Several All Saintsers have asked me questions about this past Sunday’s sermon in which I mentioned the terms transubstantiation and consubstantiation. The former, an early medieval construct in Roman Catholicism, according to The Westminster Dictionary of Theological Terms, means that the bread and wine in the Eucharist are “essentially changed” into the body and blood of Christ. The latter is a late medieval understanding of the Eucharist in which the bread and wine remain the same, but that they are conjoined or coexist with the body and blood of Jesus. Both miss the point, and certainly are a far cry from the theological understanding of the Eucharist in the early church.
The Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist is found in the community gathered, the assembly of the people of faith; the presence of God in Christ manifest in the commonweal of passionate and imaginative hearts grown wise in the practice of goodness. The celebrant in the Eucharist is in truth the people gathered there. Indeed in the early church every one would have been vested in chasubles (now only worn by priests) as the celebration depended on them. The priest was quite practically the one set aside by the community to preside over this celebration. Someone has to do it, else everyone would be speaking at once. Meals cause us to gather as family. Meals represent our life and labor, and the sacred art of sacrificial hospitality, that nurtures us for the way ahead. Meals are the center of life because they quite literally keep us alive. Meals are something worth celebrating. (If you haven’t seen the new movie Julie and Julia, you must)
When the bread and wine are placed on the altar, that is the life and labor of God’s people offered for God’s blessing of empowerment. They are there also as a symbol of transformation. Bread and wine are the alchemical result of wheat and fruit changed into gracious gifts of nurture. So at the Eucharist we gather with God fully present among us and we offer our life and labor as a means of transformation for ourselves and our world. Our God is a God of change living within the life and labor of God’s people become nurture for the hungry and thirsty of our world. Our life blood and the work of our flesh, not unlike the Christ, are taken, blessed and given to God’s beloved upon the altar of the world…a gracious table to which all are invited, especially the ones who need this nurture the most. That is why at its heart, the Eucharist is a profound symbol of justice; and where there is justice, so there undeniably is the real presence of God.
I've been under the impression from most of my life that Roman Catholics still believe in transubstantiation. Is this not the case?
My impression is that most probably don't…but that doesn't stop the Vatican from continuing transubstantiation as official theology.