The Roman Catholic dogma of transubstantiation means that the substance of Jesus Christ's flesh and blood takes the place of the substance of the bread and wine on the condition of a priest consecrating them. The communion elements are no longer bread and wine upon them having been declared to be the body and blood of Christ. The bread appears to be bread and the wine appears to be wine in every way, despite this miraculous transformation. This change cannot be grasped by our senses. The bread is Jesus Christ's flesh and the wine is His blood. They only share the qualities of what they used to be.
If Jesus Christ is the bread of life who descended from heaven, then that would mean He is present wherever the bread is. If no bread remains after transubstantiation takes place, then that would also mean Christ cannot be present at the worship service. The absence of the bread would imply the physical absence of Christ. This raises a paradox regarding Christ's presence and the nature of the bread after transubstantiation. What implications does this have for His physical presence?
This appears to challenge the logical consistency of transubstantiation because if the bread ceases to exist as bread, then the presence of Christ, who is equated with the bread, would also cease to exist. If the bread turns into Jesus’ body, then there is no longer any bread there. If there is no bread, how can Jesus, the bread of life, be present at the Mass? Can the concept of transubstantiation be reconciled with the belief in the continual presence of Christ as the bread of life?
If the substance of the bread is gone, replaced by the substance of Christ’s body, then the symbolic representation of Christ as the bread of life is also gone, creating a contradiction. If the substance of the bread is no longer present, then the bread of life cannot be present either, as the bread itself has ceased to exist in its original substance. How can bread be both transformed and still be present as bread for Christ to be the bread of life? How can the bread be transformed into the body of Christ and still be considered bread?
If one posits that the Mass is a perpetual miracle in which the finite and infinite somehow come together, then that too has its own problems. Miracles are usually one-time events that astonish everyone who encounters them, not something that happens all the time. Further, how can something that we can touch and see (i.e. bread) turn into something infinite and way beyond our understanding (i.e. Jesus)? It is like saying that a coffee cup is also the ocean. If this miracle is constantly taking place, then does that mean the laws of nature have changed? Also, if Christ's sacrifice is happening all the time, then should we not be able to examine it like we do with other things that fascinate us?
3 comments:
Maybe I misunderstand Catholic doctrine on this point... but it seems you've implied that Jesus' presence is ONLY in the bread and wine. Is that what you mean?
I don't think that's what Catholics would say... that He's ONLY present in the elements. That would indeed mean that He's never present until consecration, and never present after all of the elements are gone.
What am I missing?
Hello Tony,
The Roman Catholic Church teaches that the communion wafer becomes Jesus in a unique and substantial way. It is said to be His body, blood, soul, and divinity.
Catholic doctrine affirms that Christ is present in many ways: divine revelation, in the person of the priest, in the congregation gathered in His name, and in the sacraments.
You have not missed anything at all. I am merely toying with the substance and accidents philosophy upon which transubstantiation is based.
The whole doctrine just seems so goofy and pointless to me. It requires a degree of faith that is unreasonable. It makes things more complicated than they have to be.
Rome also claims that in the Eucharist Christ is sacrificed to God, and that the Last Supper was in itself a Mass. If the Last Supper was indeed a sacrifice of Christ, then we have an illogical situation of Christ sacrificing himself before he was sacrificed on the cross. Additionally, if each Mass is a sacrifice of Christ, then we have a direct contradiction of the Bible which says that Christ was sacrificed once for all time, and that this eliminated the need for continual sacrifices.
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