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Monday, April 20, 2020

What We’ve Got Here is a Failure to Communicate*


* In at least two senses of the word.

“The single biggest problem in communication is the illusion that it has taken place.”

-          George Bernard Shaw


What [Luther and Calvin], and all the Reformers with them, rejected was not what Thomas had affirmed.

Salkelds’s book is divided into four chapters: An Introduction, where he offers an overview of the dispute; a chapter on the Catholic tradition; a look at Martin Luther; finally, John Calvin.  Through this, he will examine agreements, disagreements, and the reasons for each.  In the opening chapter he offers the line immediately above. 

On the one hand, this is astonishing considering the significance of this disagreement at the time and over the centuries.  On the other, Luther and Calvin came along three centuries after Thomas; we all know the difficulty of communicating in writing in real time – just look at the comments section on any website.  Add to this the complication over centuries – definitions and meanings evolve and change.

Salkeld opens with a Preface.  He notes the significance of the disagreement even today, as Catholics and Protestants “have been so assured that they must disagree, but about which the vast majority of the ostensible disputants know so little.”

What else is new.  In the words of Neil Peart of Rush:

Quick to judge
Quick to anger
Slow to understand
Ignorance and prejudice
And fear walk hand in hand...

-          Witch Hunt

Transubstantiation was universally rejected by Protestants at the time of the Reformation.  Not surprisingly, shortly thereafter, the Protestants all began rejecting each other on the meaning of the Eucharist.  This drove Luther to the point of exclaiming, in exasperation:

Sooner than have mere wine with the fanatics, I would agree with the pope that there is only blood.

In 1520, in The Babylonian Captivity of the Church, Luther wrote his first meaningful criticism of the Eucharist, including Transubstantiation.  By this point, several theologians were questioning Transubstantiation in favor of the idea of consubstantiation, influenced by the nominalist thinking of William of Ockham. 

Luther was willing to accept Transubstantiation as a theological opinion, but argued that the Church had no authority to impose this human opinion as an article of faith.  This human opinion, Luther would offer, was based on Thomas’s faulty understanding of Aristotle – inserting accidents where the Bible makes no such claim about the bread – and for failing to respect the logic of the incarnation.

Calvin, a second-generation Reformer, would try to bridge the growing divide between the Lutherans and the Swiss as an attempt to keep the Reformers together.  On this, he failed.  One could consider his efforts an early work of ecumenism.  Like most ecumenists, he ended up rejected by all sides.

He described Transubstantiation as “this ingenious subtlety” through which “bread came to be taken for God.”  For Calvin, it can only be true bread representing the body of Christ.  He found the Catholic view a product of “crude imagination” and “virtually equivalent to magic incantation.” 

The Council of Trent would respond to all of this with a staunch defense.    The thirteenth session would produce the Decree on the Most Holy Sacrament of the Eucharist.  Deny that “there are contained truly, really, and substantially, the body and blood” of the Lord Jesus; “let him be anathema.”  Say that the substance of the bread and wine remain with the body and blood; “let him be anathema.”  Say that Christ is only consumed spiritually and not also sacramentally and really?  You get the idea.


It is clear enough then, that, in the sixteenth century, both the Reformers and the Roman Catholic Church made statements categorically rejecting what they took to be the position of their opponents.

The parties were talking past each other, each taking comfort in a self-assurance of certainty – certainty not only of their own position, but of understanding the other’s position.  This division would last four centuries.

One result of Vatican II was the Church’s entering into ecumenical dialogue.  Within three years – in 1967, the Lutheran-Roman Catholic dialogue in the United States produced an agreed statement: The Eucharist as Sacrifice.  A few years later, a similar outcome was realized between the Catholic and Anglican Church.  Thereafter followed others such efforts – with the World Council of Churches (WCC), and also with Reformed Protestants.

…by 1982…Roman Catholic theologians had joined signatories from Eastern Orthodox, Oriental Orthodox, Old Catholic, Lutheran, Anglican, Reformed, Methodist, United, Disciples, Baptist, Adventist, and Pentecostal communities in recommending the publication of the WCC agreed statement Baptism, Eucharist, and Ministry (BEM) for the consideration of Christians throughout the world.

The key point in this document: the universal affirmation of Christ’s real presence in the Eucharist.  This shouldn’t be surprising: neither Luther or Calvin rejected this idea.  When Jesus said “this is my body…this is my blood…”, well, it is difficult to disagree.

Salkeld identifies as more surprising is the agreement on sacrifice – as this was rejected by every Protestant community on the basis that Christ’s sacrifice was once and for all.  Why repeat this sacrifice week after week? 

…Christ who becomes present in the Lord’s Supper is none other than the crucified and risen – that is, sacrificed – Lord, who had instituted the Eucharist precisely as a memorial of his sacrifice.

Christ’s death and resurrection happened once and for all, yet the notion of memorial – just as for the Passover – would make effective in the present the memory of this past event.  On this, the Catholics and Protestants could agree.

Thus, two false dichotomies were overcome.  First, it was now affirmed that Christ is really present.  Second...
…that such an objectively given presence was not at all natural, material, physical, or magical.  It was precisely sacramental, and thus operated at a different, deeper level of reality than the one presupposed by such terms.

Jesus intended the Last Supper as a memorial, in the same way that the Passover was understood: God’s mighty acts would be made present to the community, without threatening the idea that these acts are unrepeatable.

Conclusion

It was a change of attitude, not of doctrine, that made such statements and agreements possible.  Unfortunately, in the almost forty years since this work was done, little further ecumenical progress on the Eucharist has been made.  It is also unfortunate how little understood by the wider Christian community has been the progress thus far.

The word “transubstantiation” appears to be the stumbling block, as virtually every Christian community affirms Christ’s presence.  Salkeld will dive into the reasons that consensus on the term has proved difficult.

9 comments:

  1. I have no idea what this means.

    "Thus, two false dichotomies were overcome. First, it was now affirmed that Christ is really present. Second...
    …that such an objectively given presence was not at all natural, material, physical, or magical. It was precisely sacramental, and thus operated at a different, deeper level of reality than the one presupposed by such terms."

    What does really present mean, first? How is something sacramental and a deeper level than reality? It sounds imaginary to me, and not at all required by Scripture.

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    1. This same Brett Salkeld had a conversation with a Unitarian. Get past the Unitarian part, and it was very enlightening. The version with an introduction by PVK is very worthwhile:

      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HKC6YQf3ILo

      Like all analogies - especially about God and His Son - this is not perfect. But in this video (I think it was this video), it was asked "what makes a turkey a Thanksgiving turkey?"

      A Thanksgiving turkey can be said to be "really present," yet the Thanksgiving part is not natural or material or physical. It just is. (I am so afraid to bring up this as an analogy, but if a Catholic theologian can do it, then I guess I can).

      Sacrament: an outward sign of an inward grace.

      Is not grace a deeper level than reality, no matter if or how signified?

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    2. Yeah, I think the Thanksgiving turkey analogy is a poor way to think of it. The date you are going to eat the turkey makes it a Thanksgiving turkey. It's purpose is to celebrate a holiday.

      All that means for communion is that the bread and wine is Communion bread and wine because it will be ingested as a part of the Communion ritual. There is no spiritual state or level of reality called "Thanksgiving" or "Communion".

      Your definition of sacrament is consistent with the Protestant understanding, of bread and wine being symbols. A sign is an external representation. I would first have to accept that the bread and wine is either literally the body and blood of Christ or somehow infused with it, for me to agree that Jesus sacramentally exists in the elements. I see no reason to believe that. Until I see a reason to believe that, I will have a problem following the discussion in the book.

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    3. The other question I have is, if there is going to be agreement between Catholic and Protestant the issue below will have to be resolved.

      "Salkeld identifies as more surprising is the agreement on sacrifice – as this was rejected by every Protestant community on the basis that Christ’s sacrifice was once and for all. Why repeat this sacrifice week after week?

      …Christ who becomes present in the Lord’s Supper is none other than the crucified and risen – that is, sacrificed – Lord, who had instituted the Eucharist precisely as a memorial of his sacrifice."

      As in my previous comment, I see no reason to believe that Christ is present in the Lord's supper. But if I grant it, the question is, do the Catholic's agree with the quoted statements you made? My understanding is that they do not. Until that hurdle is surpassed I don't think there is much room for agreement.

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    4. RMB, I am not going to pretend that I understand all of this. I am learning, along with the rest of us. Your comments are helping me clarify my own understanding. Thank you.

      To me, the most important point regarding the statement is that it was joint – across Catholic and Protestant lines, by theologians who know infinitely more about this stuff than I do (and, presumably, you do – although I am open to being corrected on this).

      “The date you are going to eat the turkey makes it a Thanksgiving turkey.”

      And the place and purpose for which one takes the bread and wine make it something more than bread and wine.

      “Your definition of sacrament is consistent with the Protestant understanding, of bread and wine being symbols.”

      Wrong: from the Catholic Encyclopedia: “Sacraments are outward signs of inward grace, instituted by Christ for our sanctification”

      https://www.newadvent.org/cathen/13295a.htm

      From Wikipedia: “Many denominations, including the Catholic, Anglican, Lutheran, Methodist, and Reformed, hold to the definition of sacrament formulated by Augustine of Hippo: an outward sign of an inward grace, that has been instituted by Jesus Christ.”

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sacrament

      “Until I see a reason to believe that, I will have a problem following the discussion in the book.”

      Maybe by following the discussion, you will find a reason to believe it.

      “The other question I have is, if there is going to be agreement between Catholic and Protestant the issue below will have to be resolved.”

      But they DID resolve it, as I wrote in the very next paragraph. That’s the point.

      “…do the Catholic's agree with the quoted statements you made? My understanding is that they do not.”

      It is a Catholic theologian writing about the Catholic position. What more do you want?

      Salkeld comments in the book that while the theologians have reached such agreements, unfortunately this knowledge hasn’t trickled down to the communities (that would be me, and, presumably, you). For this, it seems to me safe to blame the leadership of the various denominations.

      It really might be worth giving this book a chance.

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  2. The word "accidents" sent me to search for transubstantiation and accidents. I learned about how the essence of a thing (axis) and the manifestation (dentrites) emanating and percieved. Transubstatiation being the essence changing but the emanations, the axidents, remaining.

    I am a former HRC and I do not accept transubstantiation.

    Jesus spoke in parables, metaphores and similies.

    There were no little Jesuses raining in the desert for the Hebrews to eat.

    We do not go around with cross beams on our shoulders and we do not do canibalism.

    The map is not the land.

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    1. I wrote the following as a comment at PVK's YouTube channel. The relevant portion:

      Until the church is one, it is difficult to consider anything like the Kingdom of God and peace on earth. Until the church lives as a voice for peace and not war, the church will be considered by many nothing but hypocritical. Until the church lives as one, there is no hope for a truly healthy individual liberty. Until the church demonstrates in action the love, charity, and benevolence, (and instead leaving all of this to the state), of what use is the church?

      Our only choice is dialogue, and, ultimately, understanding that agreement on the big things is sufficient for the church to live as one.

      End quote.

      "Do this in remembrance of me." Is it truly important how, exactly, we each individually (yes, individually, because that is what Protestants have bestowed) understand this?

      Really? Compared to what alternative? Will it make a difference with Peter at the gate? I doubt it. He didn't think so in Acts.

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  3. I have not been to a Catholic Mass in a long time. I have a friend that is HRC and have no problem visiting his Church. When I visit a HRC Church I do not take communion out of respect because I do not agree with transubstantiation. And, obviously, I do not go to confession. To be able to take part of the Eucharist you must accept HRC's understanding and be part of the that collective.

    I have a bigger issue with all the Mary stuff.

    So, I do dialogue. My friend is a good friend enough to occasionally discuss theology.

    Will it make a difference with Peter at the gate? No a whit since it will not Peter at the gate.


    https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=John+6%3A22-70&version=NKJV

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    1. Jaime, I was writing symbolically about the gate, using a common phrase....and I know the gate is symbolic also...

      If it helps: will it make a difference regarding our salvation? I hope not, otherwise almost all of us are out of luck, given the thousands of picayune doctrinal differences as evidenced by the thousands of Christian denominations today.

      Or, maybe, 144,000 is the right number...

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