But it is simply wheat vs. rice! Wheat vs. rice! God doesn't care a whit about wheat vs. rice, but the Church does. And that is the problem.
Well, Christ used wheat, sorry, but thats the way it went in the Bible. There's something different in wheat vs. rice anyway, because its not just wheat, but unleavened bread, which if you listen to the Eucharistic Prayer, "work of human hands" which is really important, that something that grows from the Earth, is then cultivated by man into Bread to nourish himself, and then transubstatiated into the Body and Blood of Christ. I think if Chirst, as a member of the godhead and Holy Trinity, cared a whit to use bread, then the church should care enough to understand why, and to cultivate that thought in its doctrines about what is the central aspect of the Catholic Faith.
This sort of unbendable rigidity is why people are turned off by the Church and leave for the Diet Coke of Catholicism known as the Episcopalian Church.
If Jesus had lived in Viet Nam, wouldn't he have used rice instead of wheat? I guess that wasn't part of God's plan....
It doesn't. One interesting point of note is that, prior to Vatican II, the Church was still growing. After Vatican II membership has consistently gone down. So whether coincidental or directly related, things have gotten worse for the Church since they became less rigid.
before vatican 2 masses were held in latin and the priest had his back to the parish. the girl was offered the wine as a substitute. first communion wine is more parts cordial than wine anyway. communion being unleavened bread is important i think. the mother's just being difficult.
that's not true...there's Christian activity in the first century noted...obviously, in the Book of Acts...the letters of Paul which talk about goings-on in the early churches that date as some of the oldest in the Bible...but I've read books about first century churches and their creeds, in particular.
honestly...i don't think anything is more important than my relationship with Christ. that anything includes wheat. this is uber-legalism on par with the Pharisees, in my view. i'm sure that sounds super harsh...but that's truly what I believe.
Agreed, 110%. That's one of the things that made me leave the Catholic church -- so much emphasis on form and hierarchy over substance. Not acceptable, IMO.
You can have either the wine or the wafer, or both, for communion. The mother is not allowing her daughter to have the wine because "she doesn't approve of giving alcohol to children." She is denying her child communion also.
You misunderstood. I am talking about organized activity, meaning a kind of standardization. Acts was written late first century and it speaks of lack of accord. Regardless, the older the New Testament writings get, the more specific they get about "churches," suggesting that they took a while to develop. In many instances, Christians were practicing their faith in Jewish Synagogues, just with somewhat separate worship. So this is not clear cut and is the subject of great debate with scholars. This is not something radical I am promoting. Again, the archeological record doesn't show anything we can identify as "Christian-used" until Dura-Europos of ~250 and even it looks mostly like a synagogue. We know that houses and apartments were used as well, so that would have been where activity was concentrated. No Church hierarchies, just "leaders" who were "touched by the holy spirit" and certainly no real cohesion of ritual. That is why I said there was nothing we know for the first century with regards to communion. Would you mind pointing me to a book about first century church creeds?
I don't know if there was cohesion of ritual. i'm not sure there's real cohesion of ritual among Christians, today, frankly. yes...one of the books I read was called The Historical Jesus. It spends some time on creeds, if I remember right. Of course, many of those creeds are cited in Paul's earliest letters. that's a pretty good book...but i say that with some hesitation because i know we often have different tastes.
Where did you see that the number of Catholics has consistently gone down since Vatican II (~1965)? According to the Vatican, the number of Catholics doubled between 1961 and 2001.
Actually Max, I'd agree with you that Uber-Legalism is definitely something you don't want in a religion. However, I'd argue that the teachings on the Eucharist don't fall under that. For Catholics, the Eucharist is the Central point of our liturgy and one of our three mysteries. Therefore, it is important to gain an understanding of why it must be unleavened bread, why the Priest must say the same words Christ said and why it is so important to us as members of the Catholic Church. It is mana from Heaven that God chooses to give the Jews on their Exodus from Egypt; it is bread and wine that Melchizedek brings out in Genesis, and it is Bread and wine that Christ uses in the Last Supper. So one element of using Bread and Wine comes straight from the Bible. Another reason why we use Bread is that Catholics are not repeating the sacrifice of Christ every time we have Communion and the Eucharistic Prayer. That Sacrifice only happened once, and it is that sacrifice we continue to take part in, so to change the elements of that sacrifice just isn't possible. It's simply not symbolic for Catholics, it is the real and true prescence of Christ, the original sacrifice made upon Calvary. Uber-Legalism for me is when groups get upset about kneeling, different prayers, being said, the language a mass is said in. That was the great thing about Vatican II, was that it realized a lot of the Legalisms that had been going on and really opened up the Church to a lot more people.
I have to disagree TWHY77. Legalism is any ritual, rite, tradition that does anything other than remind us how much Christ did for us and draws us closer to him. The actual words, instruments, things involved in this reminder are irrelevant. Christ didn't die for everyone except those who can't eat wheat. I actually think it sorrows him that we would even argue this. The people that Christ publicallly condemned the most were those that put ritual over love. That put the letter of law over the needs of a human being. In France in the early part to this century there was a Friar who was known for helping the poor. One night a poor family came knocking on his door. The only open spot to sleep was were the Holy Eucharist was stored. So the Friar moved the eucharist to the attic and let the family sleep there. The next day the other Friars awoke and were very angry. How dare he put the body of Christ in a cold attic. His answer was "Christ is not cold in that Eucharist but he was cold in the body of that child" I may have butchered the story (it appears in Brenan Mannigns book the Wisdom of Tenderness).
The rather large one by Jean Dominic Crosson? If so, I have read some of his other stuff, but not that one. He is generally pretty good. bobrek, I read that more than one place but cannot remember. Perhaps it was just talking about membership in the US. That would make sense because I know Catholocism is thriving in the "3rd World," although it is a much different kind of animal.
I'm not trying to disagree with you on any of these points except the fact that the child is eating wheat, because if she is Catholic, then she believes she is eating the actual body and blood of Christ. To deny that would be to deny that the real presence of Christ is present in the Eucharist, which pretty much throws the whole Church out of whack. This is something established by Christ, and in tradition with the Bible. And that story is kind of wierd, the only place to sleep was the Tabernacle? That's kind of a small space, I mean I'm not trying to question the validity of that story it just seems wierd that the only place to sleep would be inside the Tabernacle, a very small space in most Churches....
