From: mfulsmb@uts.mcc.ac.uk (Martin Barry)
Newsgroups: bit.listserv.catholic
Subject: Re: The Real Presence
Date: 26 Jan 93 14:35:31 GMT
Organization: Manchester Computing Centre, Manchester, England, M13 9PL.

In article <1993Jan22.031538.27346@news.nd.edu> jocallag@artin.helios.nd.edu (john ocallaghan) writes:

(I said:)
>>... a lot of Catholic theologians would agree with you. It's not clear (to
>>them) whether the Council of Trent really does require belief in
>>transubstantiation, nor to what extent either the term 'transubstantiation'
>>or the transubstantiation/consubstantiation dialectic are really meaningful.
>>Karl Rahner (or one of his contributors) says that 'transubstantiation' is
>>rendered meaningless by modern scientific knowledge.

(The scourge of all rational beings [Hi, John] butts in:)

>Martin,
>Is that an argument from theological authority?

Not intended as such. I'm just acknowledging my sources here. Or would you
prefer me just to rip their arguments off?

>Perchance, could you tell me how meaningful modern scientific knowedge renders
>the real presence?

The real presence is something in which we believe, period.
Transubstantiation was an attempt rationally to explain "how" the real
presence is brought about. It has been argued that the philosophical
presuppositions of Transubstantiation are untenable. This leaves the
question "how" open. (I said more in another post,
in reply to Steve. q.v.). Here's a bit more of what it says in Rahner's
_Encyclopaedia of Theology (A concise Sacramentum Mundi)_, under
Transubstantiation:

"To reach an understanding of the Eucharistic presence which will be in
accord with the modern era, the hermeneutical principle must be invoked
according to which the philosophical context from which the formulation of a
truth of faith is derived may be expendable and replaceable. This means that
in a changed scientific and philosophical situation a truth of faith calls
for new interpretations and formulations and hence must be grasped in a new
light. The _tota substantia_, that is, the material substance composed of
matter and form with its inherent accidents, is not in accord with the
world-picture presented by physics and philosophy at the present time. In
detail, the following difficulties are now felt with regard to the
definition of transubstantiation worked out on the basis of Aristotelian and
scholastic cosmology:
(a) The models used by modern physics give matter an atomic structure. The
ultimate particles combine to form atoms which are grouped as molcules of
various types. In certain combinations, the molecules form bread and wine as
their end-results. Hence it cannot be said that the substance of bread or
wine, composed of matter and form, is the ontologically prior reality from
which in consequence the chemical properties result. Bread and wine are the
last stage of a combination of atoms, molecules and forces. Ths is why in
the twenties theologians had recourse to physics in the explanation of
transubstantiation and transposed it to the level of the atom or molecule,
which meant that the transubstantiation of a host contained an incalculable
number of transubstantiations. By the sixties, these efforts had to be
considered a failure, because discussion of transubstantiation as a physical
of cosmological process no longer seemed desirable.
(b) The cosmological approach to transubstantiation presents the further
difficulty that survival of the accidents forms an unthinkable paradox. If
one continues to maintain, along the lines suggested by the Councils of
Constance and Trent, that the eucharistic accidents exist _sine subjecto_,
there is extension and nothing that is extended, roundness but nothing that
is round, hardness but nothing that is hard, weight but nothing that is
heavy, activity with nothing acting, passivity with nothing affected, etc.
(c) [something about T being too impersonal and objectified an account of
the action of the glorified Lord. Not sure it's relevant here. -mcb]"

(Engelbert Gutwenger. Enc. of Theol, ed Karl Rahner. Burns & Oates 1975.
p1753).

Martin Barry.
Comments: Gated by NETNEWS@AUVM.AMERICAN.EDU