God in a Wafer

God in a Wafer
by Dave Ashley, c. 1996

Introduction

"Body and blood of Christ."

"Amen."

Every church-going Catholic has this exchange with a priest every time they take communion. I remember it well. We were all ushered to the priest at the alter, patiently standing in line. The priest either placed the wafer on our tongues or put it in our hand for us to place in our mouths. After returning to our seats, we would kneel and pray until everyone was served and the remaining wafers were secured in the tabernacle, a miniature arc that held the sacred wafers. We were taught to give reverence to those wafers - it was the body, soul, and complete substance of Christ. We bowed down to it. We admired it while it was paraded through the congregation on certain holidays. This was no ordinary wafer; it was Christ among us; it was the Eucharist.

As the most celebrated of the seven Catholic sacraments, the Eucharist is elevated to "the source and summit of the entire Christian life." This statement from the Second Vatican Council’s Constitution of the Sacred Liturgy echoed what had been previously stated in the Council of Trent four centuries earlier. The Eucharist contains the whole spiritual good of the Church; it’s the pinnacle of Catholic worship.[1] These ideas started taking shape in Rome sometime in the second century.

However, don’t confuse the fact that this sacrament, being celebrated more often than any other sacrament, is understood by a greater number of people. If fact, I tend to believe the Eucharist is most commonly misunderstood among all the sacraments. And so, keeping nothing hidden in the next few pages we’ll call out the official Church doctrine and compare it to God’s sacred Scriptures and traditions. In doing this we’ll arrive at the truth of God and His intentions for what we celebrate as Holy Communion.

There are two aspects of this Roman sacrament we must examine. First, it’s claimed that the elements of the bread and wine are changed into the entire-ty of Christ - body, soul, and divinity. This transformation of the bread and wine has been given the theological term of transubstantia-tion. Second, the practice of the Catholic Church is to offer these elements to God as a sacrifice; Christ is re-crucified at every Catholic communion table every day all around the world. Let’s look at each of these beliefs.

Has God Become Bread And Wine?

Let’s consider the substance of the bread and wine. We’ll begin our study at the Council of Trent in the sixteenth century.

Accompanied by the common anathema for anyone who disagreed with its findings, the council concluded in Cannon I and II that the body and blood, together with the soul and divinity of our Lord Jesus Christ, and therefore the entire Christ, are truly, really, and substantially contained in the sacrament of the most Holy Eucharist. Put another way, when the bread and wine are presented at a Catholic Mass, they are understood to be Jesus Christ, in all that He is. One prominent Catholic source says, "The doctrine of the Eucharist implies that after the words of consecration are pronounced, the substance of bread is no longer really bread but has been changed into the substance of Christ’s body."[2] The first official mention of this doctrine wasn’t until the middle ages when the Creed of pope Pius IV was published.[3]

To make no mistake about the matter, Trent also states in Cannon Law VI that Christ as the Eucharist is to be publicly and solemnly carried about in processions and adored as God. And anyone who views this as idolatry is accursed (anathematized - devoted to evil), says the Roman Catholic Church. The Catechism of the Catholic Church explains the belief of Eucharistic adoration quite clearly:

Worship of the Eucharist. In the liturgy of the Mass we express our faith in the real presence of Christ under the species of bread and wine by, among other ways, genuflecting or bowing deeply as a sign of adoration of the Lord. "The Catholic Church has always offered and still offers to the sacrament of the Eucharist the cult of adoration, not only during Mass, but also outside of it, reserving the consecrated hosts with the utmost care, exposing them to the solemn veneration of the faithful, and carrying them in procession.[4]

This is their dogmatic teaching. Some Catholics don’t accept the entirety of this teaching; other Catholics have a clear understanding and affirmation. However, regardless of how a Catholic feels or believes, this is the authoritative teaching from the Vatican, the source of all Roman Catholic doctrine. But few realize this sacrament, contrary to Catholic teaching, was not always a doctrine of such oddity.

There are at least three things we must consider to determine the validity of this doctrinal claim and while in the pursuit of establishing accurate and true tradition: 1) We must consider the Scriptures above all else, 2) We must study the original occurrence and consult with the direct descendants of those involved in the original occurrence. 3) We must consider progressive revelation. Progressive revelation is the understanding that, as time passes and mankind matures in his understanding through new archeological discovers and technological advances, God further reveals His truths to mankind. This, of course, cannot contradict or nullify what He has already established as truth. Progressive revelation is a process of further defining truth, not redefining truth.

In this case we are dealing with what happened at the Last Supper, which was a single historical occurrence and not a progressive theological idea. Nor has this occurrence had any significant clarification through science or technology. So, we can immediately set aside the influence of progressive revelation. This leaves us with what the Bible says and what the descendants of those present at the Last Supper say.

The question is: Did Jesus intend for us to consider the bread and wine to be his actual body and blood? Whatever He intended is what should be adopted as the correct doctrine and tradition of His church.

Going back to the original occurrence, Jesus and the twelve disciples were reclined on the floor celebrating the Passover meal. No, they we’re sitting on chairs before some well proportioned table with fine china in some pristine chapel with stain glass windows. It was a group of Jews in Jerusalem celebrating their heritage as was the custom of the day, and, in fact, is still celebrated by Jews today in what is called the Seder during the Feast of Unleavened Bread.

What were they doing? The institution of the Passover meal is a ceremony of remembrance. This is very important. The Passover meal is a sign and a reminder that the mighty hand of God delivered the Jewish nation out of the bonds of slavery, out of Egypt and into the promise land. This ordinance has been kept from generation to generation from the Exodus to present day.[5]

The meal included the Passover lamb, an unblemished year old male without any broken bones. Unleavened bread and bitter herbs were also served at this meal. No foreigner was allowed to eat this meal, unless he had been circumcised into the Jewish nation. All men had to be circumcised, and all of the congregation of Israel was to celebrate it. On the day of the Last Supper, Jesus celebrated the same meal as did his forefathers and all those in Jerusalem that day. They were all remembering the mighty works of their God.

Now that we have the setting of the original occurrence, we should consult with direct ancestry of those present at the Seder meal that day - the Jewish people, in fact, Messianic Jews (a Jew who believes Jesus is the promised Messiah). In a Messianic Passover meal, the lamb is no longer served because Jesus has become the Passover Lamb.[6] Unleavened bread is served as a reminder that Jesus came to remove our sin, just as yeast is removed from the bread. The bitter herbs (horse radish) is a reminder of how harsh life was for the children of Israel in the land of Egypt - our life, before being set free from the bondage of sin. Anyone who is not a child of God cannot share in this celebration.

Near the end of the meal a special piece of unleavened bread, called the afikomen, is shared just as Jesus shared it with the twelve. As they eat the afikomen, participants meditate on the broken body of the Lamb of God; the taste lingers in their mouths; the words, "do this in remembrance of me," echoes in their minds. Then the cup of redemption is shared as they remember Jesus taking the cup and identifying it with His blood that was shed for the sins of the world. The meal ends with a song.[7]

This Messianic Seder meal is one of Jewish tradition. This tradition has been maintained by God’s chosen people from generations before Christ, through their actual experience with Christ, and onto modern day ritual. It is the most historically and culturally accurate account of what Jesus shared with the twelve, one that is older and truer than any Christian tradition - certainly more substantial than the idea of transubstantiation developed some 1200 years after Christ.

Jesus was a Jew, and He passed on and trusted this tradition, in all its Jewish context, to Jewish believers in order that they may pass it on to the rest of the world. It is a cele-bration of remembrance in which the afikomen (the bread) and the wine are not treated as the actual body and blood of Jesus. Rather, it is a means of remembering what God has done to deliver them not just from their bondage in Egypt but, more importantly, from the bondage of their sin through the body and blood of Christ into everlasting redemption. Anyone would be hard pressed to convince a Messianic Jew that Jesus meant us to understand the bread and wine to be the actual body and blood of Jesus. Transubstantiation is an idea completely out of context and totally neglect of the scriptural account.

Let’s take a look at the text. When we look at the portions of Scripture pertaining to the Eucharist, the Greek word for remembrance (as in Luke 22:19) literally means to wait; it’s an affectionate calling to mind - not just a casual recollection.[8] Jesus told his disciples during the Last Supper to affectionately remember Him in the same context they were remembering what God had done to deliver their ancestors from bondage in Egypt. The great and mighty hand of God delivered them from Egypt as the body and blood of Christ has delivered them from their sin.

I wondered why Jesus would make this meal part of our lives and part of our worship. What would happen if we didn’t partake of this meal? Well, when Israel stopped celebrating the Passover, their whole nation fell apart. For example, recall the condition of Judah before Josiah. Judah turned away from God; they worshipped idols; they consulted mediums and spiritists; they did all kinds of evil in the sight of the Lord. They were a mess. It had been nearly 500 years since they celebrated the Passover; they had forgotten what their God did for them. As a result of their unfaithfulness, they faced God’s judgment. But as soon as the Passover was reinstated and as long as they remembered God’s mighty deliverance, their lives were changed and they lived in safety from God’s judgment.[9] There is great value in commemorating what God has done for us. The value of "do this in remembrance of me" is the experience of God’s favor, a life of peace with God.

Jesus taught in metaphorical terms concerning food and drink of eternal value. He said that if a person would come to him he will never hunger, and if a person believes in him he will never thirst.[10] He describes life giving food and drink in spiritual terms, not physical terms.

How then should we consider what Jesus said - "this is my body...this my blood?" Is He being metaphorical or literal? Well, if we believe Jesus meant for us to take in the bread and wine as His actual flesh and blood, we’ve just sanctioned the closest thing to cannibalism I can think of. It simply doesn’t make sense with the rest of the Scriptures and it doesn’t fit any custom or tradition of Jesus’ day. It actually opposes what Jesus was taught as a Jew.[11] We can trace all of our true Christian traditions to the customs and traditions of Jews, but not transubstantiation.

In the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, and Luke, Jesus is recorded as saying, "this is" my body, in the Greek - "touto esti," which means "this represents." It doesn’t say "touto gignetai," which means "this is turned into." Roman Catholic teaching, once again, has put aside the teachings of Christ for the teachings of men. Jesus didn’t want us to perpetually turn Him into bread and wine for consumption; He wanted us to remember what He endured for our sin:

But He was pierced through for our transgressions, He was crushed for our iniquities; the chastening for our well-being fell upon Him...He was oppressed and he was afflicted.[12]

The first generation of believers understood the bread and wine did not change in substance. Paul teaches the Corinthian church about the manner of ceremony concerning the bread and wine.[13] No mention is made of any change in the elements. Surely if this teaching of transubstantiation was a teaching of Jesus, and if this teaching is "the source and summit of the entire Christian life," we would have much evidence of it in the Pauline writings and also in the writings of those who partook of the Last Supper. But the only men-tion of it at all in Holy Scripture in other than the gospels is a few sentences where Paul teaches the elements remain as they are - bread and wine.

Finally, and probably the most destructive evidence against transubstantiation, is one of the most straightforward commands of our Lord:

You shall not make for yourself an idol, or any likeness of what is in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the water under the earth. You shall not worship them or serve them; for I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children, on the third and the fourth genera-tions of those who hate Me, but showing lovingkindness to thousands, to those who love Me and keep My commandments.[14]

When someone displays bread and wine in elaborate ceremonies and announces that these things are God Almighty and parades them about to be adored by all who would bow down before them, can we not categorically call this idol worship or the worship of a heavenly likeness?

For the sake of exposing the unbridled truth, we must not cover up or rationalize what is clearly an abomination to the Lord. Although, for what I have done, the Vatican condemns me as stated in Trent’s Cannon Law VI:

If anyone shall say that Christ, the only begotten Son of God, is not to be adored in the Sacrament of the Eucharist...nor to be solemnly carried about in processions...and that He is not to be publicly set before people to be adored, and that His adores are idolaters - let him be accursed.

This Eucharistic Adoration doctrine is a mockery of those who abide by the Scriptures, those who stand in obedience to the commandments of God. It is a blatant disregard for the sovereignty of God, the jealous God who demands nothing less than our complete devotion to Him and Him alone. It is blasphemous to kneel before the Eucharist as if it were God.

I’m probably safe in saying that most Catholics have assumed the Church’s teaching to be correct and have never taken the time to understand this doctrine in light of the Scriptures. I’m equally confident that every Catholic would agree that God loves us with a passion we may never fully under-stand. My message for Catholics is to emphasize the importance of taking the time to fully understand the teachings of the Church and to measure these teachings with respect to God’s Word, not to be overruled by traditions of men. God has given us guidelines to follow, commandments to observe in order that our lives may be pure and complete. We would utterly destroy ourselves if God would allow us to carry out our worldly ambitions to fruition. Instead of going our own way, following our man-made traditions and worldly concoctions, we need to love Him. And as evidence of our love we must follow His commands without waver-ing from His Word - the Holy Scriptures.

Is The Bread And Wine A Re-Enacted Crucifixion Of Our Savior?

This re-enactment of the crucifixion is celebrated by Roman Catholics in what is called the Sacrifice of the Mass explained by one author this way:

It is official Catholic doctrine (Council of Trent) that the Mass is a true sacrifice...of expiation for the living and the dead...Christ is the same victim and priest in the Eucharist as he was on the cross...The sacrifice of the cross was a bloody sacrifice; the sacrifice of the Mass is unbloody. Nonetheless, the fruits of the latter sacrifice are the same as those of the former. The sacrifice of the Mass, Trent declared, is properly offered not only for the sins, penalties, satisfactions, and other needs of the faithful who are living but also for the departed in Christ who are not yet fully cleansed. (Decree on the Mass, Chapter II)[15]

There it is; Roman Catholics bring Christ back to the cross every time they have a Mass - countless times each day - to apply credit to our wretched souls, both the living and the dead. To mil-lions it sounds like a workable idea, but how does it measure up to Scripture?

This discussion could come to an abrupt halt by just quoting Hebrews 7-10. But the subject deserves further elaboration.

There are basically three things Roman Catholicism teaches about the Sacrifice of the Mass: 1) At every Mass, by the works of the priest, Jesus is re-crucified as a perpetual sacrifice for the living and the dead. 2) Jesus intended and proclaimed this type of sacrifice. 3) The Sacrifice of the Mass is offered in order to take away sin (among other things).

First of all, there is no longer a need for a sacrificial order of priests. Jesus is our permanent priest.[16] When the New Testament teaches about church leadership, it excludes the priesthood. Christian priests are a Roman Catholic invention, a man-made institution.[17]

Secondly, Jesus isn’t like the priests who were before Him in that He no longer needs to offer routine sacrifices. He made one all-sufficient sacrifice for sin.[18] There are to be no more sacrificial offerings for sin. Thirdly, Jesus did not enter heaven to offer Himself again and again.[19] He appeared before God[20] once and offered Himself as a sacrifice for sin.[21] After He offered His sacrifice, He sat down at the right hand of God[22] and the sacrifice for all sin was complete.

My fourth point is that Jesus, the one who is called the Word (John 1), could not have possibly taught anything that was con-trary to Holy Scripture. To say that He did would be to deny His divine influence on Holy Scripture.

The only meaningful sacrifices that remain in the Christian faith are the spiritual sacrifices of praise[23] and doing good and sharing.[24] Our entire lives should be devoted to presenting ourselves as holy and acceptable to God - this is our full worship of God.

I urge you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God to present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service of worship.[25]

Summary

In summary, when Jesus shared the bread and wine, he didn’t turn it into himself and he didn’t mean for us to. He wanted us to remember what He had done for us, to never forget, to hold on to His mighty works in our lives that we may live accordingly - righteously, in peace, and in safety. It is God’s way we should seek, through the gospel of Jesus Christ. Our man-made traditions are fine as long as they do not conflict with that which is written through the power of the Holy Spirit by those with first-hand knowledge of what Jesus taught.

Those caught up in the Roman system of religion must ask themselves why they follow a system that is in contempt of Scripture. And if they find the Scriptures to be true, they must abandon Catholicism and enter into what God has intended for His children, the body of Christ.

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1. Catechism of the Catholic Church, c.1994, Libreria Editrice Vaticana, Citta del Vaticano, p.334, (1324-1327)
2. Rev. John A., O’Brien, Ph.D., The Faith of Millions, c.1974, Our Sunday Visitor Inc., p.220
3. Loraine Boettner, Roman Catholicism, The Presbyterian and Reformed Publishing Company, c. 1962, pp.168-169
4. ibid. 1, p.347
5. Exodus 12-13
6. 1 Corinthians 5:7; 1 Peter 1:19
7. The Lederer Foundation, The Messianic Passover Haggadah, c.1989
8. James Strong, Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible, Greek Dictionary of the New Testament, Macdonald Publishing Co., p.11; W.E. Vine, Vine’s Expository Dictionary of Old and New Testament Words, Fleming H. Revell Co., c.1981, pp.274-275
9. 2 Kings 22-23 and 2 Chronicles 34
10. John 6:27-35; 4:31-34
11. Leviticus 7:26,27; 17:10,11
12. Isaiah 53:5, 7
13. 1 Corinthians 11:20-34
14. Exodus 20:4-6
15. Richard P. McBrien, Catholicism, Volume II, Winston Press, c.1980, p.763
16. Hebrews 7:23-26
17. Ephesians 4:11, 1 Corinthians 12:28
18. Hebrews 7:27, 10:8-14
19. Hebrews 9:25
20. Hebrews 9:24
21. Hebrews 9:26, 28
22. Hebrews 1:3, 8:12
23. Hebrews 13:15
24. Hebrews 13:16
25. Romans 12:1

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