Justin Katz takes umbrage at my post about the girl whose first Communion was invalidated by a Church ruling because the wafer she ate was made with rice instead of wheat.
The central premise behind his response seems to be (and let me know if I’m wrong here, Justin) that even though I don’t necessarily believe that wheat is a requirement in the communion bread, I shouldn’t judge as Pharissaical those who have deemed it canon. Justin feels that my comparison to Jesus’ condemnation of the rules of Corban that had been installed by the Pharisees in order to extend the Law, by which they were able to increase their devotion to God through acts of piety, to be less than judicious, and he feels my tone was hennish, “clucking” my tongue at the narrow doctrine of the Catholic Church.
Here is the point which Justin brings up which I intend to address with this post:
For lack of time, I’m not going to pursue the thorough research necessary to trace the doctrinal conclusion about wheaten bread through history, but two points are relatively obvious to make. The first is that, even accepting that legitimate arguments could be made against the tradition, Jeremiah hasn’t found them. The specific lesson of the passage from Mark 7 that Jeremiah cites has to do with spiritual cleanliness’s being an internal quality, not something that can be ingested through a lapse in physical cleanliness. Jesus’ other example, corban (or “qorban”), is something set apart for God, so the warning is against human rules that offer loopholes from Commandments. The reality that calling dibs for God, so to speak, isn’t a legitimate way to avoid helping one’s parents doesn’t mean that nothing can be put aside for Him.
On the general matter that human traditions oughtn’t supplant divine doctrine, well, the fact that one can teach “as doctrines human precepts” does not mean that all taught doctrines are human precepts. As Jeff Miller put it, those who invoke the Pharisees in attacks against the Church “tend to forget about the opposite of the Pharisees – the Sadducees who followed no rules but whatever suited them.” Could a legitimate Mass be celebrated with popcorn and beer?
I also don’t intend to trace the full history of the Church’s decision to make wheat the defacto Eucharistic standard, though I will go into some Scripture that indicates that the grain of the Eucharist bread is at best a matter of negligible spiritual quality, and that the purpose of the bread is not ingredient-specific allegory used to instill some canonical ruling into the hearts of believers.
For those unfamiliar with the Catholic Church doctrine on the subject, here is a bit of background. Inestimabile Donum 8, which is the latest major statement on the subject of the liturgy, says this about Eucharist bread:
The bread for the celebration of the Eucharist, in accordance with the tradition of the whole Church, must be made solely of wheat, and, in accordance with the tradition proper to the Latin Church, it must be unleavened. By reason of the sign, the matter of the Eucharistic celebration ’should appear as actual food.’ This is to be understood as linked to the consistency is mof the bread, and not to its form, which remains the traditional one. No other ingredients are to be added to the wheaten flour and water. The preparation of the bread requires attentive care to ensure that the product does not detract from the dignity due to the Eucharistic bread, can be broken in a dignified way, does not give rise to excessive fragments, and does not offend the sensibilities of the faithful when they eat it.
The Code of Canon Law states that “The bread must be made of wheat alone and recently made so that there is no danger of corruption” (924:2).
Friar Nicholas Halligan discusses the validity of the consecrated bread in The Sacraments and Their Celebration, noting that Transubstantiation occurs only if the ingredients of the bread are lawful and licit.
The requisite material for the celebration of the Eucharist and the confection of the sacrament is only wheaten bread, recently made whereby the danger of corruption is avoided… Unleavened bread alone is to be used in the Latin Rite.
The bread must be made from wheat, mixed with natural water, baked by the application of fire heat (including electric cooking) and substantially uncorrupted. The variety of the wheat or the region of its origin does not affect its validity, but bread made from any other grain is invalid material. Bread made with milk, wine, oil, etc., either entirely or in a notable part, is invalid material. The addition of a condiment, such as salt or sugar, is unlawful but valid, unless added in a notable quantity. Unbaked dough or dough fried in butter or cooked in water is invalid matter; likewise bread which is corrupted substantially, but not if it has merely begun to corrupt…
The bread must be of wheat flour and only in case of necessity a white material thrashed or crushed from wheat. It must be free from mixture with any other substance besides flour and water. It is gravely unlawful to consecrate with doubtful matter. Altar breads must be fresh or recently baked and must not be allowed to get mouldy, which condition varies with regions, climates, etc.
The Church has thus created, from a very simple ceremony involving bread and wine, a highly involved and doctrinally complex ritual that requires Church approval for its very process to be considered valid. Certainly, it is mete of believers to examine all doctrines and test them against the Word. So, what does Scripture say about the sacrament of the Communion?
The Last Supper, in which Jesus offered up his body and blood, was a recreation of the historical and spiritual event which took place in Egypt, when the Lord passed over the houses of Egypt and the Hebrews, and spared the Hebrews’ firstborn by dint of the blood upon their lentils. This miraculous foretaste of the sacrifice of Jesus was provided with certain instructions.
“Then they are to take some of the blood and put it on the sides and tops of the doorframes of the houses where they eat the lambs. That same night they are to eat the meat roasted over the fire, along with bitter herbs, and bread made without yeast. Do not eat the meat raw or cooked in water, but roast it over the fire-head, legs and inner parts. Do not leave any of it till morning; if some is left till morning, you must burn it. This is how you are to eat it: with your cloak tucked into your belt, your sandals on your feet and your staff in your hand. Eat it in haste; it is the LORD’s Passover.
“On that same night I will pass through Egypt and strike down every firstborn-both men and animals – and I will bring judgment on all the gods of Egypt. I am the LORD . The blood will be a sign for you on the houses where you are; and when I see the blood, I will pass over you. No destructive plague will touch you when I strike Egypt.
“This is a day you are to commemorate; for the generations to come you shall celebrate it as a festival to the LORD – a lasting ordinance. For seven days you are to eat bread made without yeast. On the first day remove the yeast from your houses, for whoever eats anything with yeast in it from the first day through the seventh must be cut off from Israel. On the first day hold a sacred assembly, and another one on the seventh day. Do no work at all on these days, except to prepare food for everyone to eat – that is all you may do.
“Celebrate the Feast of Unleavened Bread, because it was on this very day that I brought your divisions out of Egypt. Celebrate this day as a lasting ordinance for the generations to come. In the first month you are to eat bread made without yeast, from the evening of the fourteenth day until the evening of the twenty-first day. For seven days no yeast is to be found in your houses. And whoever eats anything with yeast in it must be cut off from the community of Israel, whether he is an alien or native-born. Eat nothing made with yeast. Wherever you live, you must eat unleavened bread.” – Exodus 12:7-20
The importance of the yeast is a matter of some import, I suspect, for the Catholic Church, though Church doctrine itself keys more on the type of grain that is used rather than its unleavened nature. Nevertheless, Jacob Neusner of Bard College makes an
Wheat in a Land of Milk and Honey
It’s clear that Jeremiah Lewis and I aren’t going to iron out our underlying differences of spiritual understanding discussing — on blogs — the ingredients of the Eucharist at Roman Catholic Mass. Therefore, I’m not going to get into the…
A well documented post.
Thankee.
O.K., maybe I’m off track here, but I thought the idea of the posts for the Christian Carnival was for ecumenism. If it is, I don’t find your posting to be very appropriate.
If it’s not, can I post something next week about the absurdity of Sola Scriptura?
I mean I just want to know what the purpose is. If it’s ecumenical in nature great! If it’s to debate one another’s theology that’s great too – I just want to know what the purpose is.
Justin’s question of taking communion with “beer and popcorn” is one I want to address, as it recalls an experience I had a couple of years ago. At a small retreat the campus minister had forgotten the grape juice, but orange juice was available at the camp, so we took communion with orange juice and bread. It was, for me and I believe for the rest of our small group, a very powerful and moving time of remembrance. As such, I told others about the experience. Certain Protestants in the group were horrified that we had used orange juice instead of grape. These are people who regularly take communion with Welch’s and leavened bread, so clearly they were simply clinging to the traditions they were accustomed to. Why do I think OJ and leavened bread were appropriate where beer and popcorn would not have been? Because communion is a matter of the heart, a ceremony of faith and remembrance. I myself could not take communion with beer and popcorn seriously. My mind would be on the ridiculousness of using beer and popcorn, instead of on my Lord and Savior who I am intended to be remembering with this ceremony. For me, any fruit juice and any bread will do for communion, although I do prefer grape juice and unleavened bread. I think the Bible does a pretty good job of warning us against legalism, so I don’t stress if communion is not a precise clone of the Biblical example.
Arguments from scripture alone, or sola scriptura arguments are not compelling or convincing to Catholics as we do not accept the “doctrine” of sola scriptura.
Calling the Magesterium (popes, bishops, councils) “Pharisees” is also not compelling or persuasive becasue it is an ad hominem fallacy attack.
Suggesting that anything that is “good” can be used for communion is indeed too simplistic. Cathlics believe that this is the body, blood, soul and divinity of Jesus Christ and take great care of the consecrated elements. Did you know that the precious blood that is unused is poured down a special sink that empties into consecrated ground? It is never emptied into the sink to go into the regular sewer. LIkewise, the consecrated hosts are also greatly cared for so that not even a crumb should be lost.
You may not understand or agree Catholic theology, but you should know that everything the Catholic church teaches has a reasoning behind it. You could be more compelling and persuasive perhaps if you knew what those were.
we do not accept the “doctrine” of sola scriptura.
Then you must also consider the Scriptures to be fallible. This is the problem when debating questions like this – it’s like coming to a gunfight with a tire. Two completely origins of belief. As an evangelical Protestant, I look at what Scripture has to say about “other teachings” that don’t line up with the Word and think, “Huh. Paul just said that other teachings are false and must be fortified against.”
Did you know that the Scriptures teach that Christ died ONCE for man’s sins, and after that he was raised to the right hand of God? Catholic Eucharist teaches that it is literally the blood and body of Christ that is being consumed; in essence, Christ is dying over and over again–a completely illegitimate and blasphemous doctrine. That is why I disagree strenuously with many Catholic practices, because they are grounded in something other than Scripture; man’s traditions, however noble they might appear, if they measure not against the purity of the Word, cannot stand in the place of God.
If you don’t believe in the infallibility of the Word of God, and you don’t believe in it as the sole text from which the Christian faith springs, then I can only appeal to you from the grounds of the scripture that says “Let God be true and every man a liar.” Request, implore before God and ask of Him to reveal the Truth of His nature, of His Word.
Then you must also consider the Scriptures to be fallible
That’s an inductive reasoning fallacy. We don’t accept scripture ALONE and frankly neither does scripture as scripture itself never says that it is the sole authority.
Catholic Eucharist teaches that it is literally the blood and body of Christ that is being consumed; in essence, Christ is dying over and over again–a completely illegitimate and blasphemous doctrine.
I agree. Fortunately that is NOT what the Catholic Church teaches.
That is why I disagree strenuously with many Catholic practices, because they are grounded in something other than Scripture
You strenuously disagree with what you think you know about Catholic practices but clearly you really don’t know much about Catholicism.
Request, implore before God and ask of Him to reveal the Truth of His nature, of His Word.
I have – that’s why I’m Catholic.
I’d love some education on the subject, then. Honestly.
If my understanding is incorrect or incomplete, I would certainly like to remedy that.
Can you address the points that I made in this comment, for starters?
Then you must also consider the Scriptures to be fallible. This is the problem when debating questions like this – it’s like coming to a gunfight with a tire. Two completely origins of belief. As an evangelical Protestant, I look at what Scripture has to say about “other teachings” that don’t line up with the Word and think, “Huh. Paul just said that other teachings are false and must be fortified against.”
Actually, the Catholic Church teaches that the Bible is the inerrant, authoritative Word of God. And, actually, St. Paul says to “Hold fast to the traditions you were taught, whether by word of mouth or by letter”. (2 Thess. 2:15) And that the Church, not the Bible, is “the pillar and bulwark of truth”. (1 Tim. 3:15)
Did you know that the Scriptures teach that Christ died ONCE for man’s sins, and after that he was raised to the right hand of God? Catholic Eucharist teaches that it is literally the blood and body of Christ that is being consumed; in essence, Christ is dying over and over again–a completely illegitimate and blasphemous doctrine. That is why I disagree strenuously with many Catholic practices, because they are grounded in something other than Scripture; man’s traditions, however noble they might appear, if they measure not against the purity of the Word, cannot stand in the place of God.
As has already been indicated, the Catholic Church does not teach that the Lord Jesus dies again in Holy Mass. It is a re-presentation of the one offering of Christ on the Cross. Not another offering, but the same offering. I think you “disagree strenuously” with Catholic practices because you actually have no idea what the Church teaches.
If you don’t believe in the infallibility of the Word of God, and you don’t believe in it as the sole text from which the Christian faith springs, then I can only appeal to you from the grounds of the scripture that says “Let God be true and every man a liar.” Request, implore before God and ask of Him to reveal the Truth of His nature, of His Word.
“Let God be true and every man a liar”. That works both ways, doesn’t it? For starters, how about showing is Bible-ignorant Cathlicks where the Bible says that the Bible alone is the Word of God?
Thanks.
Jeremiah,
Instead of asking a Catholic layman, why not start by going to what the Church herself has to say?
You could start with the Catechism of the Catholic Church, available online at http://www.christusrex.org/www1/CDHN/ccc_cont.html
Or you could check a copy of “The Catholic Catechism” by Fr. John Hardon, SJ, (requi
ELC:
I’ve done a little research of my own. Turns out the Church rejected Sola Scriptura in the 16th century, at the Council of Trent. At that Council, Scripture was deemed incomplete, and that Church Tradition was to be the presiding authority in determining Christian interpretation of dogma. Before that, Church Fathers held to Sola Scriptura, including such early Church luminaries as Ignatius, Polycarp, Clement, the Didache, Barnabus, Irenaeus, and Tertullian. Indeed, someo of these men were embattled by the Gnostics, who claimed they had an Apostolic oral Tradition independent of Scripture.
Church historian Ellen Flessman-van Leer writes that “proof from tradition and Scripture serve one and the same end: to identify the teaching of the Church as the original apostolic teaching. The first establishes that the teaching of the Church is this apostolic teaching, and the second, what this apostolic teaching is.” (Tradition and Scripture in the Early Church)
Likewise, Heiko Oberman comments about the relationship between Scripture and Tradition in the Early Church: “Scripture and tradition were for the Early Church in no sense mutually exclusive: kerygma (the message of the gospel), Scripture and Tradition coincided entirely. The Church preached the kerygma, which is found in toto in written form in the canonical books. The tradition was not understood as an addition to the kerygma contained in Scripture but as handing down that same kerygma in living form: in other words everything was to be found in Scripture and at the same time everything was in living Tradition.” (The Harvest of Medieval Theology)
Bishop Cyril, of Jerusalem, offered this defense of Sola Scriptura in A Library of the Fathers of the Holy Catholic Church: “This seal have thou ever on thy mind; which now by way of summary has been touched on in its heads, and if the Lord grant, shall hereafter be set forth according to our power, with Scripture proofs. For concerning the divine and sacred Mysteries of the Faith, we ought not to deliver even the most casual remark without the Holy Scriptures: nor be drawn aside by mere probabilities and the artifices of argument. Do not then believe me because I tell thee these things, unless thou receive from the Holy Scriptures the proof of what is set forth: for this salvation, which is of our faith, is not by ingenious reasonings, but by proof from the Holy Scriptures.”
I found this to be interesting: “A good bit of confusion exists between Catholics and Protestants on sola Scriptura due to a failure to distinguish two aspects of the doctrine: the formal and the material. Sola Scriptura in the material sense simply means that all the content of salvific revelation exists in Scripture. Many Catholics hold this in common with Protestants, including well-known theologians from John Henry Newman to Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger. French Catholic theologian Yves Congar states: “we can admit sola Scriptura in the sense of a material sufficiency of canonical Scripture. This means that Scripture contains, in one way or another, all truths necessary for salvation.” What Protestants affirm and Catholics reject is sola Scriptura in the formal sense that the Bible alone is sufficiently clear that no infallible teaching magisterium of the church is necessary to interpret it.” (Roman Catholics and Evangelicals: Agreements and Differences)
It appears then, that the disconnect is between the content of Scripture and the interpretation of Scripture. Catholic doctrine teaches it has not created the interpretation, just discovered it through exploration of the Scriptures. That seems dangerously close to a self-defeating premise, though I won’t go into that now. What concerns me is the emphasis of Tradition as authoritative and correct.
Jesus himself offers warnings against the teachings of the Pharisees’ traditions (Matthew 15:3, Mark 7:9), while the Colassians 2:8 warns against deceptive human traditions that rely on “hollow and deceptive philosophy”. Then there is 1 Peter 1:17-19 which states, “And if ye call on the Father, who without respect of persons judgeth according to every man’s work, pass the time of your sojourning here in fear: Forasmuch as ye know that ye were not redeemed with corruptible things, as silver and gold, from your vain conversation received by tradition from your fathers; But with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot:” Then there is all that exhortation against the traditions of the Canaanites given to the Hebrews as they crossed the Jordan. Tradition holds a rather weak spot in the pantheon of authority, yet it’s being wielded like a child with daddy’s gun (and in a way, that’s exactly analagous).
I am not convinced that the 1 Timothy 3:15 Scripture is referring to the Church as the pillar of truth. Indeed, it just as easily could be referring to (and makes more sense to me) God as the pillar and ground of the truth.
As for Scripture being the sole Word of God, take a look at 2 Timothy 3:16-17, Isaiah 8:20, and again Matthew 15:1-9. Not to mention the several thousands of times it says, “Thus saith the Lord…” Scripture itself is witness to the fact that it is God’s sole authority for Christian dogma. Meanwhile, the 2 Thessalonians 2:15 Scripture invalidates many Catholic traditions.
How can we know all this? “So then faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God” (Romans 10:17).
[more in a bit]
Franklin, thanks for the suggestions. I’ve got quite a bit of reading with those links you’ve sent, so you’ll forgive my substance-less post–it may take me a bit of time to respond…
Jeremiah:
I apologize: I actually have no intention of getting into arguments in comment boxes. I should have held my tongue… er… keyboard. :-)
If you want to believe that the Fathers (who believed in bishops, a sacrificing Christian priesthood, baptismal regeneration, forgiveness of sins through the ministerial priesthood, etc.) actually believed in sola scriptura, you go right ahead.
“As for Scripture being the sole Word of God, take a look at 2 Timothy 3:16-17, Isaiah 8:20, and again Matthew 15:1-9.” Oh, I’ve already looked at them. And lots of other scriptures, too.
ELC: would it suffice to agree to disagree? In the meantime, I hope you can accept my sincerest apologies for inflaming any tension with these posts.