question for Lutherans or former Lutherans

[Arlene]

My friend was raised in the Lutheran church although does not attend that church any more. We were discussing differences in our religous beliefs and when I told her that Catholics believe in the Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist, she told me that Lutherans did too. She even used the word Transubstanciation and said that’s what they believe in, too, just like Catholics. I was not aware of this. I thought this was strictly a Catholic belief, and that Protestants believed that the communion was symbolic only.

 

[Grace283]

dont quote me but i believe they do… the reason being it because Lutherans (named after Martin Luther, and aka the Church of England) are the most congruentbut are imperfect to the Catholics on the beliefs

 

[Montalban]

dont quote me but i believe they do… the reason being it because Lutherans (named after Martin Luther, and aka the Church of England) are the most congruentbut are imperfect to the Catholics on the beliefs

Lutherinism is not also** known a**s (aka) the Church of England!

 

[dosdog]

My friend was raised in the Lutheran church although does not attend that church any more. We were discussing differences in our religous beliefs and when I told her that Catholics believe in the Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist, she told me that Lutherans did too. She even used the word Transubstanciation and said that’s what they believe in, too, just like Catholics. I was not aware of this. I thought this was strictly a Catholic belief, and that Protestants believed that the communion was symbolic only.

The Lutherans proclaimed in full synod:
“The Zwinglians . . . we do not even grant to them a place in the church, far from recognizing as brethren, a set of people, whom we see agitated by the spirit of lying, and uttering blasphemies against the Son of Man.” (113;v.1:466)

The Zwinglians believed that the Eucharist was wholly symbolic (probably the majority position of Protestants today). Hence, whoever believes the same would have had the foregoing said about them by Dr. Luther, who firmly held to Consubstantiation, i.e., the actual Body and Blood of Christ is present in the communion along with the bread and wine.
catholicapologetics.info/apologetics/protestantism/protin.htm

 

[Grace283]

Lutherinism is not also** known a**s (aka) the Church of England!

whoops… see why i said “don’t quote me” lolol…

Lord love me…

 

[Cran]

Former Lutheran reporting

Lutherans do believe indeed that in the moment they receive, they receive the blood and body of Christ. But they do not believe that it is the blood and body before they receive or after they receive (that’s why they don’t keep the left over bread in a tabernacle).

It is so to speak just the believe of the receiver that brings about the transubstanciation (if they had a valid one, that is) and not the eucharistic prayer performed by a validly ordained priest with right intention and matter.

 

[Montalban]

whoops… see why i said “don’t quote me” lolol…

Lord love me…

People used to put LOL and I thought it was Lots of Love - and couldn’t understand it when people were doing this at the end of some very bitter and attacking posts.

 

[gcnuss]

Current Lutheran reporting

Lutheran belief is that in Holy Communion we receive the Body and Blood of Christ. How that comes to be we do not profess to know. We simply believe the words of our Lord, “this is my body, given for you” and “this cup is the new covenant in my blood, shed for you…”

There are differences among Lutherans as to whether they believe that the Real Presence persists outside of the Eucharistic service. Some reserve the consecrated elements for taking communion to the homebound, thus showing a belief that the elements remain the Body and Blood of Christ after the service is ended.

 

[Contarini]

My friend was raised in the Lutheran church although does not attend that church any more. We were discussing differences in our religous beliefs and when I told her that Catholics believe in the Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist, she told me that Lutherans did too. She even used the word Transubstanciation and said that’s what they believe in, too, just like Catholics. I was not aware of this. I thought this was strictly a Catholic belief, and that Protestants believed that the communion was symbolic only.

In the Reformation itself, the view that it was only symbolic was actually a minority view–in fact each Protestant group typically accused those to their “left” of holding that the sacraments were “bare signs” (nuda signa), with no one quite willing to put it that starkly. However, you’re right that this is the most common view among Protestants in the past couple centuries, at least in the U.S.

Lutherans believe in an objective bodily presence of Christ in, with, and other the elements of bread and wine. They do not historically believe in transubstantiation (though I can believe that some Lutherans today might use the term), that is to say, in the transformation of the bread and wine into the Body and Blood (on the level of “substance,” however we define that). In scholastic language, that means that Lutherans think that there are two substances present under the “species” (the outward form which we can perceive by our senses) of bread and wine. Most Lutherans do indeed believe that this presence of the Body and Blood takes place only during the liturgy, but as gcnuss points out this is not universally held.

At any event, the presence is NOT dependent on the faith of the recipient in the Lutheran view–this is one of the things that most sharply divides the Lutherans from other Protestants. Unbelievers are still eating and drinking the Body and Blood, but to their condemnation. But neither is it dependent on consecration by a priest in apostolic succession. It is dependent on the word of promise, which is how Lutherans understand the Words of Institution–a promise by Christ to be present (in a bodily fashion) whenever Christians invoke these words over bread and wine in remembrance of Him. Anyone can celebrate the Eucharist, although as a matter of good order only the ordained should do so except in emergency circumstances.

Edwin