No, this too is not correct.“Transubstantiation” occurs all the time – every time you eat.
Eg. Eat beans; the substance of beans is changed into the substance of your human flesh. Transubstantiation.
And if not from food, just where do you think the matter that forms new flesh in a growing body comes from? or the new cells that are constantly being formed to replace dying cells?No, this too is not correct.
Transubstantiation does not happen when I eat beans. The beans don’t become my flesh. The beans are used by my body but they don’t become my body.
It’s the body of Christ. Even Jesus calls it His “body”.Neither does the bread turn into the flesh of Jesus. There is no meat. It is the substance of his body, not his thigh muscle. The Eucharist is not the flesh of Christ but the entire substance of his body.
Do you mean the same thing by “flesh” and “body”?Neither does the bread turn into the flesh of Jesus. There is no meat. It is the substance of his body, not his thigh muscle. The Eucharist is not the flesh of Christ but the entire substance of his body.
-Tim-
No, it was His Glorified Body. There are a number of reasons for saying so.The first Eucharist, when Jesus was with His apostles, he hadn’t died yet, so it couldn’t have been his glorified body, at least not then.
Jesus Christ is fully present in the Eucharist. His presence is real, corporeal, actual and substantial. The whole Christ is present - body, blood soul and divinity. It is Jesus.Do you mean the same thing by “flesh” and “body”?
(Eg. when you say “Neither does the bread turn into the flesh of Jesus” do you mean the bread does not “turn into the body of Jesus”?
If you’re using the 2 words, flesh and body, to mean 2 separate things, could you give your definition for each of them – so I can tell what you mean when you say it doesn’t turn “into the flesh of Jesus”.
So no transformation occurs. The atoms of the bread do not change, and since the accidentals of the bread derive from the existence and arrangement of the atoms, the accidentals do not change.Let’s not confuse transformation with transubstantiation. They are two separate terms.
Transformation is the changing of the form of matter. It is something that can be measured, weighed, seen, etc. It is limited to the physical world.
Transubstantiation does not at all imply transformation - it is the changing of the substance of the matter, but not it’s form.
That would be incorrect. The " substance " of the bread and wine would include their " form " and their " matter " as well. The appearances of the bread and wine are accidents, not forms. These accidents no longer exist in a substance or subject. Nor does any substance or subject exist in them, not even Christ’s. He exists under the " veil " provided by the accidents. He is wherever they are, but he is not a part of them, he is hidden by them or veiled by them. Think of the accidents as a kind of sponge soaking up water. The water permeates the the sponge, but it is not an actual part of the sponge. Likewise, Christ permeates the accidents, but he is not a part of them. Or think of them as vehicle carrying Christ. He is where the vehicle is, but he is not a part of the vehicle.Let’s not confuse transformation with transubstantiation. They are two separate terms.
Transformation is the changing of the form of matter. It is something that can be measured, weighed, seen, etc. It is limited to the physical world.
Transubstantiation does not at all imply transformation - it is the changing of the substance of the matter, but not it’s form. Jesus comes to us “disguised” in the form of bread. It cannot be measured or weighed or seen by the human eye. Transubstantiation transcends the physical limitations of whatever form it takes (bread and wine).
God Bless,
CSJ
The word transubstantiation requires an understanding of the theological and philosophical meaning of the 2 terms - substance and accidents - as they apply to something that exists.The dififoculty I have with understanding how the bread and wine look, taste, feel, and remain the same while claiming theyre not the same is hard.
You said it very well. I think it helps if we " visualize " the accidents as a kind of vehicle carrying Christ to us. He accompanies the accidents but is not a part of them, nor are they a part of him. Yet, if they are not there, neither is he. They are a sign of his presence only. Also, we call the accidents bread and wine only before the consecration. After the consecration, the bread and wine no longer exist because thei substance has been changed into the body and blood of Christ. As difficult as it is to think about these things, people need to make an effort to do so.The word transubstantiation requires an understanding of the theological and philosophical meaning of the 2 terms - substance and accidents - as they apply to something that exists.
**1) Substance **is the thing itself; it exists in itself, not in something else. Substance is the whole thing; not just a part of it.
2) Accidents cannot exist on their own; they are contingent - can only exist in something/in a substance. (“looks, taste, feel” are accidents. Eg. “red” cannot exist just on it’s own-a jar of red, or an ounce of red, etc. Same with “sweet” (taste) or “soft” (feel), or any of the other accidents. Accidents inhere in substances and so normally when we “know” the accidents of something, we are knowing the substance also.
Here, in my words, is what happens at the words of Consecraion - according to the concepts Aquinas gives in his Summa (to keep it simpler and shorter I’ll just include the bread and not the wine):
newadvent.org/summa/4076.htm#article1
- First (prior to Consecration) there is bread –
the **“substance” **is bread;
the “accidents”/species of that substance include the color white, the shape of a circle; the dimensions of that circle; it’s weight, taste,…- When the priest says the words of consecration over the bread, God takes it’s substance and converts it into the substance of Jesus’ body - but the conversion of the bread terminates right at that point and does not continue on to converting the accidents of the bread.
By God’s power and will, the accidents of bread miraculously remain without inhereing in any substance. These accidents (taste,shape,etc.) really continue to exist and so when you receive the host/bread you experience them.- But Jesus is present whole and entire in the consecrated host which means therefore that the accidents of His body must also be there since they inhere in it’s substance. They are obviously not present in the manner of physical species. Aquinas terms the manner in which they are present as “concommitance”. (Concommitance is also the manner in which Our Lord’s soul, divinity, and blood are also present in the consecrated bread.) Nevertheless, since the substance of Christ’s body is not really deprived of its dimensive quantity and its other accidents, hence it comes that by reason of real concomitance the whole dimensive quantity of Christ’s body and all its other accidents are in this sacrament.
I hope this helps. It got longer than I wanted it to.
Just a couple points in closing:
First, it’s important to remember that the Eucharist is a mystery - something we cannot fully comprehend - and it is a miraculous phenomena. We know and believe it because Jesus told us it is Him.
Second, I do not have a degree in philosophy or theology (just done a lot of reading on my own), and there are a lot of gaps because of trying to condense some difficult concepts into just a few lines.
I think the difficulty is that you are approaching the subject with a particular philosophical worldview that is incompatible with Christianity. You are taking for granted a mechanical, naturalistic view that would of course render the idea of transubstantiation absurd. What meaning could substance possibly have if reality is only a bunch of elementary particles bouncing around? Behind thee idea of substance, however, is the idea that a substance is something not reducible to its constituent parts. Take water for example. It is composed of oxygen and hydrogen, but it is not reducible to a mixture of either and its properties are not reducible to the properties of either. Also consider that the behavior of a substance reflecting the behavior of its constituent matter does not mean that the substance is an illusion and that their is no deeper reality than the material reality of its particles. Isn’t it possible that matter is not instead of substance, but that matter is together with and concurrent with substance?So no transformation occurs. The atoms of the bread do not change, and since the accidentals of the bread derive from the existence and arrangement of the atoms, the accidentals do not change.
So what is the “substance” then? It is not a physical change, as that would require transformation. It is only a philosophical change, as what is changing is how the observers regard the physical object. Can Aristotle’s substance define something other that simply how we categorize a physical object or an idea?
And food does become the human body, as does air and water. At least some of it does. Sometimes the molecules are broken apart and the released energy is used by the body, and sometimes the atoms and molecules of both organic (plants, animals, and fungus) and inorganic (vitamins and minerals) objects are used to build new living cels, tissue, DNA, hormones, etc. I don’t know if Aristotle addressed this as his understanding of how the body worked at the small level was limited, but it is an example of the atoms of one object becoming part of another object and then being considered to be part of that new object. But the atoms are not created or lost, they are only re-arranged. That’s why “substance” seems to be a topic of philosophical categorization rather than a description of what physically existent material is present in an object and what is not.
I don’t know how much you understand about Aristotle, Thomas Aquinas, and Catholic theology, but you must understand that the Catholic Church has formally Defined its teaching on the Real Physical Presence of Christ in the Eucharist. One accepts it on Faith because Christ taught. The terms the Church used to Define this Dogma are those of Thomas Aquinas, which are similar to but not restricted to those used by Aristotle. So, in a sense, the Church has " canonized " Thomas’ use of these terms in this Dogma.My problem with the philosophical description is that only gives a philosophical change. So if the Eucharist “becomes” something other than just bread, it seems that only a philosophical change is happening, not a physical change. “Substance” as defined by Aristotle only really addresses the philosophical interpretation of what something is.
We know the bread is made of atoms, arranged in a certain way by the growth of the wheat and the processing of the kernels of wheat into flour and then into bread. These atoms are the physical existence of the bread. The color and appearance of the bread comes from which waveforms of light bounce off of these atoms. The taste of the bread comes from how these atoms interact with the atoms in the cels of your tongue. So “accidents” derive from the actual physical substance of the thing in question.
When bread is blessed to become Eucharist, these atoms do not change. The accidents still come from the way that light bounces off the atoms, or the atoms chemically react to your tongue or digestive system. The physical substance of the bread does not change, nor do any of its physical properties. No changes occur that can be detected in the physical world.
The only difference is in properties that humans apply to classify the bread. To the physical world, saying “this bread was used in a Eurcharist ceremony” and “this bread once sat on that table” hold the same level of distinction. Without knowledge of the history of the bread, it couldn’t be classified.
If a change happened on some other plane of existence, and things on that plane of existence could affect our physical world, then the affect could be reliably and reproducibly detected. Simply writing it off as a “mystery” doesn’t seem any different than stating “I don’t know”. At that point, you could claim anything is a mystery.
Hi Nita,The word transubstantiation requires an understanding of the theological and philosophical meaning of the 2 terms - substance and accidents - as they apply to something that exists.
**1) Substance **is the thing itself; it exists in itself, not in something else. Substance is the whole thing; not just a part of it.
2) Accidents cannot exist on their own; they are contingent - can only exist in something/in a substance. (“looks, taste, feel” are accidents. Eg. “red” cannot exist just on it’s own-a jar of red, or an ounce of red, etc. Same with “sweet” (taste) or “soft” (feel), or any of the other accidents. Accidents inhere in substances and so normally when we “know” the accidents of something, we are knowing the substance also.
Here, in my words, is what happens at the words of Consecraion - according to the concepts Aquinas gives in his Summa (to keep it simpler and shorter I’ll just include the bread and not the wine):
newadvent.org/summa/4076.htm#article1
- First (prior to Consecration) there is bread –
the **“substance” **is bread;
the “accidents”/species of that substance include the color white, the shape of a circle; the dimensions of that circle; it’s weight, taste,…- When the priest says the words of consecration over the bread, God takes it’s substance and converts it into the substance of Jesus’ body - but the conversion of the bread terminates right at that point and does not continue on to converting the accidents of the bread.
By God’s power and will, the accidents of bread miraculously remain without inhereing in any substance. These accidents (taste,shape,etc.) really continue to exist and so when you receive the host/bread you experience them.- But Jesus is present whole and entire in the consecrated host which means therefore that the accidents of His body must also be there since they inhere in it’s substance. They are obviously not present in the manner of physical species. Aquinas terms the manner in which they are present as “concommitance”. (Concommitance is also the manner in which Our Lord’s soul, divinity, and blood are also present in the consecrated bread.) Nevertheless, since the substance of Christ’s body is not really deprived of its dimensive quantity and its other accidents, hence it comes that by reason of real concomitance the whole dimensive quantity of Christ’s body and all its other accidents are in this sacrament.
I hope this helps. It got longer than I wanted it to.
Just a couple points in closing:
First, it’s important to remember that the Eucharist is a mystery - something we cannot fully comprehend - and it is a miraculous phenomena. We know and believe it because Jesus told us it is Him.
Second, I do not have a degree in philosophy or theology (just done a lot of reading on my own), and there are a lot of gaps because of trying to condense some difficult concepts into just a few lines.
One must be a valid minister of the Holy Eucharist.Hi Nita,
But by all of these explanations, how can you tell or not tell, that Ive transubstantiated a slice of pizza? It appears that I can claim that Ive done so, but there’s no way you can disprove for sure. If you can disprove, what method would you use?
You can say its not true, but I can say the accidents remained and what you’re seeing, smelling, tasting, eating, is not really pizza its human flesh, it just looks like pizza, but it really ceased being pizza the second I consecrated it.
How does one respond to such a claim?
Pizza does not meet the following criteria.THE MINISTER OF THE MOST HOLY EUCHARIST
Can. 900 §1. The minister who is able to confect the sacrament of the Eucharist in the person of Christ is a validly ordained priest alone.
Can. 924 §1. The most holy eucharistic sacrifice must be offered with bread and with wine in which a little water must be mixed.
§2. The bread must be only wheat and recently made so that there is no danger of spoiling.
§3. The wine must be natural from the fruit of the vine and not spoiled.
Transubstantiation is not a claim. Transubstantiation is not something we say or do. It is a truth revealed to us by God and it takes place because God wills it to take place.Hi Nita,
But by all of these explanations, how can you tell or not tell, that Ive transubstantiated a slice of pizza? It appears that I can claim that Ive done so, but there’s no way you can disprove for sure. If you can disprove, what method would you use?
You can say its not true, but I can say the accidents remained and what you’re seeing, smelling, tasting, eating, is not really pizza its human flesh, it just looks like pizza, but it really ceased being pizza the second I consecrated it.
How does one respond to such a claim?
Your method for deeming what is valid or invalid is only based purely on philosophy then, as the OP noted I believe.One must be a valid minister of the Holy Eucharist.
Pizza does not meet the following criteria.
But again, that would be based on Catholic philosophy.Transubstantiation is not a claim. Transubstantiation is not something we say or do. It is a truth revealed to us by God and it takes place because God wills it to take place.
Bread and wine changed into the substance of Jesus is part of God’s revelation and God’s will. Pizza changed into human flesh is not. The word bread is in the Bible 430 times. The word wine is in the Bible 303 times. The word pizza is not in the Bible.
There is 2000 years worth of evidence for transubstantiation as taught by the Catholic Church and not 2000 microseconds of evidence for pizza. Someone could claim that gravity doesn’t exist, but evidence all around them would prove them insane. A sane person believes in that which God has revealed to us.
-Tim-
I made an error in calling what happens in the process of nutrition an example of "transubstantiation".Hi Nita,
But by all of these explanations, how can you tell or not tell, that Ive transubstantiated a slice of pizza? It appears that I can claim that Ive done so, but there’s no way you can disprove for sure. If you can disprove, what method would you use?