dg@lakart.uucp (David Goodenough) (11/29/89)
Since it appears to be time for the annual "How does the Eucharist work?" discussion, I'd like to submit the following for consideration. This very discussion: transsubstantiation / consubstantiation / something else / who knows what, came up at our church a while ago. Someone settled it rather interestingly by asking the following question: How many of you can explain _EVERYTHING_ that goes on when your car engine is running? What about fuel combustion: you mix air and gas (why does the gas have to be vaporised?), add a spark, and it burns. But what is happening when it's burning - can you answer at the atomic or subatomic level? Why does the carbon want to disconnect from the hydrogen and join to the oxygen? What about the electrical system: where does the electricity live in the battery: it's only full of lead compounds and sulphuric acid? How do you get a 30000 volt pulse to make the spark out of a 12 volt battery - with the coil: but what happens in the coil to cause it? etc. etc. etc. etc. - I won't go into all the nauseating detail. The whole point is WE DON'T KNOW, and WE DON'T NEED TO KNOW. All you need to know is that you put the key in the ignition, turn it, and the car goes. Maybe Eucharist is like that. We know what we need to know: how to make it work, as instructed by Christ. But as to the exact mechanics of what happens, it may be that this is something comprehensible to God alone, and we are trying to understand something that we can't. To provide a loose analogy, how many first grade maths students are going to be able to comprehend integral calculus? Not that many. Are we being first graders trying to grasp integral calculus? Yours in Christ, -- dg@lakart.UUCP - David Goodenough +---+ IHS | +-+-+ ....... !harvard!xait!lakart!dg +-+-+ | AKA: dg%lakart.uucp@xait.xerox.com +---+ [This is a common enough theory, and one that I think has a lot to be said for it. My own position is that the crucial issue is that Christ is really present to us in communion, and transsubstantiation is just a theory about how it happens. However there's a problem with this approach. Transsubstantiation seems to involve the definition of what happens, and not just the explanation of how it happens. If you adopt it, after the consecration there isn't bread there at all. It's really Christ, and you should act accordingly. This can lead to rather different practices. Taken to their limit, you could have practices that appear completely appropriate to someone who believes in transsubstantiation, but appear to be idolatry otherwise. Such an absolute dicotomy is fortunately not an unavoidable result. Even those who consider the elements simply symbols should have some latitude for treating symbols the way you would treat the thing symbolized. However I have to believe that there are going to be at least some implications to believing that the elements are not just symbols for Christ, but Christ himself. --clh]
bill@cs.utexas.edu (Bill Baker) (11/30/89)
[dg@lakart.uucp (David Goodenough) commented that it is not necessary to agree on how the Eucharist works to celebrate it. He compares it to automotive technology: we don't necessarily have to understand it to use a car. --clh] While it is true that most of us do not understand how a car's engine works, it is important that somebody knows. It is helpful for an automechanic to understand some princibles of air/gas mixtures to better tune my carborator. It is also true that the better I understand how my car's engine works, the better I can care for it. In other words, while I do not believe anyone must understand the theology behind the Eucharist to participate in the Sacrament, if an individual does obtain a deeper understanding, their participation will be deepened. On a more general topic, why should we study theology at all. We could simply beleive the faith handed down to us with out question. But we don't. It is our nature (our God given nature) to question all that we see. So the point is not that we don't know, or that we don't need to know, how the Sacrament of the Eucharist works. The point is that we don't know yet, and it is a question that evokes natural curiosity in many people. (It is my personal belief that the Eucharist is the sacrement that brings us closest to Christ and a better understanding of this sacrament brings me a better understanding of my relationship with Him.) More importantly (most importantly), none of the sacraments are magic acts. No one 'does Eucharist'. Christ only instruction was to "Do this in memory of me." He never told us exactly how to do it. Bill Baker Tandem Computers, Inc, Micro Products Division e-mail: bill!halley!cs.utexas.edu... us-mail: 14231 Tandem Blvd. Austin, TX 78727 phone: 512-244-8083