Jesus, the Word of God, the Word Made Flesh.

 

[brb3]

Since in the Eucharist, de fide, the accidents DO NOT CHANGE then we can say, without doubt, that we should not detect a change whatsoever in the Eucharist.

Except, we do !!

We receive the Heat, the Fire, the Light Himself within us. We are changed by the Eucharist. So, we know that the SUBSTANCE in the Eucharist has been changed … since we become [via transformation] what we have received.

 

[Verbum_Caro]

Except, we do !!

We receive the Heat, the Fire, the Light Himself within us. We are changed by the Eucharist. So, we know that the SUBSTANCE in the Eucharist has been changed … since we become [via transformation] what we have received.

There are various ways we can know that the Eucharist is changed. But in each case it is not through direct observation via our 5 senses of the Eucharist itself that we discover the change.

As I said:

1. Our senses, augmented or not, do not detect bare substances.
2. We (currently) know substances through their accidents, and likewise detect substantial changes by change in accidents.
3. DE FIDE the accidents of bread and wine do not change, under normal circumstances, in the Eucharist.
4. Therefore we do not detect, via our senses, a change in the Eucharist (in the Eucharist, means, of course, by examining the Eucharist)

You began this thread with a discussion of using scientific equipment to observe the Eucharist, please don’t know try to change your course to include observations of your own interior response or the effects of grace on others. . . that isn’t the topic.

VC

 

[wynnejj]

We receive the Heat, the Fire, the Light Himself within us.

I don’t think that if one would conduct an exit poll from Sunday Mass with the question, “Do you feel the Heat, the Fire, the Light Himself within you?” that you would find your scientific empirical evidence where one detects these accidents of the Holy Eucharist. Yet, you may find that many feel that the cumulative effect is a general re-orientation of their moral compass and a profound sense that they are headed in the right direction.

However, if by Heat, Fire & Light, you are referring to a sense of receiving Love and an increased ability return that Love to God and to reflect more perfectly that Love to others, I think that many would agree that is the primary detected accident of the Holy Eucharist.

 

[brb3]

However, if by Heat, Fire & Light, you are referring to a sense of receiving Love and an increased ability return that Love to God and to reflect more perfectly that Love to others, I think that many would agree that is the primary detected ACCIDENT of the Holy Eucharist.

I would disagree.

Not the accidents, but the SUBSTANCE !! God is LIGHT, LOVE, FORGIVING, NURTURING, RENEWING, ETC …

 

[brb3]

You began this thread with a discussion of using scientific equipment to observe the Eucharist, please don’t know try to change your course to include observations of your own interior response or the effects of grace on others. . . that isn’t the topic.

Again, the topic is “Luther’s Consubstantiation vs Catholic [Trent’s] Transubstantiation … which is best supported by 21st Century Science”. Just because YOU, and others, have deviated from the topic … doesn’t bother me. I’ve indulged your sidetracks into METAPHYSICS, and occasionally have responded using ‘metaphysical’ language.

Glad you’re back to the thread VC … keep us on topic, if possible

 

[Verbum_Caro]

keep us on topic, if possible

Trying to!

But you’re response reminds me of a child who asks his dad

"Hey Dad! Can we take the car to the soda-shop?

to which his father replies

No, my boy, the rains have washed out the road so we can’t go to soda-shop.

to which the boy impertinently yawlps

NOPE! (wagging his head like this :nope You’re wrong pop! We can go to soda-shop! We can S-W-I-M!

VC

 

[wynnejj]

Good morning brb3,

Your mission, should you decide to accept it, is to S-W-I-M to the soda shop. Of course, should you or any of your mission impossible force be accidentally caught looting the shop that is closed, this agency will disavow any knowledge of your actions. This thread will self-destruct within several posts. Good luck, brb3.

• wynnejj

 

[Philthy]

The key is how God defines himself … as LIGHT.

This is quite a ridiculous claim and so I will ridicule it. It is wrong on two counts:
First, and most obviously, God does not define himself as LIGHT. Light is part of creation, and therefore could not possibly :“Then God said: Let there be light, and there was light.%between%” Gen 1:3 He is defined as love - “Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love.” 1John 4. Only Christ speaks of Himself as the “light of the world” and He does so in an analogous fashion: his teaching is “light” (revelation) to a dark (fallen) world.
Secondly, this is not key to anything but rationalizing your indefensible postion.

The BigBang was one tremendous explosion of matter … into energy. As the energy cooled in the first nanoseconds, low M.W. Hydrogen & Helium elements were formed … and photonic / bosonic energy began its transit @ light-speed. Light photons have no mass, yet when absorbed by an opaque object, that object gains mass from them. Later, that object can lose that mass equivalent, and a photon of light is released again.

Irrelevant

Quantum mechanics is still the research interest of scientists. Its DUALITY, of wave and particle properties, is very mysterious. When mankind fully understands light PHOTONS & the STEM CELL … we will perhaps solve the Transubstantiation puzzle of the Eucharist.

I don’t think so. I think you are grasping at straws and are doing so in direct contradiction to some pretty clear teachings.

 

[brb3]

This is quite a ridiculous claim and so I will ridicule it. It is wrong on two counts:
First, and most obviously, God does not define himself as LIGHT.

:nope: He does indeed. St. John speaks to the teaching of Christ on this in his first Epistle.

"This is the message we have HEARD FROM HIM AND PROCLAIM TO YOU, THAT GOD IS LIGHT AND IN HIM IS NO DARKNESS AT ALL. 1 John 1:5

 

[benjohnson]

My gut reaction to all of this: doing anything other than receiving the true body and blood of our lord seems wrong. Poking and prodding it with scientific tools does not seem to be an appropriate thing to do for the personal sacrifice our God has made for us.

As a scientist, I sympathize with the desire to understand this miracle, but for myself I find that having it be a “mystery of our faith” is more than sufficient.