Tuesday, November 6, 2007, 7:25 PM
a. It is not magic: some view the Celebration of the Eucharist as something similar to an “enchantment”. The priest behaves like a wizard, so the story goes, who by enchantment transforms the bread and the wine in “food of gods”. This misinterpretation of the transubstantiation has always been decidedly rejected by the Church.
b. It is not a miracle: often the analogy if drawn with the Miracle of Cana (John 2:1-12). But in that case the water was, by Jesus’ miraculous action, transformed into wine, which had all the organolectic characteristics of wine (colour, brilliancy, taste, smell): indistinguishable by anybody (even the master of ceremonies, certainly a competent wine waiter, but totally unaware of the miracle). For this “miraculous” interpretation of the transubstantiation (the wine becomes real blood, and the bread real flesh), the position of the Church ahs always been ambiguous. On the one side the “spiritual” meaning of the “transformation” is insisted upon. On the other, though, insisting on the concept of “substance” (Transubstantiation=transformation of substance), can allow for a (almost) literalistic interpretation (the wine becomes real blood, and the bread real flesh). The best expression of this is the so-called "Miracle of Bolsena", which, though, is not officially supported by the Roman Catholic Church.
a. It is not magic: some view the Celebration of the Eucharist as something similar to an “enchantment”. The priest behaves like a wizard, so the story goes, who by enchantment transforms the bread and the wine in “food of gods”. This misinterpretation of the transubstantiation has always been decidedly rejected by the Church.
b. It is not a miracle: often the analogy if drawn with the Miracle of Cana (John 2:1-12). But in that case the water was, by Jesus’ miraculous action, transformed into wine, which had all the organolectic characteristics of wine (colour, brilliancy, taste, smell): indistinguishable by anybody (even the master of ceremonies, certainly a competent wine waiter, but totally unaware of the miracle). For this “miraculous” interpretation of the transubstantiation (the wine becomes real blood, and the bread real flesh), the position of the Church ahs always been ambiguous. On the one side the “spiritual” meaning of the “transformation” is insisted upon. On the other, though, insisting on the concept of “substance” (Transubstantiation=transformation of substance), can allow for a (almost) literalistic interpretation (the wine becomes real blood, and the bread real flesh). The best expression of this is the so-called "Miracle of Bolsena", which, though, is not officially supported by the Roman Catholic Church.
Go to What the Transubstantiation is
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