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Source: (consider it)
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Thread: Purgatory: Reserving the Sacrament - Knock! Knock! Who's There?
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hatless
Shipmate
# 3365
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Posted
Indeed, DoD, and the majority of Baptist services are 'preaching services' without communion - what Calvin called ante-communion.
There are many ways of responding to the presence of God in Christ, but the use of a communion wafer does suggest something of a fixation on the actual bits and pieces of the eucharist.
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My crazy theology in novel form
Posts: 4531 | From: Stinkers | Registered: Sep 2002
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Divine Outlaw
Gin-soaked boy
# 2252
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Posted
We are 'fixated' on said bits and pieces because we believe that they are Jesus, albeit under a unique mode of presence. We think Jesus is a Good Thing to be fixated on, not least because we hope to spend eternity being fixated on him.
You do not believe that they are Jesus. You think he may be present to us through them, even as your wife may be present to you in an email. But that is hardly unique. So you are not fixated on them.
We are both responding appropriately to our beliefs, it seems to me.
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insert amusing sig. here
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Melon
Ship's desserter
# 4038
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Triple Tiara:
Post another picture of your martyrs and I'll post another picture of ours.
Please do post your pictures of anabaptists persecuting catholics.
quote:
Or just stop it and address the issues rather than hurling misguided missiles intended to cause destruction rather than discussion.
Well, when the issue of what the church fathers taught was raised (or rather stated as "they all agree with me" as fact), I posted links to two summaries that suggested a more complicated picture. DoD said he didn't like the links, but no-one has pointed out which of the quotes supporting memorialism from the church fathers were inaccurate. At that point everyone's taste for early church history appeared to dry up.
Then someone else said that the Waldensians were only condemned when they became heretical. This being about the only bit of church history that I have ever studied from primary sources, I asked what changed in their doctrine after an earlier pope failed to condemn them (clue: the answer is "nothing at all"). Another dead end...
I'd never choose to stand on church history as the basis of an argument. The whole question of how to do exegesis on the basis of random bits of history is not something my theological tradition offers much help with.
But I do have to say that I'm finding your "poor little catholic church, downtrodden by nasty mean pacifist sects" routine extremely entertaining in a surreal sort of way.
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French Whine
Posts: 4177 | From: Cavaillon, France | Registered: Feb 2003
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Divine Outlaw
Gin-soaked boy
# 2252
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Melon:
has pointed out which of the quotes supporting memorialism from the church fathers were inaccurate.
That is because you posted no such quotes. You posted quotes claiming that the eucharist is a memorial and that it is a symbol. Aquinas himself would have wholeheartedly agreed.
Memorialism is the doctrine that the eucharist is a memorial of the Christ-event in the same way that Burns Night is a memorial of a poet.
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insert amusing sig. here
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hatless
Shipmate
# 3365
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Divine Outlaw Dwarf:
We are 'fixated' on said bits and pieces because we believe that they are Jesus, albeit under a unique mode of presence. We think Jesus is a Good Thing to be fixated on, not least because we hope to spend eternity being fixated on him.
You do not believe that they are Jesus. You think he may be present to us through them, even as your wife may be present to you in an email. But that is hardly unique. So you are not fixated on them.
We are both responding appropriately to our beliefs, it seems to me.
That seems about right. I think Jesus Christ is specially and characteristically present in communion, and I might even say 'uniquely' if I had a good lawyer by my side to nod that it was OK. But, no, I don't think a communion wafer really is Jesus.
(And, as I said several pages ago, though I accept that this is your sincere belief, I think it's an evangelistically unhelpful one. There is little chance of explaining what the 'unique mode of presence' is (I still don't get it) before incredulity drives the plain woman or man back out of the church.)
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My crazy theology in novel form
Posts: 4531 | From: Stinkers | Registered: Sep 2002
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Divine Outlaw
Gin-soaked boy
# 2252
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Posted
Christians are in the business of saying things which stay just this side of nonsense. But, I would never greet someone with an account of eucharistic theology. I would invite them to worship with me. If they started asking how it might be anything other than nonsense that we meet the Lord there, then I might start with the theology.
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insert amusing sig. here
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hatless
Shipmate
# 3365
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Posted
Actually, second thoughts. If I thought the wafers really were Jesus, I'd want to fill my pockets with them. I'd want huge overconsecration so I could plaster them all over the walls of my house. I'd give them away to bemused passers by, just on the off chance. And how shocking that would be! To treat God in Christ as a commodity.
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My crazy theology in novel form
Posts: 4531 | From: Stinkers | Registered: Sep 2002
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Vesture, Posture, Gesture
Shipmate
# 10614
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Posted
"Then someone else said that the Waldensians were only condemned when they became heretical. This being about the only bit of church history that I have ever studied from primary sources, I asked what changed in their doctrine after an earlier pope failed to condemn them (clue: the answer is "nothing at all"). "
Lets have some secondary source names please. Waldensians did have that many doctrines in the beginning. They supported the vita apostolica ie: lots of poverty etc like St Francis et al and it was only after they started trying to give sermons themselves that they were condemned. Once they were condemned, they began developing heretical theology - any half decent book on Medieval Heresy or Popular Religion argues more or less, from what I remember, as I did.
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An undergraduate proudly told Benjamin Jowett, the great 19th Century Classicist that he was an agnostic. Jowett replied "Young man, in this university we speak Latin not Greek, so when speaking of yourself in that way, use the word ignoramus"
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Divine Outlaw
Gin-soaked boy
# 2252
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by hatless:
Actually, second thoughts. If I thought the wafers really were Jesus, I'd want to fill my pockets with them. I'd want huge overconsecration so I could plaster them all over the walls of my house. I'd give them away to bemused passers by, just on the off chance. And how shocking that would be! To treat God in Christ as a commodity.
Ah, but there's the subtlety. Jesus is there, but he's there for a particular purpose. To be our food.
Commodifying the eucharist is always a danger. Terry Eagleton once wrote a brilliant, albeit slightly barmy, article to the effect that some ways of celebrating Benediction did just this. On the other hand, commodifying Jesus is a more general danger in a capitalist society. Have you accepted Jesus as your Personal Saviour who will sort out your problems and transform your lifestyle? Come to Our Church and find out how!
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insert amusing sig. here
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Barnabas62
Shipmate
# 9110
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Melon:
quote:
Originally posted by Barnabas62:
As an evangelical it seems to me important to recognise that the scripture does not in itself justify either a metaphorical view of Christians as the body of Christ or a metaphorical view of feeding through bread and wine.
I need some help unpacking this. The "discern the body" passage is preceded by concerns about divisions in the church and followed by Paul's pythonesque "UDI for noses" passage on unity and complementarity.
The choice isn't between whether the bread is literally the body or the church is literally the body. I take "You are the body of Christ" as literally (or not) as "This is my body broken for you". The question is surely which analogy Paul is using in the "discern the body" passage, and I can't see any textual reason to assume that he suddenly switches from community concerns to real presence and back to community concerns.
OK, here is an attempt to unpack. I suppose your view would be fine, taking 1 Cor 11 in isolation. But Paul has already provided this equally well-known quotation on the nature of the Lords supper and the nature of the body of Christ (in 1 Cor 10 v 15-17)
quote:
15. I speak to sensible people; judge for yourselves what I say.
16. Is not the cup of thanksgiving for which we give thanks a participation in the blood of Christ? And is not the bread that we break a participation in the body of Christ?
17. Because there is one loaf, we, who are many, are one body, for we all partake of the one loaf.
The body (of Christ) and the meal are intimately linked in this illustration of Pauline thought. We "koinoneo" (share, communicate, distribute, partake) the body and blood of Christ. It is hardly stretching a point to say that that thought is reinforced in I Cor 11 v 29. Not just about the church as the body of Christ but about the bread and the wine. In the above quote, there is exact equivalence between the bread and the body, the cup and the blood.
Melon, it seems to me to be at the very least arguable this way. Paul was pointing out that the behaviour of the Corinthians was "dissing" both the church, the body of Christ, and the bread and the wine. And that both "dissings" were wrong and subject to judgment. I am saying that, from the very beginning, there was reverence towards the bread and the wine and you can see it here.
I'm in the throes of moving house at present and my mind is on lots of other things, but I hope this has at least clarified where I'm coming from. It hasn't had as much thought as I would have liked to give it.
[ 16. February 2007, 17:11: Message edited by: Barnabas62 ]
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Who is it that you seek? How then shall we live? How shall we sing the Lord's song in a strange land?
Posts: 21397 | From: Norfolk UK | Registered: Feb 2005
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Lietuvos Sv. Kazimieras
Shipmate
# 11274
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Posted
I don't believe that anyone here has cited a type of reservation of the MBS that was practised widely in early patristic times, during the persecutions of the Church. Many Christians carried on their persons little silver boxes that contained consecrated bread -- the sacramental Body of Christ -- and at least one authority (Gregory Dix) has asserted that in some times and places the majority of communions that a Christian was able to make would be from this reserved Sacrament, in isolation, alone, secretly. The discovery of these little caskets and their contents in one's possession was prima facie evidence of the illegal practise of Christianity and could easily amount to a death sentence.
Although this practice was a response to a particular exigency, it implies belief in the Real Presence of Christ in the Sacrament (the sacramental element in one kind only still conveyed grace outside of the immediate celebration of the Eucharist in which it was consecrated).
I'm sure that the voices here who are determined to oppose the Real Presence of Christ in the Sacrament of the Altar will find this historical precedent irrelevant or unconvincing. I don't think so. But at last, belief and adoration of Jesus in the Most Holy Sacrament comes down to faith and to obedience to what the Holy Catholic Church has ever taught and believed (IMO).
Posts: 7328 | From: Delaware | Registered: Apr 2006
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Triple Tiara
Ship's Papabile
# 9556
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Posted
quote:
Quoth Melon: , Well when the issue of what the church fathers taught was raised (or rather stated as "they all agree with me" as fact), I posted links to two summaries that suggested a more complicated picture. DoD said he didn't like the links, but no-one has pointed out which of the quotes supporting memorialism from the church fathers were inaccurate. At that point everyone's taste for early church history appeared to dry up.....I'd never choose to stand on church history as the basis of an argument. The whole question of how to do exegesis on the basis of random bits of history is not something my theological tradition offers much help with.
Nope, actually, it was presented as "I agree with all of them". What you are doing is adopting a position and trying to find backing for it. That is exegesis on the basis of random bits of history. Finding the coherent thread and the whole picture certainly would help you in your struggle.
quote:
But I do have to say that I'm finding your "poor little catholic church, downtrodden by nasty mean pacifist sects" routine extremely entertaining in a surreal sort of way.
And I am finding your self-righteous tone surreal. So?
I have said very little, if anything, about your church or tradition. I am not even sure I know what "nasty mean pacifist sect" you belong to. You have gone on endlessly in less than charitable terms about the Roman Catholic Church. You just cannot stop yourself.
May I add that I think the Roman Catholic Church has behaved abominably in many times and in many places, that I don't approve of corrupt popes or burnings at the stake, and before it comes up, of child-abusing priests. So can we move on now?
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I'm a Roman. You may call me Caligula.
Posts: 5905 | From: London, England | Registered: May 2005
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Melon
Ship's desserter
# 4038
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Vesture, Posture, Gesture:
Lets have some secondary source names please.
"The Waldesian Dissent", by Gabriel Audisio, generally recognised as one of the world authorities on the history of the Waldensians (and not, to my knowledge, any kind of anabaptist). On page 10, he quotes the inquisitor Bernard Gui's history of the movement, which identifies poverty, vernacular translations of Scripture, and that "they dared preach the gospel in the streets" as the hallmarks of the movement. That's all from day one (1170), according to the inquisition.
They were condemned as "schismatic", but not as heretics, in 1184. "As late as 1190 and 1207, some bishops agreed to join in debates with them, proving that they did not see them as staunch heretics who should simply be eliminated" (p16).
"Drawing on Durand of Huesca's treatise Liber antiheresis... K-V Selge has clearly shown that Vaudès and his fellows did not only remain orthodox, but also had no intention of doing otherwise" (idem).
Anathema was not pronounced until 1215.
Some Waldensians believed some more or less wonky things about various subjects, including the sacraments, but that doesn't seem to have been the main issue for the church. "The only contention remained the question of preaching" (p14). They petitioned the pope in 1179, received his oral blessing, and were allowed to preach "so long as they first presented themselves to the local priest so he could issue the appropriate licence" (idem). The final straw, thinks Audisio, was the decision of the Waldensians to hear confessions and offer the sacraments when a catholic priest was not available (and amenable to deal with those disposed towards the Waldensians). Lots of catholic politics around the edges which I'll skip to avoid offending the poor, persecuted catholics here.
Of course since the inquisition destroyed almost all the Waldensians' own documents, it's hard for anyone to be certain on the details, but it's a fact that a period of several decades passed between the time they were first noticed by the catholic hierarchy and their excommunication, and it's hard to make a serious case for a radical change in doctrine during that period. Audisio suggests that the real issue was clericalism, not the sacraments.
"Halfway-decent medieval histories" tend to be less than sympathetic to anabaptist groups, and it's much easier to write the history from the side of the groups who had armies and didn't have all their writings burned.
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French Whine
Posts: 4177 | From: Cavaillon, France | Registered: Feb 2003
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Triple Tiara
Ship's Papabile
# 9556
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Posted
quote:
Lots of catholic politics around the edges which I'll skip to avoid offending the poor, persecuted catholics here.
Like I said, you just can't stop yourself.
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I'm a Roman. You may call me Caligula.
Posts: 5905 | From: London, England | Registered: May 2005
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The Scrumpmeister
Ship’s Taverner
# 5638
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Metapelagius:
quote:
There are Orthodox Churches that have Benediction - sometimes in the ciborium and sometimes ina monstarnce, usiang leavened bread that has been specially moulded for the purpose.
St B.
Thank you for this. The source for my assertion was Bp Kallistos, not personal experience. But is the practice one of "western Rite" Orthodoxy, or is it more general?
![[Smile]](smile.gif) It's certainly practised in Western Rite parishes under the Patriarchate of Antioch. As for ROCOR, I can only speak definitively of one of our monasteries. St Petroc Monastery and the missions, parishes, and study groups attached to it follow the more English traditions (along the lines of Sarum), and so don't have Benediction, as it was never part of that tradition. Christminster, on the other hand, is of a more continental tradition and so would be the more likely ROCOR candidate for Benediction, but the reality is that I know very little about their monastic liturgical Use except for their Divine Liturgy. ![[Frown]](frown.gif) There is a group of Western Rite parishes in France, using a version of the Gallican Liturgy. They used to be under the Patriarchate of Romania and are currently in discussion with Serbia to be received by them. I know virtually nothing about their Use and so cannot comment either way. I'm sorry not to be of much use.
I don't think the Benediction features in the Eastern Rite at all but I'm happy to be corrected.
quote:
So you can put a muffin in a monstrance .... ![[Razz]](tongue.gif)
![[Big Grin]](biggrin.gif) Indeed you can.
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If Christ is not fully human, humankind is not fully saved. - St John of Saint-Denis
Posts: 14741 | From: Greater Manchester, UK | Registered: Mar 2004
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FCB
Hillbilly Thomist
# 1495
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Melon:
it's a fact that a period of several decades passed between the time they were first noticed by the catholic hierarchy and their excommunication, and it's hard to make a serious case for a radical change in doctrine during that period.
Why is it hard to make this case? By your own account they had a radical change at least in practice -- i.e. lay people ministering the sacraments. Often shifts in practice reflect shifts in doctrine.
Also, perhaps I simply have lost the thread here, but what is the case of the Waldensians supposed to be evidence of?
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Agent of the Inquisition since 1982.
Posts: 2928 | From: that city in "The Wire" | Registered: Oct 2001
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Melon
Ship's desserter
# 4038
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Triple Tiara:
Nope, actually, it was presented as "I agree with all of them". What you are doing is adopting a position and trying to find backing for it.
No, you are talking rubbish. My summary was "Clear as mud". Callan and DoD announced that the early church believed in RP. They reminded me several times to make sure I addressed their point. The decision to throw the church fathers around was theirs, not mine. My only innovation was looking at what the church fathers actually said and asking how it supported their claim. I'd still be interested in an answer.
Your problems with language appear to have started with the OP, since you first complain about it in the third post of the thread. I couldn't put my hand on the recent post on another thread where you referred to "shitty little protestants" or similar, maybe you could jog my memory?
quote:
Originally posted by Matt Black:
It's Melon who has the fixation on single-word expressions, not me
I wouldn't say I have a fixation, I used the word 'magic' in one post, which caused MT to have a coronary. In that one post, using a one-word description was pretty crucial to the argument. Using theological language would have got in the way of describing two incompatible theological world views, and expanding the definition each time would have resulted in something like
quote:
If you are into real presence, then what matters about sacraments is that, basically, they are a way in which the grace of God can be experienced in a supernatural but in no way superstitious way oh no although it doesn't make a lot of rational sense but then why should faith be judged by modernist criteria I ask you, and if someone denies that they are are a way in which the grace of God can be experienced in a supernatural but in no way superstitious way oh no although it doesn't make a lot of rational sense but then why should faith be judged by modernist criteria I ask you you lose the very essence of the sacraments.
which somehow doesn't seem quite as pithy.
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French Whine
Posts: 4177 | From: Cavaillon, France | Registered: Feb 2003
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HenryT
Canadian Anglican
# 3722
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by hatless:
Actually, second thoughts. If I thought the wafers really were Jesus, I'd want to fill my pockets with them. I'd want huge overconsecration so I could plaster them all over the walls of my house. I'd give them away to bemused passers by, just on the off chance. And how shocking that would be! To treat God in Christ as a commodity.
Jesus did several things to demonstrate God's abundance. The amount of wine at Cana, feeding five thousand ... Why do we not practice from abundance today? Why do we make rules and keep things close for the few we know?
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"Perhaps an invincible attachment to the dearest rights of man may, in these refined, enlightened days, be deemed old-fashioned" P. Henry, 1788
Posts: 7231 | From: Ottawa, Ontario, Canada | Registered: Dec 2002
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Melon
Ship's desserter
# 4038
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by FCB:
Why is it hard to make this case? By your own account they had a radical change at least in practice -- i.e. lay people ministering the sacraments. Often shifts in practice reflect shifts in doctrine.
Audisio says that these practises had "only been intended as an answer to a critical situation and to pressing needs". But the most convincing argument is that the inquisition condemns them for stuff that they were doing on day one, and inquisition records were nothing if not thorough. If the inquisition doesn't think their doctrine changed, it probably didn't change.
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French Whine
Posts: 4177 | From: Cavaillon, France | Registered: Feb 2003
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Triple Tiara
Ship's Papabile
# 9556
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Posted
quote:
I couldn't put my hand on the recent post on another thread where you referred to "shitty little protestants" or similar, maybe you could jog my memory?
You can't put your hands on it because I have never said any such thing, ever, anywhere.
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I'm a Roman. You may call me Caligula.
Posts: 5905 | From: London, England | Registered: May 2005
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hatless
Shipmate
# 3365
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Lietuvos Sv. Kazimieras:
I'm sure that the voices here who are determined to oppose the Real Presence of Christ in the Sacrament of the Altar will find this historical precedent irrelevant or unconvincing. I don't think so. But at last, belief and adoration of Jesus in the Most Holy Sacrament comes down to faith and to obedience to what the Holy Catholic Church has ever taught and believed (IMO).
Determined to oppose? A curious turn of phrase. And when DoD was saying that we just have different beliefs, I found myself wondering if that is actually so.
I wonder if belief in the Real Presence isn't actually an assertion, a claim. To disbelieve is not just to understand these things differently, but to oppose the Holy Catholic Church. It is to refuse obedience. It's not just a question of what we happen to believe, but of our disposition towards or against the RCC.
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My crazy theology in novel form
Posts: 4531 | From: Stinkers | Registered: Sep 2002
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hatless
Shipmate
# 3365
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Henry Troup:
quote:
Originally posted by hatless:
Actually, second thoughts. If I thought the wafers really were Jesus, I'd want to fill my pockets with them. I'd want huge overconsecration so I could plaster them all over the walls of my house. I'd give them away to bemused passers by, just on the off chance. And how shocking that would be! To treat God in Christ as a commodity.
Jesus did several things to demonstrate God's abundance. The amount of wine at Cana, feeding five thousand ... Why do we not practice from abundance today? Why do we make rules and keep things close for the few we know?
Good question. Lack of faith, I'd say. Fear that grace and love will run out.
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My crazy theology in novel form
Posts: 4531 | From: Stinkers | Registered: Sep 2002
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Melon
Ship's desserter
# 4038
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Triple Tiara:
quote:
I couldn't put my hand on the recent post on another thread where you referred to "shitty little protestants" or similar, maybe you could jog my memory?
You can't put your hands on it because I have never said any such thing, ever, anywhere.
Mea culpa, it has been pointed out to me that it was PaulTH. Sorry.
In the process of looking for it, I did read all your posts on the sister churches thread, from which
quote:
We need to be aware of how we use words, and of how we understand words. It may be uncomfortable or unpleasant for the Tudor Church and others that they are not recognised by the Italian Mission as "sister" churches, but there is a very specific reason for that.
Wise counsel indeed. And it may be uncomfortable or unpleasant for the Italian Mission that the descendants of schismatic sects consider their doctrine of the Eucharist to look a lot like magic, and that they find hiding crisps in little cupboards to be downright odd, but there is a very specific reason for that too.
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French Whine
Posts: 4177 | From: Cavaillon, France | Registered: Feb 2003
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FCB
Hillbilly Thomist
# 1495
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Melon:
But the most convincing argument is that the inquisition condemns them for stuff that they were doing on day one, and inquisition records were nothing if not thorough. If the inquisition doesn't think their doctrine changed, it probably didn't change.
OK, I'm really trying to get this: so are you saying that the Inquisition documents say that the Waldensians didn't hold the Catholic view of the sacraments from day one?
If so:
1) I'm not quite so willing to believe Inquisitorial documents as you are. There is plenty of reverse-engineering of heresy.
2) I'm still not sure I see the relevance of the Waldensian example. What exactly does this prove?
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Agent of the Inquisition since 1982.
Posts: 2928 | From: that city in "The Wire" | Registered: Oct 2001
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ken
Ship's Roundhead
# 2460
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Melon:
"As late as 1190 and 1207, some bishops agreed to join in debates with them, proving that they did not see them as staunch heretics who should simply be eliminated" (p16).
[...]
Anathema was not pronounced until 1215.
They should go back to teaching history as a matter of battles and dates and things. Less of this touchy-feely stuff.
What happened in 1209, people?
That's right, the Albigensian Crusade. Simon de Montfort. Raymond of Toulose. Siege of Beziers.
There was a war on. All of a sudden what is now Southern France and the adlacent parts of Spain and Italy were full of refugees, people running away from the war. Some of them really were heretics. Some of them really were heavily armed heretics who had been fighting against the Catholics. Some of them really were anonymous heavily armed heretics who had been fighting against the Catholics and were now in hiding. Some of them really were anonymous heavily armed heretics who had been fighting against the Catholics and were now in hiding and who remembered seeign their friends and family and neighbours butchered by Catholic armies.
So all of a sudden there is no place for peaceful but slighly dodgy schismatics. Because who knows what wolves might be hiding among the sheep in their mountain pastures?
In the 1210s the war turned against the Catholics briefly and things got really nasty. That was when the Waldensians were unjustly anathematised.
And then the drastic and bloody victory of the Catholics and France in the 1220s, followed by the gradual reduction of the Catalan country up to 1255, then the long slow rooting out of the last remnants of Catharism right up to the 1330s. (As described micro-historically in Montaillou and fictionally in The Name of the Rose both books set just after the end of the process)
So the Waldensians, and later the Spiritual Franciscans, and half a dozen less well-known but mostly harmless and generally innocent groups of Christians who seemed to have little in common other than lay leadership, opposition to the ruling class, and a tendency to talk a lot, all got picked on big-time. Not their fault.
But also no real reason to find them the theological or spiritual ancestors of the anabaptists of three hundred years later - that story probably starts in England with Wyclif and goes through the Hussites and the Taborites. Except that the sorts of things the early Anabaptists did, and even more the sorts of things they were unjustly accused of, are in a sense the sorts of things that emerge naturally whenever there is a sudden collapse of government and religion, because people are like that.
And nothing at all to do with the idea of the Real Presence, because some of these people believed it and some didn't. I don't think there is a strong connection. Did you read those verses I posted in Ecclesiantics and linked to?
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Ken
L’amor che move il sole e l’altre stelle.
Posts: 39579 | From: London | Registered: Mar 2002
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Jason™
Host emeritus
# 9037
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Posted
Overall, I don't think that I believe in Real Presence. As I continue to read on through this thread, however, I'm disgusted and frankly somewhat ashamed to be included in that group.
To me, and only to me, Real Presence is just unnecessary. None of my other beliefs depend on that belief, and I can see no specific gain or benefit to me or anyone else by my believing it. It doesn't mean I won't ever believe, and it certainly says nothing about anyone else's belief--it's just not something I've experienced as true.
In fact, I think Real Presence is a lot like tongues in this way. There is biblical support for both sides of the argument as well as reasons, complete with detailed anecdotal evidence and historical figures for and against, to believe either way. Some of the descriptions of the Real Presence on this very thread have been extremely enlightening to me, from people like DOD and FCB and Ingo and others. It makes a lot of sense to see why and how they have experienced the Eucharist. And I hope (and would expect) that they would see some value in my own experiences of Communion, though they may differ from theirs.
What I don't understand is an OP situated in dismissive terminologies that oversimplify and don't show the slightest desire to understand or learn. I don't understand tossing aside hundreds of years of experience and discussion because a few anabaptists didn't believe the same way. I don't understand throwing loaded terms like "magic" around and expecting them to further the discussion rather than derail or distract it. And I don't understand why we, as Christians, would so often rather dismiss and deride other traditions and experiences rather than engage in a respectful discussion of the differences.
(Lest I'm accused of any self-righteousness, I admit that I am quick to dismiss and deride in many cases, even if Real Presence isn't my hot button.)
Posts: 4123 | From: Land of Mary | Registered: Feb 2005
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Divine Outlaw
Gin-soaked boy
# 2252
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Professor Kirke:
And I hope (and would expect) that they would see some value in my own experiences of Communion, though they may differ from theirs.
Of course.
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insert amusing sig. here
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Lietuvos Sv. Kazimieras
Shipmate
# 11274
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Melon:
In the process of looking for it, I did read all your posts on the sister churches thread, from
And it may be uncomfortable or unpleasant for the Italian Mission that the descendants of schismatic sects consider their doctrine of the Eucharist to look a lot like magic, and that they find hiding crisps in little cupboards to be downright odd, but there is a very specific reason for that too. [/QB]
This really is some of the most inflamatory, disrespectful and arguably blasphemous language I've seen lately on the Ship (given that I almost never read or participate in Hell threads). Even more so, given the overall tone and previous posts of the radical iconoclastic protestant argumentarians who gleefully carry out this attack on the historic Catholic Christian religion. ISTM that those who have explained and upheld the historic doctrine of the Church Catholic have done so in a reasonable, uplifting, charitable spirit. By contrast, two or three anti-Catholics respond in willfully offensive terms.
Posts: 7328 | From: Delaware | Registered: Apr 2006
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Knopwood
Shipmate
# 11596
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Posted
I'm sure I've said this before, but my primary problem with memorialism is this:
1) Christ promised that those who ate his flesh and drank his blood would be united with him.
2) Presumably he meant this either in some manner on the literal spectrum (from Aquinas to Calvin) or figuratively.
3) The figurative meaning of the phrases "to eat someone's flesh" and "drink their blood" in Aramaic in first-century Israel was to revile and insult someone.
4) Our Lord was presumably not promising to abide with those who reviled and insulted him.
On second thought, that's an intriguing possiblity.
Posts: 6806 | From: Tio'tia:ke | Registered: Jun 2006
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Triple Tiara
Ship's Papabile
# 9556
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Posted
Professor Kirke, I don't often do this but ![[Overused]](graemlins/notworthy.gif) Thank you for your post.
"hiding crisps in little cupboards" is not what we are discussing. But I promised a reply to Daisymay so here goes.
quote:
What is the reason, Triple Tiara, for the focus on the "Presence" in such a specific place, way of words etc?
It's much the same as the reason for a focus on the words of Scripture. How does God communicate with us? What did Jesus himself instruct? What are the implications of Jesus giving us this instruction?
If you begin with the idea that Jesus meant this like a parable, alongside some of his other references to himself as door, light etc, that the eucharist is a symbolic act of remembering him, or the Zwinglian idea that receiving communion is to show others that you are a Christian, for example, then you have no need to proceed further about what the bread and wine are. So no need for reservation, honour, benediction and so on. Indeed, it would be contradictory.
But if you start at the other end, and see the eucharist about taking Jesus literally, then you have to start working out all sorts of implications. If a change is wrought in the elements, could one possibly dispose of them without much concern? To say yes would be contradictory to this viewpoint.
So what do you do then? Okay, one answer is eat it all up there and then, and it's a logical answer. But then what of the sick and housebound and those unable to come to Mass? So keep some for them. Okay where? And how do you treat the bit you have kept? Just ignore it until you have to use it? So we keep it in church, where the Church gathers, where the Body of Christ is with the Body of Christ.
And if you do take the words literally, and you do start to think of the implications, you start to try and work out just how literal this is, and what Jesus was wanting us to do. So is it just his body without any of his divine essence? Body-food therefore for our bodies? And what sort of doctrine of body and soul do you then end up with? That surely cannot be right. Surely he means to be feeding more than our bodies with this food?
So if he is feeding us spiritually through our bodily eating of his body, then there must be something of his divinity, himself, in the sacrament. So you start to see other implications of how you should treat the elements.
And when you feed on him and know his giving of himself to you in such an intimate way, then you have to ask what his presence in the sacrament means. And praying before that sacrament becomes as natural as eating it. It's about communicating with Jesus, being united with him, being at one with him. It's never about trying to lock him up and keep him hemmed in!
(By the by, belief in this transformation of the bread and wine is not very hard for those who do believe in taking Jesus literally. As St. Ambrose said: "If the word of the Lord Jesus is so powerful as to bring into existence things which were not, then a fortiori those things which already exist can be changed into something else" (De Sacramentis, IV, 5-16). )
None of which is to say that he is only found there. But it is the only way he is present in matter, in "accidents". So how we treat that matter matters. Because those accidents are not the only part of the story, for their "substance" is something much more important.
quote:
Is it to do with the responsibility of the clergy for providing Something, somewhere specific, for the rest of the Church Community? Is there believed to be something that only they can do?
Yes, it is believed that there is something specific only the ordained can "do". That's a very long and intricate discussion, which might get us bogged down. It has to do with the Church understanding herself as being ministered to by Christ the priest, whose priestly sacrifice of himself on Calvary is still ministered to his people in a priestly way.
But that was not the first part of your question. I had to read and re-read to try and figure out what you were asking. But then I got it by reading what you next wrote:
quote:
It is not believing the same sort of idea that some of us have; we are all equal, all in God's service, all in God's presence?
One cannot make such a separation of priests and people - they go together. Priests without people are redundant, in the same way that people without priests are not a priestly people. Recent teaching documents on the Liturgy, such as Sacrosanctum Concilium of the Second Vatican Council, or The General Instruction on the Roman Missal are at pains to point out the dynamic interaction between priests and people, constituting the whole Body of Christ, in making this act of worship. Yes, we are equal, all in God's service, all in God's presence. But obviously we are not all the same. As you well know, there are many diverse ministries and ways of serving a la 1 Cor 12: 27-29
BUT, this sacrament is not important because the priests have to do it - that would be a strange idea to try and justify.
quote:
Is there a belief that God is more present in the bread and wine once it's been prayed over and blessed, than the Presence that we can meet at all times and in all places? That sounds a bit disappointing to me, if so.
It's not about God being more present here than there. Rather, this sacrament is about celebrating the fruits of the Lord's Passion, death and resurrection in the way he himself gives us. That must make it hugely important for starters. Secondly, because the consecrated bread and wine are the only forms of his presence discernible to the senses, that gives them a different standing in the normal order of things. So yes, they are special, yes they are highly significant, yes the Lord is present to us in a unique way. But still, that does not mean it is the ONLY way he is present to us.
quote:
On completely another bit of discussion earlier on, I'm more into thinking that we each make our own decisions at every moment in our present lives, than just accept what other people, academics or deeply spiritual people, may have written or passed on years ago; they may make spiritual, emotional, thoughtful contac with us, but it happens now, now, now, to each one of us.
I can only refer you to another post on another thread about this, rather than overdo things here! It's on the sentire cum ecclesia thread
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I'm a Roman. You may call me Caligula.
Posts: 5905 | From: London, England | Registered: May 2005
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Melon
Ship's desserter
# 4038
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Professor Kirke:
What I don't understand is an OP situated in dismissive terminologies that oversimplify and don't show the slightest desire to understand or learn.
The OP is by a member of the Salvation Army. Can someone point me to the places where the Roman Catholic church shows a desire to learn from them?
quote:
Originally posted by Ken:
But also no real reason to find them the theological or spiritual ancestors of the anabaptists of three hundred years later - that story probably starts in England with Wyclif and goes through the Hussites and the Taborites.
Whoever said that they were the ancestors of the anabaptists? It has been claimed that they had a lot in common with such groups, and they did, particularly in their "back to the Bible" hermeneutics (and their vernacular Bible must have been one of the first in Europe). In the end, they threw their lot in with the Swiss reformers, were massacred a second times for their pains, and their descendants can still be found as part of the Methodist church in Tuscany.
quote:
Originally posted by FCB:
quote:
Originally posted by Melon:
But the most convincing argument is that the inquisition condemns them for stuff that they were doing on day one, and inquisition records were nothing if not thorough. If the inquisition doesn't think their doctrine changed, it probably didn't change.
1) I'm not quite so willing to believe Inquisitorial documents as you are. There is plenty of reverse-engineering of heresy.
2) I'm still not sure I see the relevance of the Waldensian example. What exactly does this prove?
If we don't believe the inquisition documents, there is virtually nothing else to go on. By memory we have about 3 pages of documentation by the Waldensians themselves. My comments on this were in response to
quote:
Originally posted by Vesture, Posture, Gesture:
The Catholic Church tolerated the followers of Valdo until their doctrines strayed from those of the Church.
when, in fact, the Catholic Church tolerated the followers of Valdo for as long as it was politically expedient. They believed more or less the same sort of thing when they were preaching against the Albigensians with the pope's blessing as when they were excommunicated.
quote:
Originally posted by Lietuvos Sv. Kazimieras:
ISTM that those who have explained and upheld the historic doctrine of the Church Catholic have done so in a reasonable, uplifting, charitable spirit.
I think you mean the Church Roman Catholic, unless the explanation was on behalf of all of us.
However reasonable, uplifting and charitable TT's explanation of why protestants lost out by leaving Rome (when in fact Luther was thrown out against his will), and, elsewhere, why TT's church is bigger than anyone else's church, it still tends to stick in the throat. Dialogue appears to mean that TT and others educate us theologically illiterate bastard offspring of The Reformation (sic). If you have gained the impression that I'm not up for that sort of dialogue, we are on the way to understanding each other.
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French Whine
Posts: 4177 | From: Cavaillon, France | Registered: Feb 2003
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Jahlove
Tied to the mast
# 10290
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Posted
I don’t think anyone is saying that Grace, the Love of God, the experience of Christ, the provision of the nourishing strength to live one’s faith in one’s daily life cannot happen via the practices of churches whose doctrine does not insist on belief in Transubstantiation. I’m also aware that some of the Churches of the Reformation have members who believe this as well as those who don’t and both are accommodated.
Back along, when Noah was a teenager (page 1), Vesture, Posture, Gesture posted
quote:
in all of the Catholic Churches and services I have been to, be they an utterly empty Cistercian Monastery with the only movement being a flickering sanctuary lamp, a jam packed thousand people strong Old Rite Benediction (ie: the full liturgical kaboodle), a 20 minute rushed novus ordo mass in English in the church that offers the only English Mass in St Petersburg or a straight forward student mass with a 'worship band', I have always felt (and the sacrament is reserved in all these places) the presence of God in a unique way, a way I think which is unique to His presence in the Sacrament.
And for me, also, it became important to be part of a worshipping community that DOES, de fide, subscribe to the Transubstantiated Real Presence of the SotA.
Personally, I would never say to anyone that *your* experience of the presence of the Lord in your life via communion isn’t real or true because you don’t believe it is truly the Body & Blood of Christ - if others can find the fulness of faith here, fine - I didn’t. I do find it interesting that some of those who do not subscribe to Transubstantiation are so vehement in the need to insist that it is untrue and superstitious rubbish.
As Ken says, the history of the Albigensian-Waldensian-Perfect-Rome conflict is by no means black-and-white and I am not sure that the invocation of centuries-old blood-letting in the course of power-struggles and doctrinal disputes is terribly relevant to whether, TODAY, a belief in Transubstantiation is a valid position. Surely most decent people are properly appalled at these, as they are of more modern atrocities perpetuated in the name of secular and religious ideologies.
To return to the reason for the start of this discussion: The Blessed Sacrament Webcam - the majority of the posters on the Eccles thread, whether or not they belong to a tradition that insists on Transubstantiation, seem basically sympathetic to what the Florida Monks are trying to achieve. I believe it but am not averse to a bit of gentle ribbing (as against vicious satire and parody) - maybe because it is still a bit *strange* to have it available via this new, virtual technology developed over the last - what - 20 years.
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“Sing like no one's listening, love like you've never been hurt, dance like nobody's watching, and live like its heaven on earth.” - Mark Twain
Posts: 6477 | From: Alice's Restaurant (UK Franchise) | Registered: Sep 2005
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Triple Tiara
Ship's Papabile
# 9556
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Posted
Melon, take it to Hell or drop it. This wheezing diatribe and determination to show to the world how evil we blackhearted papists are, and me in particular, really doesn't belong here.
[ 16. February 2007, 21:22: Message edited by: Triple Tiara ]
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I'm a Roman. You may call me Caligula.
Posts: 5905 | From: London, England | Registered: May 2005
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Jason™
Host emeritus
# 9037
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Melon:
quote:
Originally posted by Professor Kirke:
What I don't understand is an OP situated in dismissive terminologies that oversimplify and don't show the slightest desire to understand or learn.
The OP is by a member of the Salvation Army. Can someone point me to the places where the Roman Catholic church shows a desire to learn from them?
Completely irrelevant and a total avoidance of the question and problem. Much of the "argument" on this thread has had the flavor of a playground fight, and there's no exception here.
Posting here on a public forum is about individuals interacting with other individuals, not whole institutions. If a Roman Catholic had started this thread with a dismissive post showing little respect for low-church theology, I'd have written with similar disgust.
Posts: 4123 | From: Land of Mary | Registered: Feb 2005
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Metapelagius
Shipmate
# 9453
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Posted
[Keeping head down from heavy artillery above]
Many thanks for your illuminating reply, St B. Bp Kallistos does say that the Eastern Rite does not have a form of Benediction; as for the Antiochenes I shall have to ask a friend in that grouping, though those I know are not, I am pretty sure, western rite. I have to admit that I have not heard of Christminster - except in the novels of Hardy, that is; but how would the counter-reformation rite of Benediction fit with the use of a Gallican liturgy?
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Rec a archaw e nim naccer.
y rof a duv. dagnouet.
Am bo forth. y porth riet.
Crist ny buv e trist yth orsset.
Posts: 1032 | From: Hereabouts | Registered: May 2005
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Bullfrog.
Prophetic Amphibian
# 11014
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Posted
All this talk of ceremony is making me think of Confucius, who lived during a time of considerably civil war in ancient China.
He really didn't care for gods, but he felt that if you just would do the ceremony correctly, and with an honest heart, and respected the authorities, then good things would come about as naturally as the moon follows the sun across the sky.
Does ceremony, as action, have intrinsic value regardless of the symbols associated?
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Some say that man is the root of all evil
Others say God's a drunkard for pain
Me, I believe that the Garden of Eden
Was burned to make way for a train. --Josh Ritter, Harrisburg
Posts: 7522 | From: Chicago | Registered: Feb 2006
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IngoB
Sentire cum Ecclesia
# 8700
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by daisymay:
That's one of the things that concerns me - Jesus present as a human being just puts cannibalism in my mind.
In regular eating, I take the bread, eat it and thereby turn the bread into my body: through digestion it will be bring energy to my cells and fat on my hips. But in sacramental eating, I take the bread, eat it and thereby turn me into the consecrated bread, which is the body of Christ: through digestion I will bring spiritual energy to the cell of the body of Christ that is me, and in due time will become fat on the hips of the bride of Christ in heaven.
In regular eating, I eat the bread, in sacramental eating, I'm eaten by eating the consecrated bread. The higher absorbs the lower in eating: I'm higher than regular bread, so I consume it. But Christ is higher than me so in eating Him I'm consumed. Sacramental eating is thus offering yourself to Christ: as He enters my body and is digested, I enter Him in the spirit and am renewed. It shows the unity of "body and soul", but now on a communal level: something greater than me is being built up here as I together with others nourish myself on Christ, as we extract the grace from His bloodstream that we need to survive as cells of His body. Sacramental eating here on earth is an image and likeness of that mystical union in heaven, when Christ will be all in all, in spirit and body.
So eating Christ is no more cannibalism than your cells drawing nourishment from your bloodstream is cannibalism on their part. He is our Sustenance, the Bread of Life, so we eat Him to become part of Him, to partake in His eternal life.
(None of the above is original, btw, it's ancient Catholic thought. For example, St Augustine is strong on this IIRC.)
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They’ll have me whipp’d for speaking true; thou’lt have me whipp’d for lying; and sometimes I am whipp’d for holding my peace. - The Fool in King Lear
Posts: 12010 | From: Gone fishing | Registered: Oct 2004
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Triple Tiara
Ship's Papabile
# 9556
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Posted
Meta-p, you are NOT keeping your head down from the heavy artillery when you deliberately interject a discussion with the Orthies into papist-prot gunfight.
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I'm a Roman. You may call me Caligula.
Posts: 5905 | From: London, England | Registered: May 2005
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Matt Black
Shipmate
# 2210
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Posted
TT, alhtough your reply a few posts back was to Daisymay rather than to me, I'm nevertheless grateful for it. I suppose I'm coming more from the position described by you thus:-
quote:
If you begin with the idea that Jesus meant this like a parable, alongside some of his other references to himself as door, light etc, that the eucharist is a symbolic act of remembering him, or the Zwinglian idea that receiving communion is to show others that you are a Christian, for example, then you have no need to proceed further about what the bread and wine are. So no need for reservation, honour, benediction and so on. Indeed, it would be contradictory.
Having said that, I do accept some kind of Divine Presence at communion, similar to but different from that which exists "where two or three are gathered together", or in the evangelical practice of 'daily quiet time', and I suppose at heart I'm more of a Cranmerian receptionist than a strict memorialist (even most of the latter I've encountered, when pressed, will admit to "something special happening at communion" or some such words and will observe it with a fair amount of solemnity); after all, if it's just about remembering Christ's death, then we don't need bread and wine for that, do we?
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"Protestant and Reformed, according to the Tradition of the ancient Catholic Church" - + John Cosin (1594-1672)
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Metapelagius
Shipmate
# 9453
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Posted
Minime uero, reuerende Pater tiarae triplicis ...
As I understand it, the Church of the East and the unreformed Church of the West (trying to find terms as neutral as possible) have from a very early date had the custom of reserving consecrated bread for the purpose of giving communion those of the faithful sick, housebound or otherwise unable to be present at the liturgy. The Easterners still do just that; the Westerners have developed habits of devotion focused on the reserved bread, culminating in Corpus Christi processions, Benediction and the like. The difference in practice is interesting, and some consideration of it would shed some light on the OP.
Not so much fun as a good old papish-prod knockabout, I must admit, but perhaps in the long run a tad less futile ![[Roll Eyes]](rolleyes.gif)
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Rec a archaw e nim naccer.
y rof a duv. dagnouet.
Am bo forth. y porth riet.
Crist ny buv e trist yth orsset.
Posts: 1032 | From: Hereabouts | Registered: May 2005
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Leetle Masha
Cantankerous Anchoress
# 8209
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Posted
Originally posted by Metapelagius:
quote:
The Easterners still do just that
However, we make deep prostrations when approaching the chalice, and in Great Lent, at the Presanctified Liturgy when the sacred elements (consecrated on the previous Sunday) for that celebration are brought in procession into the church to be received by the faithful in Holy Communion, we kneel and put our foreheads on the floor.
In that gesture of reverence, we are very close indeed with everyone else who beholds the Mystery.
M
[ 16. February 2007, 23:33: Message edited by: Leetle Masha ]
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eleison me, tin amartolin: have mercy on me, the sinner
Posts: 6351 | From: Hesychia, in Hyperdulia | Registered: Aug 2004
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Mother Julian
Ship's librarian
# 11978
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Posted
I believe in the Real Presence, based on a straight reading of Jesus's words in the Gospels. I also find it helpful to worship and adore our Saviour in the Reserved Sacrament.
But I find it unhelpful to attempt to tie the RP down to any particular explanation. For me, the mystery of the Real Presence is not just a useful metaphor for the mystery of God, but an essential part of my understanding of how the Holy Trinity is greater than and above all human understanding (which isn't to say that we can understand nothing of God or that we shouldn't attempt to understand).
I'm a little nervous of posting in Purgatory, especially on such a subject, but I think I'm trying to say that I approach my Saviour in childlike (but not childish) love, awe and adoration, just wishing to thank Him for his sacrifice, even though I cannot intellectually apprehend it fully in this life.
As another poster wrote,it all flows from how we read Jesus's words in the Gospel accounts. To me, my belief is in accordance with what most Christians at most times have believed, and logical and consistent, but then, we all tend to think that, don't we ...
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The corn was orient and immortal wheat which never should be reaped, nor was ever sown.
Posts: 359 | From: the banks of the mighty River Mersey | Registered: Oct 2006
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Davy Wavy Morrison
Shipmate
# 12241
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Posted
I don't think many "memorialists" would say that the Lord's Supper is "just about remembering Christ's death". Take away "just" and the idea becomes better. The wedding ceremony when my wife and I were married was not "just" a coming together of two people. A wedding anniversary celebration or a war memorial service is not "just" a remembrance. These things are all REMEMBRANCES, sometimes of a very deep and moving kind, just like the Lord's Supper can be (or Lord's Dinner if we want to use current English). There is no need to have some kind of "real presence" view to make a remembrance very worthwhile.
It possible to remember Christ's death other than at the communion, and that may sometimes be (during a sermon, singing a song, in private or corporate times of prayer etc) just as moving and with a sense of Christ's presence (at times) more real than in a communion service.
When I disagree with Roman Catholics it is because I believe they have misread the very Bible which their Church regards as the inspired Word of God. Protestants have exactly the same New Testament (and I frequently use a grammatical analysis of the Greek New Testament produced by the Pontifical Biblical Institute in Rome). I have learnt much from Roman Catholics.
I believe in robust argument of vital theological issues, in love, and because of love.
On a tangent, some posters have pointed out that Martin Luther was forced out of the church against his will. Maybe, but his burning of the excommunication bull didn't help him get back in.
Posts: 406 | Registered: Jan 2007
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Caty S.
I read, therefore I am.
# 11996
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by IngoB:
quote:
Originally posted by daisymay:
That's one of the things that concerns me - Jesus present as a human being just puts cannibalism in my mind.
In regular eating, I take the bread, eat it and thereby turn the bread into my body: through digestion it will be bring energy to my cells and fat on my hips. But in sacramental eating, I take the bread, eat it and thereby turn me into the consecrated bread, which is the body of Christ: through digestion I will bring spiritual energy to the cell of the body of Christ that is me, and in due time will become fat on the hips of the bride of Christ in heaven.
In regular eating, I eat the bread, in sacramental eating, I'm eaten by eating the consecrated bread. The higher absorbs the lower in eating: I'm higher than regular bread, so I consume it. But Christ is higher than me so in eating Him I'm consumed. Sacramental eating is thus offering yourself to Christ: as He enters my body and is digested, I enter Him in the spirit and am renewed. It shows the unity of "body and soul", but now on a communal level: something greater than me is being built up here as I together with others nourish myself on Christ, as we extract the grace from His bloodstream that we need to survive as cells of His body. Sacramental eating here on earth is an image and likeness of that mystical union in heaven, when Christ will be all in all, in spirit and body.
So eating Christ is no more cannibalism than your cells drawing nourishment from your bloodstream is cannibalism on their part. He is our Sustenance, the Bread of Life, so we eat Him to become part of Him, to partake in His eternal life.
(None of the above is original, btw, it's ancient Catholic thought. For example, St Augustine is strong on this IIRC.)
This I find really interesting - the 'cannibalism' aspect is something that has crossed my mind in the past, and this answers a number of my questions.
The thought crossed my mind that there is some kind of parallel here with the sick woman who touches Jesus' cloak in Luke 8 - direct physical contact with Him changed and healed her. Indeed, when we hear of Jesus encountering anyone who is ceremonially unclean, contact with Him makes that person clean where contact with a normal person would spread the uncleanliness to the formerly clean.
Or have I got the wrong end of the stick competely? I can't think clearly at 1.20am.
Does anyone know where in St Augustine's writings I could find more on this?
Posts: 2119 | From: Devon | Registered: Nov 2006
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Leetle Masha
Cantankerous Anchoress
# 8209
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Posted
Athanasius+ posted:
quote:
I think I'm trying to say that I approach my Saviour in childlike (but not childish) love, awe and adoration, just wishing to thank Him for his sacrifice, even though I cannot intellectually apprehend it fully in this life.
You are in good company there, Athanasius+, with Ste. Thérèse of Lisieux and with St. Jean Vianney, a patron saint of priests, who said
quote:
"If we really knew what happens in the Mass, we would die...."
Mary
[French orthographie]
[ 17. February 2007, 00:25: Message edited by: Leetle Masha ]
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eleison me, tin amartolin: have mercy on me, the sinner
Posts: 6351 | From: Hesychia, in Hyperdulia | Registered: Aug 2004
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Caty S.
I read, therefore I am.
# 11996
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Davy Wavy Morrison:
I don't think many "memorialists" would say that the Lord's Supper is "just about remembering Christ's death". Take away "just" and the idea becomes better. The wedding ceremony when my wife and I were married was not "just" a coming together of two people. A wedding anniversary celebration or a war memorial service is not "just" a remembrance. These things are all REMEMBRANCES, sometimes of a very deep and moving kind, just like the Lord's Supper can be (or Lord's Dinner if we want to use current English). There is no need to have some kind of "real presence" view to make a remembrance very worthwhile.
Agree that a commemoration/memorial (which seems to be the sense conveyed by 'do this in remembrance') is more than just 'remembering'. In my experience, there is a strong identification between those receiving communion and the body and blood of Christ "given/shed for you". That is, the bread and wine are symbolic, but there is specific recognition that the body and blood given on the cross are real.
There is a reverent attitude towards the bread and wine, and contemplation of their symbolic significance, even though the actual bread and wine are still considered to be just bread and wine.
There is also an awareness that the sacrament is performed in the presence of the omnipresent Trinitarian God - even where that presence is not believed to differ either quantitatively or qualitatively from an act of corporate worship where communion is not celebrated. God has not left the building.
(And if my brain was foggy an hour ago, it is even worse now. I hope that all makes sense.)
Posts: 2119 | From: Devon | Registered: Nov 2006
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Davy Wavy Morrison
Shipmate
# 12241
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Posted
Yes. It makes sense. I think it's roughly what I think. And it's about 2:00 p.m. here which means that even I can more or less think clearly.
Posts: 406 | Registered: Jan 2007
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The Scrumpmeister
Ship’s Taverner
# 5638
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Metapelagius:
[Keeping head down from heavy artillery above]
Very wise.
Sadly, I don't share your wisdom and am in some state of disbelief that Melon has had the boldness to make that accusation against Triple Tiara, have it pointed it that it was a false accusation and then consider it acceptable to post a reply to the thread without proffering anything approaching an apology.
quote:
Many thanks for your illuminating reply, St B.
You're very welcome.
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Bp Kallistos does say that the Eastern Rite does not have a form of Benediction;
He will know much better than I do. I worship in the Eastern Rite and have never come across it, either in practice or in our Book of Needs (which is essentially a Rituale and liturgical customary in one).
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...as for the Antiochenes I shall have to ask a friend in that grouping, though those I know are not, I am pretty sure, western rite.
Sub-deacon Benjamin Anderson of St Mark's, Denver, may be a good person to ask. He is an Antiochian Western Riter who is involved with the Lancelot Andrewes Press, which publishes much of the stuff to accompany the Western Rite as used in Antioch. He may be able to tell you whether Benediction features in their official prayer book or whether it is just an additional devotion used by soem of their parishes.
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I have to admit that I have not heard of Christminster - except in the novels of Hardy, that is;
They're only small, but they are a Benedictine monastery in Rhode Island under ROCOR, carrying on the spiritual traditions of what was the monastic community of Our Lady of Mount Royal, which started life as an Old Catholic monastery but was received into Orthodoxy in the 1960s under the leadership of Dom Augustine (Whitfield), its then Abbot. He is still alive, although quite elderly and poorly, and the only other surviving member of the community is the former Prior, Dom James (Deschene), who is now the Abbot of Christminster.
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...but how would the counter-reformation rite of Benediction fit with the use of a Gallican liturgy?
It does seem to be a little mis-matched, doesn't it? I don't know whether they use it at all, but I wouldn't worry too muchy if they did. In resuscitating the Western Rite in Orthodoxy, which began in the late 19th century, the attempt was never to take a reconstructionist approach. Many of the Western liturgies lived on in Catholicism, Old Catholicism and, to some degree, in Anglicanism. While the starting point has largely been to look to the pre-schism Western Liturgies, the Orthodox recognise that liturgy and spirituality develop (indeed as they have in the East) and so adopt some of these developments that they feel will be spiritually beneficial to their people, provided that those developments are consonant with Orthodox Faith.
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If Christ is not fully human, humankind is not fully saved. - St John of Saint-Denis
Posts: 14741 | From: Greater Manchester, UK | Registered: Mar 2004
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Nunc Dimittis
Seamstress of Sound
# 848
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Posted
Posted by Athanasius+:
quote:
But I find it unhelpful to attempt to tie the RP down to any particular explanation. For me, the mystery of the Real Presence is not just a useful metaphor for the mystery of God, but an essential part of my understanding of how the Holy Trinity is greater than and above all human understanding (which isn't to say that we can understand nothing of God or that we shouldn't attempt to understand).
And IngoB:
quote:
In regular eating, I take the bread, eat it and thereby turn the bread into my body: through digestion it will be bring energy to my cells and fat on my hips. But in sacramental eating, I take the bread, eat it and thereby turn me into the consecrated bread, which is the body of Christ: through digestion I will bring spiritual energy to the cell of the body of Christ that is me, and in due time will become fat on the hips of the bride of Christ in heaven.
thankyou for expanding what I was trying to say a few pages back. (Although the "fat on the hips of the bride of Christ" made me a bit queasy. )
Posts: 9515 | From: Delta Quadrant | Registered: Jul 2001
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