non-Catholics and communion on the Camino

[Donald Schell]

Dear Gene,

> Just to round out your message, Jeff, transubstantiation is both dogma and
> doctrine of the Roman Catholic Church. First adopted in 1215 by the fourth
> Lateran Council, it was reconfirmed by the Council of Trent in 1551,
> reconfirmed repeatedly since then by church leaders and theologians, and
> affirmed again in Pope Paul VI's encyclical Mysterium Fidei as recently as
> 1965. The doctrine was declared as essential to the faith of the Orthodox
> Church in 1672.

The 1672 reference is to the Confession of Dositheus, Patriarch of
Jerusalem.  It's the first time any Orthodox teacher used such language and
he did so specfically to repudiate his predecessor who had been, though the
Patriarch of Jerusalem, a very eager student of the writings of John Calvin.

I offer this on Dositheus' 1672 language from Fr. John Meyendorff, a noted
Orthodox priest and scholar who was for many years dean of St. Vladimir's
Seminary in Crestwood, New York,

"Orthodox teaching always has emphasized the reality of the sacramental
change (METABOLE) in the Eucharist, by which the bread and wine are
transformed into the Body and Blood of Christ.  However, neither the
Orthodox liturgy nor the Fathers nor any authentic text prior to the
Sixteenth Century uses the term 'transubstantiation' (Greek METOUSIOSIS) to
describe this mystery.  The term is employed in later Orthodox confessions
of faith intended to define the teaching of the Church with respect to
Protestant opinions on this matter, but there is always the reservation that
the term is only one of sevferal that could be employed and does not imply
that the Church intends to adopt the Aristotelean philosophical theory of
form and matter."
John Meyendorff, The Orthodox Church, p. 72

> The dogma has been repudiated by the Church of England.

And yes, while that is formally true, Anglicans/Episcopalians have
consistently taught and believed the Christ is truly present in the
Eucharist, so the argument is about the necessity (or even adequacy) of the
particular Aristotelean definition.    It is also true that ARCIC, a
commission of Roman Catholic and Anglican scholars formulated an agreed on
understanding of Eucharistic presence in the last twenty years.

I'm sorry that this is all a little obscure and remains in the realm of
controversy.  What seems quite clear to me is that the pilgrim practice and
experience of walking together patiently and in love reveals a great deal
more about our Christian and human unity than our historical arguments about
doctrine.

I offer this irenically and hope the conversation can accept it as such
where we meet in a spirit of peace and delight in mysteries deeper than we
can speak.

Donald Schell


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