An honest question for my protestant brothers:
There’s been a lot of talk on a certain set of blogs lately about the Calvinist view of the Eucharistic presence of Christ. I find it very interesting, largely because the way Calvin talks about Jesus in the Eucharist is not entirely un-Catholic. He seems very eager to have more than a spiritual presence, but still a sort of uniting of the bread and wine with Jesus rather than the elements becoming Jesus.
So, there’s a difference, though possibly not insurmountable. Of course, from a Catholic perspective, this is all moot since protestants don’t have priests. For the Catholic, it is absolutely required to have a priest to have the Eucharist. So we can talk all day about what who thinks the Eucharist is and how Christ is present but, as far as the Church is concerned, protestants are not actually celebrating the Eucharist.
My question is this, if three protestants are at home together with a bottle of wine and a loaf of bread and decide to celebrate the Eucharist, use the proper formulae of consecration, whatever you assume needs to be in order is in order, can they do it? Is it the Eucharist? Is a minister required or merely nice to have? If so, who defines what a minister is?
I hope I’m clear that I have no intention of backing protestants into a corner or eliciting a particular reaction. I realize the discussion on Evangelical Catholicity and suchlike is not really a discussion between Catholics and protestants, but until we resolve the difference we have about who can confect the sacrament, any talk between protestants and Catholics about the nature of Christ’s presence in the sacrament seems a bit vapid.
Homesick No More 
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April 18, 2008 at 7:53 am
Matthew N. Petersen
I think there is something substantial to your question, but the problem I have with it is it makes me less Sacramental than I am. If Protestants do not have the Body and Blood of Christ, then either they aren’t saved, or Christ regularly saves people in what strikes me as an impersonal and gnostic way. The Evangelical soteriology that I really dislike is true, at least sometimes. People have their conscious sprinkled, but not by the Cup of the Sacrament. If we confess our sins in an aetherial way (i.e. not to a sensible person) our sins disappear. It is not true, for a substantial number of people, that The Eucharist cleanses our sins when we regularly frequent Confession. “Walking in the Light” and “the blood of Jesus Christ His Son” are, for a substantial number of people, gnostic.
That is, if Protestants don’t have the True Body and Blood of Jesus, it seems that the Christian faith is preferably incarnational, perferably Eucharistic, but not so in itself. But I want to believe that the Christian Faith is by definition Eucharistic. It is the Bread of the Sacrament that gives us access to the Holy of Holies–that is, it is the Body of Christ. It is the Wine of the Sacrament that cleanses us from all sin–that is, it is the Blood of Christ. And it is the Bread of the Sacrament that makes us one people.
In short, though there seems to be something to that question, it seems to imply a shortening of the Eucharist and its centrality. I don’t know that I can explain exactly what I believe, though I did just finish Zizioulas’ Eucharist Bishop Church and I hope to put up a post soon dealing with some of these issues. Perhaps we should stop saying Christ is not limited by the Sacrament of His Body and Blood, and say rather that Christ is not (physically) limited by the Sacrament of Holy Orders. But it seems that just shifts the issue. Instead of the faith being only optionally Eucharistic, it becomes only optionally Episcipocentric, which as you say, is not acceptable.
Anyway, I hope to have a post up relatively soon dealing with some of these issues.
April 18, 2008 at 9:23 am
Thos
“My question is this, if three protestants are at home together with a bottle of wine and a loaf of bread and decide to celebrate the Eucharist, use the proper formulae of consecration, whatever you assume needs to be in order is in order, can they do it? Is it the Eucharist? Is a minister required or merely nice to have? If so, who defines what a minister is?”
No, they cannot. It’s interesting that your question is whether or not a minister is required, because the problem with your hypothetical is that they are not in corporate worship, but in private fellowship.
I knew a Charismatic pastor who encouraged me to have the Lord’s Supper with my friends in our college bible study (gosh 10 years ago!). I was pretty weirded out when he handed me a Lord’s Supper take-home box-kit. I didn’t know at the time why this was wrong. But at any rate, there are some Protestants who certainly would say the three in your hypo can have the Supper. They believe it is a Memorial only. My Baptist-pastor grandfather did this around the table in his home regularly.
But the Reformed, perhaps motivated to refute Catholic private masses, have maintained that it is only proper to celebrate Communion as a part of corporate worship. Without doing lots of homework, my guess is that this is based on their understanding that Graces from the Sacraments are for corporate and not private use.
Your question was a “can they do it”, and in a sense, they can do whatever they want. However, I believe a private use of wine and bread would be improper, and do not believe the Reformed would say that particular sacramental Grace inheres in that event. I do know of Reformed Pastors who have Communion with the sick and shut-in. But before doing this, they will invite the congregation to come attend, thereby making the even corporate, and not private.
Peace in Christ,
Thos.
April 18, 2008 at 9:29 am
Thos
I should add that in the corporate setting, the Reformed teach that their two sacraments may not be “dispensed by any, but by a minister of the Word lawfully ordained.” (Westminster Confession XXIV, 4). So that’s another answer in the negative to your question.
Peace in Christ,
Thos.
April 18, 2008 at 11:59 am
mattyonke
Matt,
Good answer. I’ll get to you later.
Thos,
Your answer seriously misunderstands private masses or, alternately, seriously misunderstands the mass.
The Catholic view is that the Sacrament of the Altar is Christ offered for the whole world. When a priest offers Mass by himself, he is not offering Christ to the Father for himself (the priest), he is offering Christ for the world.
I do understand that the Westminster confession applies that standard, my question is, is it necessary? That is to say, if three of your pentacostal brethren have shared bread and wine and said the words of consecration, have they had the sacrament? or have they only had food?
The question extends itself further when you reckon that some protestant communions don’t have ministerial consecrations at all, such that in some protestant churches, which are churches by every protestant reckoning, there is no “minister” to speak of. What then?
April 18, 2008 at 6:41 pm
Dave Hodges
Petersen said: “If Protestants do not have the Body and Blood of Christ, then either they aren’t saved, or Christ regularly saves people in what strikes me as an impersonal and gnostic way.”
Bingo.
April 18, 2008 at 9:18 pm
Thos
Matt,
“Your answer seriously misunderstands private masses or, alternately, seriously misunderstands the mass.”
My answer does no such thing. I was telling you how the Reformed would view that situation, and added also how the Charismatics and Baptists would. Those people may seriously misunderstand private masses, but my answer does not.
Of course the Reformed position is absolutely opposed to the sacrificial nature of the Eucharist, so it is naturally opposed to private masses (and all masses, their being “damnable idolatries” in Westminster parlance). They retained their own version of the Lord’s Supper, but under their formulation, private communion was a no-no because it’s only rationale would look far too much like the Catholic teaching on the Mass (private or otherwise).
You ask whether it’s necessary to have an ordained minister. I doubt the question has even been considered much, because even the Reformed (contra the Baptists) attach such a lower significance to the event that there is little curiosity over what happened when it might have been invalid. The recipient still thought he was receiving grace, and probably many or most Reformed Christians would say that God can spiritually transmit his grace over a multitude of formal deficiencies.
I would say the Baptists have not partaken of the Sacrament in a way that confers special graces (as the Reformed say happens) because they do not believe that is occurring. The Charismatic/Pentecostal have a more sacramental view that is still quite foreign to me though, so I’d be best not to opine what the Reformed theologian would say occurs there. Again, though, I doubt the pro forma requirement of an ordained minister’s presence would get in the way of a Reformed theologian believing actual grace is conferred in a Pentecostal service IF they have sincere belief that they are receiving Christ’s graces therein.
I sense that you may be driving at something like this: ‘(at least some) Protestants believe communion to be central to the church, but if (perhaps most) Protestants today practice it illegitimately, isn’t the sacramental Protestant church movement broken?
If this sense is remotely close to what you’re getting at, I think you ascribe to Protestants a higher view of the sacraments than is in practice (though not necessarily higher than what was in mind at the time of the Reformation – Zwinglian thought, and perhaps ecclesial liberty in general, has taken its toll). We say there are only two sacraments, but then also speak of the actual grace received from “hearing of the word” (i.e., preaching). And the sermon is the gravamen of every service, whereas communion may be monthly (some churches more, others much less). Greater anxiety would be caused for Protestants upon learning their pastor was teaching something “wrong” out of the Bible than that he was not properly ordained for the communion, or that the words of institution were wrong, etc. In other words, Protestants walk away from church on Sunday morning talking about how to apply the sermon, not about how spiritually filling the communion was that morning (or three weeks ago).
Peace in Christ,
Thos.
April 19, 2008 at 1:18 am
Matthew N. Petersen
Thos,
“Greater anxiety would be caused for Protestants upon learning their pastor was teaching something “wrong” out of the Bible than that he was not properly ordained for the communion, or that the words of institution were wrong, etc.”
I’m not sure that applies to Anglicans, Lutherans, or some Reformed
April 19, 2008 at 2:16 am
Thos
Matt,
I can never nail down whether Anglicans consider themselves “Protestant” or not, but my best guess is that the negative response has a better argument going for it than the positive.
As for Lutherans, you may very well be right. I am guilty of over-generalizations, but to avoid it in the future, I may need to discontinue use of the word “Protestant” altogether.
There are “some Reformed” who will disagree on virtually every level, as I have seen in a major shake up of my own denomination recently. However, for the sake of peace, let me amend my statement as follows:
“It is my opinion, based on my own observations, that a good many Reformed believers see the proper teaching of the Word as a matter of greater ecclesial moment than meeting the formal requirements of the Lord’s Supper, as they are outlined in the Westminster Confession. In other words, my experience tells me that the Reformed clergy and laity would find it to be more of an affront to hear blasphemy preached, than to hear their pastor mistakenly leave out the Trinitarian invocation over the elements of the Sacrament on one given Sunday.”
You know, if my church found out our pastor’s ordination 20 years ago had some technical deficiency (maybe he hadn’t finished 3-credits of his prerequisite M.Div. degree), I believe not a single person would stop to worry that the communion we’ve been receiving all these years was, in terms of Grace, a nullity. I was trying to say nothing more than that. I believe that is what Matt was trying to learn about, and I thought I could help answer.
Peace in Christ,
Thos.
April 19, 2008 at 6:49 am
Matthew N. Petersen
Ok, I have my (quite substantial) <a href=”http://colinclout12.blogspot.com/2008/04/eucharist-bishop-protestants.html.”post up on this. I’m a little tired today, so I’m not sure it’s quite so coherent as it needs to be, particularly in the end.
Thos
Fair enough.
Peace,
Matt
April 19, 2008 at 6:50 am
Matthew N. Petersen
Sorry about that…didn’t finish my code. Is this better?
April 19, 2008 at 6:52 am
Matthew N. Petersen
Sigh. I hate HTML!
April 30, 2008 at 1:41 am
Drew
Hi Matt,
This is Drew Schadegg, the publicist that works with Eric. I ran across your blog and found the coversation interesting. I’m a reformed Protestant, who has moved between the Lutheran, Presbyterian and even Reformed Baptist traditions over the years (I’ve settled in the Presbyterian church). I have a degree in Historical Theology, so this stuff gets me fired up.
What I am interested to hear discussed, is the significance of the Protestant view of the “Priesthood of All Believers.”
Luther states bluntly (as Luther liked to do):
“All Christians are priests, and all priests are Christians. Worthy of anathema is any assertion that a priest is anything else than a Christian.”
This, of course, is a doctrine upheld by all protestants as a central tenet. My understanding has always been that this doctrine would make it acceptable for any group of believers to administer the sacraments. In protestant tradition, the blessing of a minister (such as a sacramental blessing of a priest) does nothing to confer a means of grace on the elements. The means of grace are spirtually present in the elements (though the nuances of this are debated in various protestant circles).
Is communion to be celebrated during corporate worship? The Westminster Confession would say “yes” primarily, however, the definition of corporate may be different depending on the situation. I do not believe it would go against scripture or protestant tradition to say that three believers could participate in the Eucharist in their home.
April 30, 2008 at 4:58 am
Matthew N. Petersen
Drew,
I don’t know that I can comment much on the Protestant view, I do know that many Protestants think the pastors have legitimate authority over the Eucharist, and that only they should celebrate it, but that this issue shouldn’t be addressed as priesthood, but as something else. I’m not sure they would say only they can.
But do have some thoughts about priesthood of all believers that may be relevant.
Revelation 1 clearly says that every Christian is a priest of the Father and the Holy Spirit, and Christ (in the High Priestly Prayer) seems to say that every Christian is a priest of Him as He is a priest of the Father. Priesthood of all believers is a highly Scriptural doctrine.
But if we read scripture carefully, we know that “priesthood of all believers” is an empty statement. Levitical priesthood of all believers? Jethroan priesthood? We are priests. But after what order?
II Corinthians 2:13 says we are transformed into the image of Christ. What sort of priest are we? The same sort Christ is–otherwise we aren’t really His image. As reverge for the calamity she brought on her beloved, the gods cursed Orual, telling her “you too shall be Psyche.” As revenge for the calamity we brought on our Beloved, God cursed us, telling us “you too shall be Jesus.” We are each a priest after the order of Melchizedek. We are called to purify the heavenly tabernacle with our own blood, and offering our flesh and blood as food to our neighbor, purify our neighbor from sin.
That’s why St. Paul can fill up what is behind in Christ’s suffering for the sake of His body, the Church. That’s why St. Therese offers herself as a grape to satisfy the thirst of the dying Christ. That’s why we are a well of living waters. That is why our beloved comes into our garden and eats the spices. that’s why St. Paul commands us to imitate Christ by healing others with our stripes. This Sacrament is the wine Wisdom has mixed, and Christ longs for. It is because of his Melchizedekian priesthood St. Paul, by the power of his own suffering, sent another Comforter to the Corinthians.
But we cannot accomplish our priesthood on our own. We are radically dependent on the Son. We are only priests because Christ lives in us. We cannot stand on our own, but only by leaning on our beloved. “Who is this coming up from the wilderness leaning on her beloved?” We live only be eating the Fruit from the Tree planted by the streams of water flowing forth from the temple.
We need the Bread of life. We need the Blood of Jesus Christ on us, to be cleansed from sin, but also to live, to remain holy, and even, as I Corinthians says, to be Christ.
And we need Christ here to give it. How can we bring, by our own efforts, Christ down from heaven?
And second, our baptism makes us Christ. But it does not make us the full-grown Christ. As Christ was raised by His Mother and Joseph, so we need guardians, shepherds. We need Christ, our Father, to discipline us, and grow us up.
But again, Christ is not here. Christ Himself must be here to feed us and shepherd us. Without him, we are like sheep without a shepherd. Lost in the wilderness with no mana.
But though Christ Himself is not here (in the sense I mean), he has left his children under guardians. And these guardians, priests after the order of St. Peter, have the authority to raise us, and to feed us. But the Petrine priesthood is destined to perish with use, for in the world to come, we shall see Christ face to face.
Unlike the Melchizedekian priest, the Petrine priest does not speak on his own authority, nor offer Himself up, nor feed his flock on his own flesh, but rather acts as the royal envoy, speaking with the voice and authority of the (absent) king, and offering the kings food. It is, as The Catechism of the Catholic Church says, a servant priesthood, instituted to enable each Christian to realize his priesthood. And as I said above, though all Christians have the greater priesthood, we do not all have the authority to act as guardians of the Church.
May 1, 2008 at 6:53 am
Thos
Drews,
You said “My understanding has always been that this doctrine [the priesthood of all believers, would] make it acceptable for any group of believers to administer the sacraments.”
I said in my second post here on the 18th that I think not. Well, yes and no might be a better way to respond.
The Westminster Confession, major expression of Reformed faith, requires an ordained minister for communion. So if “any group” in your statement includes a small bible study of laity, I believe they would be outside the Reformed tradition to have communion.
But I would certainly agree with you that the grace we say is inherent in the sacrament does not appear on account of the power of the ordained pastor. So a seeming conflict? It tells me that the Westminster requirement is one of ‘good order and discipline’, not one of sacramental efficacy. So, for that matter, a group that practiced otherwise is not, as a rule, missing out on the grace (since the pastor is not, as a rule, putting in the grace). But the Reformed do seem to see the ordainer minister’s role as special.
Your statement also seems right in this sense: if “any group” means any body of Christians forming itself into a church. The Reformed view is that our pastors’ ordinations are made valid by the calling body, the people. This is the “bottom-up” nature of our polity to a tee. So maybe the bible study of laity can’t have ‘valid’ communion without a pastor, but they can validly call a pastor if they form into a church.
Peace in Christ,
Thos.
August 20, 2008 at 1:49 am
Ash
I know I’m incredibly late Matt.. but it just occurred to me, Jesus said where two or three are gathered together in my Name, there I will be, in the midst of them. _
–Matthew 18:20
For where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them.
Root word being Mesos which means, “Middle”, “Among” or “the Midst”. Hmm.. sounds like a literal presence to me. Maybe I’m just stupid though. I mean, there have been Popes for hundreds of years, many score my years, who have had much more experience in brainwash–oops, I mean studying and teaching others then I. But let us ponder the fact that if ‘I’ (pope bishop ect ect) am the only one who can ‘summon’ our Lord, then I have every control over ‘you’ (the people) and can make you hop, skip, eat dirt, whatever- because of the sole fact that I am the only one who can bring the access to the divine and redemptive savior that you need to gain LIFE (not to mention keep your tongue, or your lands and property and let us not forget the fact that ‘I’ won’t allow the translation of the Scriptures into a form that you can read to know for yourself what is required of you for salvation–). The savior who incidentally made it possible for ALL to come to the throne of God, and have a personal relationship with no need for Levitical red tape. Why else would Christ die, ifnot to do away with the need for a Priest?
Ahh, Priests……what of “Do not call anyone Father, but your Father in Heaven”?
–Matthew 23:9
And call no man your father upon the earth: for one is your Father, which is in heaven.
The root word, is Pater, which has a long list of sub-meanings but basically from what I’ve found is this..
1. Paternal father (or ancestor or paternal figure take your pick)
2. a title of honor
3.the originator and transmitter of anything
I guess that sums it up.. how very unfortunate to all of us out here who have called our sire ‘Father’ over the centuries. Cause it couldn’t possibly be the Title of Honor that is in question.. *gasp*
Should we throw out these things just because a ‘p-e-r-s-o-n’ said that it was ok? I just don’t understand Catholics, but then again I don’t really understand Protestants either. Both seem to have a bunch of babble and smoke and mirrors when it comes to something that they find uncomfortable.
Who would have ever thought I’d debate doctrine again, HA! This has been a strange day.
Cheers!
August 20, 2008 at 2:19 am
Ash
Oops, I should clarify, not root word but original word or “Original Greek” (that sounds better)… DUH. Root would be the original to the original lol Dumb moment. Sorry.