Transubstantiation

In this episode, Alex Nash and Mark Sell continue their series examining Catholic doctrines through the lens of Scripture, turning their attention to Transubstantiation — the teaching that the bread and wine of the Eucharist are miraculously transformed into the literal body, blood, soul, and divinity of Christ.

They begin with recent news from the Catholic world, including the Society of St. Pius X’s upcoming consecration of bishops and a Swiss diocese’s ruling on parishioners sharing consecrated hosts with their dogs. From there, they define the doctrine using Catholic sources and the Council of Trent, address claimed Eucharistic miracles, and compare transubstantiation with related views like consubstantiation, the “real presence,” and the symbolic understanding held by many evangelicals.

A major portion of the episode is devoted to careful, verse-by-verse examination of the key biblical passages: John 6, Luke 22, and 1 Corinthians 10–11. Alex and Mark explain why they believe these texts point to a spiritual, symbolic, and memorial observance rather than a literal change in substance — while emphasizing the deep reverence believers should have for the Lord’s Supper as a proclamation of Christ’s death.

They also discuss the historical development of the doctrine, insights from the Church Fathers, and the broader implications of transubstantiation, including Eucharistic adoration, processions, and the practical consequences of believing the elements remain the physical presence of Christ.

As always, the conversation is grounded in Scripture, respectful yet direct, and aimed at helping listeners clearly understand what the Bible teaches on this important subject.

Tune in for a thoughtful, biblically-centered exploration of one of Catholicism’s most distinctive doctrines.

Next episode: Baptismal Regeneration.

Transcript

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SPEAKER_00 0:00

Acts 2, 42. And they continued steadfastly.

SPEAKER_01 0:05

Jeremiah and Ibn Belech both said two words. They said, Yes, Lord.

SPEAKER_00 0:15

Steadfastly in the apostles' doctrine and fellowship. You study him. You read the scriptures, you read the four gospels, you trace his steps, you hear his words, you see his works, you see the compassion and the love of his father. And in breaking of bread, he is all together. Lovely. And in breaking of bread and in prayers.

SPEAKER_04 0:45

Well, we've been on this uh journey for a little bit now, Mark, um going through these different points of doctrine with Catholicism. And uh we really have, as we've been talking about, two more to cover here. The one today would be transubstantiation, and then our next one and final one will be on the subject of baptismal regeneration. Um these last two we've kind of saved for the end, and they're a little bit different, in my opinion, anyway, than all the ones that we've covered up to this point. I think the ones that we've covered up to this point, I've really struggled to see a coherent Catholic defense for the different points, you know, the Pope or Praying to Mary or any of these kinds of things. I mean, there's verses you can take and leverage out of context, but it seems to me anyway, really obvious that they're being taken out of context. But in these last two, in transubstantiation and in baptismal, maybe especially in baptismal regeneration, there are definite verses where a Catholic could read you a verse and could say, How come you don't believe what the scripture says? And you've got to be able to look down at your Bible and read it and understand what it what it means and not play any games, if you will, with it, or not say, Well, it can't mean this, and so, et cetera. So we really want to spend time in the Word today and really go through uh these verses that really do present a very strong uh case, if you will. Now, before we get into our episode today, there's been, I mean, there's a new Pope, and there's been all kinds of things happening within Catholicism. And I know, Mark, we talked about you going over just a couple of current events and kind of highlighting them briefly just for interest's sake for anyone who's following some of these things.

SPEAKER_02 2:41

Yes, I have two news stories. Um, one of them is not really related to our subject, but it's so important and so current that I just wanted to make a brief mention of it first, and that is uh coming up on July 1st, which is just less than a month from now, the Society of St. Pius X is going to consecrate four new bishops. And this is a very significant story because uh they are going to consecrate these bishops without papal mandate, which means that while the consecrations themselves will be valid, they will be illicit. They will not have papal permission. And this is very significant because the Society of Pape Pope Pius X is the largest traditionalist Catholic uh organization, uh you might say, in the world. It's a worldwide organization. They have over 700 priests, they have um six international seminaries with uh almost, I believe, almost 300 seminarians. They have about 300 uh sisters and nuns. They have they are in dozens of countries and they have hundreds of chapels and hundreds of thousands of lay loyal followers. The Society of St. Pius X was founded in uh 1970 by the late Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre, and it has just grown in leaps and bounds because so many uh Catholics have rejected the modernist uh changes that came in after the Vatican II Council of between 1962 and 1965. And so um this group has a long history since 1970 of being having a lot of conflicts with the Vatican, and it's all coming to a head now. And the Vatican has made it clear, uh the Pope Leo has made it clear through his spokesperson, Cardinal Um Victor Emanuel Fernandez, who's the prefect for the Dicaster for the Doctrine of the Faith, made it clear to the society that if they go through with these consecrations, not only will the two bishops that they currently have be excommunicated, but so will also the four new bishops that they create and possibly any priests who, not necessarily, but possibly any priests who, by continuing their ministry, show that they are in fellowship with this um schism, which is what the what the Vatican is calling it as a schism. So this will this will have monumental effects. This is this will rock the Catholic world uh coming up July 1st, unless something changes between now and then. This will be a huge uh severance of a very large portion of the Catholic Church, the most traditionalist part of it. And um it's it's a big deal. It's a big deal. So we're looking to see what happens there. And I would just say a lot of Catholics are not aware of these things, but then if they really they need to keep up with the news and see that all is not so unified, this this veneer of unity in the Catholic Church is a complete fallacy. Uh there's a lot of infighting and arguments between them, and this is a real manifestation of that. And the second news story, this is a quickie, has to do with our subject today. And I'm not bringing up this news story for sensationalism or saying this is with, you know, some from some Protestant source to make fun of Catholics. This is reported in uh at least three Catholic news outlets, probably more, but I have three that I recorded here. Um first one called The Pillar, and the headline is Swiss Catholics out of doghouse over Eucharistic desecration. And the next one is from Catholic World News, and the headline reads, Dog owners who shared the Eucharist with their pets are not excommunicated. Swiss bishop rules. And then the third one is from the Catholic Herald. And the headline, this is from April 28th, by the way, very current, fairly current, April 28th, 2026. Swiss Diocese says dog host incident did not incur excommunication. And I'll just read a real quick synopsis of this story. A Swiss Catholic diocese has concluded the three parishioners who shared consecrated hosts with their dogs during a liturgy last year did not incur automatic excommunication, ruling that the act, while deeply regrettable, lacked the sacrilegious intent required under canon law. The ruling was issued under the authority of Bishop Joseph Bonemain, who serves the diocese of Cher after the episode occurred during a blessing of animals on October 4th at a parish in Zurich. According to the diocesan statement, poor weather led organizers to move the event indoors and combine it with a Eucharistic celebration during which three individuals gave portions of the consecrated host to their pets. Well, that's just a synopsis of that story. And it's important, it may sound like kind of crazy, but uh it really does pertain to our subject today. The implications of that, which we'll talk about more as we go along.

SPEAKER_04 8:06

And just for clarity, a consecrated host would be equivalent to what we would call the bread on the table at the Lurse. Correct. Correct. Okay. Well, thank you for those. Um it's always interesting. You always come to me and we talk about kind of different things that are happening within Catholicism. I think it's very interesting, and I appreciate you sharing that with our listeners. Um, in terms of what a Catholic believes, we're gonna jump into this a little bit, and we need to define transubstantiation. I think people generally, at least most people probably on this podcast know what transubstantiation is, but we're gonna let a Catholic define it. So this is from Catholic Apologists, a book that I read in preparation for this whole series. Quote Through this miracle, God causes the appearances of bread and wine to remain, but replaces the underlying underlying reality that unites these appearances, the substance, with the body and blood of Christ. That's why Catholics teach that during the consecration at Mass, the bread and wine transubstantiate or change in substance into the body and blood of Christ. This explains how we can consume what appear to be bread and wine and still be faithful to Jesus' command to eat his flesh and drink his blood. So that's from an apologist. Here is from an actual canon from the Council of Trent. This is church law. Quote: If anyone shall have denied that in the sacrament of the most holy Eucharist are contained truly, really, and substantively the body and blood together with the soul and divinity of our Lord Jesus Christ, and consequently a whole Christ, but shall have said that they are only in it as a sign or a figure, let him be anathema. So this is something where what I believe would incur an anathema. I mean, almost all these ones that we've talked about, if you believe something different than the Catholics, there's somewhere that says, let him be anathema. Well, this certainly is the case here. The council, the catechism of the council trend is basically like a teaching booklet, I understand, that goes with um with that state clearly that it is it includes his bones, his nerves, his soul, and his divinity. Now, um I know that there have been different instances. We talked about this a little bit with Mary, uh Corpus Christi. So in 1263, this German priest named Peter of Prague was on a pilgrimage to Rome. He was celebrating Mass in Bolsena, Italy, and he struggled with doubt regarding the doctrine of transubstantiation, which, you know, we all would understand, questioning if the bread and wine actually changed in the body and blood of Christ. So, according to these accounts, what happened was that immediately after the priest said the words of consecration, uh, the body or the blood began to bleed from the consecrated host, that's the bread, onto the linen cloth that's used on the altar. The priest then reported this to Pope Urban IV, who happened to be nearby in Orvieto, and the Pope ordered an investigation to deem that it was a real miracle, and that is part of the basis behind celebration and the feast and everything else of Corpus Christi.

SPEAKER_02 11:09

Yes, I think what you just mentioned there is um one of the so-called Eucharistic miracles. Yeah. Perhaps the earliest one from Lanciano, Italy, around 750 AD, as when that uh incident allegedly occurred. Um might just pause here since you brought up the subject to mention a little bit more about Eucharistic miracles. Uh there have been many of them claimed, but some of the more famous ones are the one you just mentioned. Also, the one in the Center in Portugal in 1247, a woman attempting to cure her husband stole a consecrated host, which began to bleed, leaving visible blood on her and her husband and a container. More recently in Buenos Aires, Argentina, 1996, a discarded host turned into a bloody substance, which later was found by experts to contain white blood cells, red blood cells, and heart tissue that was still living, allegedly. Medical examiners found the tissue was indistinguishable from damaged human heart muscle tissue, allegedly. And one more in Tikstila, Mexico in 2006. During mass, a host began to bleed, with analysis revealing that the tissue was heart muscle and that the blood originated from the interior. I might just say a few things about these alleged miracles. Interestingly, all of these hosts with reddish stains are said to be blood type A B, which is consistent with other blood-stained relics, such as the Shroud of Turin. Type A B blood is relatively rare, and this supposedly proves that they are all the true blood of Christ. Because how else can you explain why they all are type A B blood? If people were perpetrating hoaxes, for example, putting blood on hosts, we would expect to see other blood types show up, right? But the reason for this is simply, as I understand it, that these stains are are they not blood at all. And when you test non-blood substance for blood type, the results often exhibit a false positive AB, particularly in the case of bacterial contamination. Also, no human DNA is present on these hosts except for minuscule amounts, which would result from contamination from like handling the hosts. So the truth is these stains on a host are actually mold or bacteria. The scientists who authenticate these miracles, so-called, are usually Roman Catholics who simply run tests assuming that the substance is blood. Their research is never subjected to peer review, nor published in any respected peer-reviewed scientific journals. So there's really no reason why we should take any of these seriously, in my view. But many Catholics put a lot of stock in these things, these kinds of things that are just wildly out there.

SPEAKER_04 14:15

Yeah, so there's definitely some that are hoaxes, some that are this kind of mold or whatever, you know, you drop a host on the floor and mold eventually gets to it and whatever else. Anyways. So I'm gonna just run through really quickly, and this is more just for curiosity. I'm gonna take like 30 seconds on this, but there are two other terms aside from transubstantiation that we should know. One is consubstantiation. This is uh sometimes associated with Martin Luther. Uh it said, you know, he believed consubstantiation. All consubstantiation is, is you're just making so a Catholic said it changes in its substance, but the accident remains. It's it's this whole Platonic kind of view where, you know, the actual substance of the host changes into the full body, like the whole person of Christ is there, but he sort of projects this bread-like substance that we actually you know can taste, touch, feel, or whatever else that it really is Christ, but it looks, tastes, you know, under a microscope, feels like bread. Go ahead.

SPEAKER_02 15:25

You describe that as consubstantiation?

SPEAKER_04 15:27

No, that's transubstantiation. Oh, yeah, correct. Yeah. Yeah. That's transubstantiation. Consubstantiation would be saying, no, it really is bread, but there's it mixes in. The presence of Christ. The presence of Christ and remains, but it remains bread. Yeah, correct. So consubstantiation is it's just taking transubstantiation and sort of taking one step back, if you will. Yeah. Yeah. From from that. But it's still the person of Christ is there. Um, it's, you know, quote, in with or under the elements uh is kind of a thing. Basically, we don't know where he is, but we know he's around here somewhere. And so when you eat it, you're eating him, etc. And then there's real presence. Um, this would be more like the Calvin side of things, more a little bit further downstream from Luther, when you take essentially even another step back. It's it's the concept that no, the bread and the wine are really bread and wine, they stay bread and wine. No, you don't have the body and blood of Christ there on the table, but you're kind of, as you eat it, you are spiritually sort of, I'm just gonna put it in really crass terms. If you will, you're sort of catapulted into heaven and you are in a spiritual sense eating the body and blood of Christ, but only in a spiritual sense. And then meanwhile, on earth, you're going through this motion of eating, you know, what remains bread and wine. That would be real presence. So it's not important for anyone to understand this. It's just if you hear these terms, they're each kind of transubstantiation is the furthest out there. And then these are each kind of a step back, but they're all had the same thing where in some way or other you're actually eating the body and blood of Christ, either spiritually, physically, either, et cetera.

SPEAKER_02 17:14

Aaron Powell And the term real presence applies to all three of those, actually. Yes, that's true. It's just that the the third one you mentioned, uh Calvin, or a lot of Presbyterians teach, is the most reduced version of that real presence. Correct.

SPEAKER_04 17:30

And then you have um the symbolic view, which is what a lot of evangelicals believe. It would be what you and I would believe, which is that the bread and the wine are there, and they are symbols and only symbols of the body and blood of Christ. And that is what we eat. We eat the symbol of the body of Christ, we eat the symbol of the blood of Christ. And so we uh we'll get into more a little bit what that means. It isn't like it just means nothing because it's just a symbol or something like that. It means a great deal, and we are to treat it with respect because it is a symbol of a most holy thing. But it is just a symbol, if you want to put it that way. So those are kind of the different views. Um we obviously are coming to it with with our own particular view, but um, we want to look at the scripture and really in a careful way examine and challenge our own view in terms of what it says. And we're gonna start here, maybe in not the most obvious place. We're gonna start in John chapter 6. And the reason I'm gonna start in John 6 is because it provides a little bit of a backdrop. And I'm just gonna say at the outset that not every Catholic would take John 6. In fact, many would not take John 6 and apply it to transubstantiation and would kind of properly uh put it in its place. But many others do, right? Aaron Ross Powell, Jr.

SPEAKER_02 19:02

Well, I think most modern ones do. But as you say, in the Middle Ages there were a considerable number of Catholic theologians who did not view John 6 as referring to the Eucharist.

SPEAKER_04 19:14

So what we want to do is we want to go through John 6 and really see what it's saying, because I'm just gonna skip to one of the verses that sounds pretty defined. And this is gonna be John 6, verse 53. So Jesus said to them, Truly I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in yourselves. He who eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day. For my flesh is true food, and my blood is true drink. He who eats my flesh and drinks my blood abides in me and I in him, et cetera, et cetera. Now, if you just take that and you lift that section out, I mean you can see where you could say, okay, it seems awfully important to eat the flesh of the Son of Man and to drink his blood. And he's saying, My flesh is true food and my blood is true drink, and my goodness, you know, I think maybe we've got this wrong. Now, I had those thoughts years ago. And um, go ahead, Mark.

SPEAKER_02 20:22

Well, I just want to say those words of the Lord Jesus, except you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you. Um, I believe those words with all my heart. Absolutely, I believe those words. Um and the question is, what do they mean? Right. And that's what we that's what we need to get down to here. But it's very clear in the context. We will, as we go through this, we'll see what exactly is meant by those words. But they're precious. I mean, it's true. Except you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you. And whoever does eat the flesh eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, he said. Uh, those are those are precious words, a precious promise that we can we can hold on to and and enjoy.

SPEAKER_04 21:09

Amen. So we're gonna go back to the beginning of this chapter, and we don't have time to go through every verse or anything like that, but we're just gonna try to see some of the highlights. So in the beginning of this chapter, he feeds the 5,000. And then he leaves, he he basically goes through the night, he gets away from the crowd, and then he's preaching, and they show up and they start to have this conversation. So the setup of it is um verse 25. When they found him on the other side of the sea, they said to him, Rabbi, when did you get here? And then uh verse 26, Jesus answered them and said, Truly, truly, I say to you, you seek me not because you saw signs, but because you ate the loaves and were filled. Do not work for the food which perisheth, but for the food which endures to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give to you, for on him the Father God. God has set his seal. So they're looking for food. They just got a apparently probably really, I don't know what it tasted like, but I assume just like bread and everything else, probably really good bread since the Lord multiplied the loaves and whatnot. And they ate it and they're hungry and they come and right away they're saying well, sorry, right away the Lord is speaking to them and telling them, you know, you're not seeking me because I did a wonderful miracle and you see my power and you want to understand it. You're seeking me because you want to eat some food, right?

SPEAKER_02 22:38

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 22:40

Which any of us might do, you know, we might think, wow, you know, that was incredible. I'd like to see that again. And so they ask him, what are we going to do that we might work the works of God? And then Jesus, right away, he says, This is the work of God that you believe on him whom he has sent. And then you see that they're hungry, and that I I take it that they're just a hungry crowd with food on their mind. And so they right away they say, Well, what then do you do for us signs that we may see and believe you? You know, well, he had just done like the 5,000 people fed, you know, the day before. But anyways, they asked, and then right away they say, you know, our fathers ate manna in the wilderness, as it is written, he gave them bread out of heaven to eat. So I take it that what they were saying is they were kind of suggesting, could you do another bread miracle where we get a really big meal, but this time make it fall out of heaven? I take it that that's what they're suggesting. You know, if you do that sign, well, we'll believe you then, you know, for sure. And so the Lord says, Truly, truly, I say to you, it is not Moses who gave you that bread, but my father who gives you the true bread of out of heaven. And the bread of God is that which comes down out of heaven, gives life to the world. They say, Well, please, we we want this bread. And then he says to them that famous verse, I am the bread of life. He who comes to me will not hunger, he who believes in me will never thirst. And so this I take as a key to this whole passage.

SPEAKER_02 24:07

It is a key, yes.

SPEAKER_04 24:09

So if he says, I am the bread of life, and he says, If you come to me, you will not hunger, then logically coming must mean that you eat, right? In this kind of a sense. That's the way I take it. Because then you won't be hungry. So therefore, eating equals coming to Christ. And then he says, He who believes in me will never thirst. So believing equals drinking of Christ. I mean, just logically, that has to be what it means. And the Lord, I think he continues in this kind of a way, and they start to grumble and they start to complain. Um, so in verse 41, the Jews were grumbling because he says, I'm the bread that came down out of heaven. They're saying, you know, I did we didn't see him descend out of heaven. You know, he has a father and mother that we know about and everything else. And the Lord kind of is is is working with them. We have a lot of these verses, and he tells them explicitly as it goes on, verse 48 I am the bread of life. Your fathers ate the manna in the wilderness, and they died. This is the bread which came down out of heaven so that one may eat of it and not die. I am the living bread that came down out of heaven. If anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever. And the bread also which I will give for the life of the world is my flesh. So it seems to me that what is happening is that the Lord has explained what he means. He has said, You need to believe on me. They said, Well, we want to see a miracle. He said, I am the miracle. I'm the bread of life that came down like manna out of heaven. You need to believe on me, you need to come to me, you won't hunger, you won't thirst. And he's not talking about, you know, your stomach grumbling. He's talking about hunger and thirsting for righteousness, etc. And this conversation kind of continues and it builds to this point where the Lord um states very clearly, out of this context, those verses that we already read, my flesh is meat indeed, my blood is drink indeed. You have to eat and drink my blood, or you don't have life in you. Is that how you understand all that, Mark? Do you want to add anything to that?

SPEAKER_02 26:22

I do, I do. And um I think it's pretty clear to uh when we come to the Lord Jesus, we that is the partaking of his flesh, when we believe on him, that is drinking of his blood. It's very plainly. And another key verse uh which uh I believe really he kind of wraps things up in this subject is verse 63, where he says, It is the spirit that quickeneth, the flesh profiteth nothing. The words that I speak unto you, they are spirit and they are life. You know, because a lot of those who were present there were being scandalized by the way he was speaking. So he kind of clarifies, I believe, in the in these words that he's saying, look, look, this is spiritual talk. This is this is not to be taken literally. I'm speaking spiritually, the words that they and it so it's the words, it was his words that conveyed life when they were believed, when they were mixed with faith. And um we see we see in here too that when he says, um, when he says, He that eateth of this bread shall live forever in verse 58, well no Catholic believes that because uh living forever means everlasting life. It means life everlasting, it lasts forever. If by by eating the Eucharist you receive everlasting life, um, well, you would never need to go back and do it again. You would have everlasting it would, you know, one portion would be enough. Uh so so they don't really believe the words of the Lord Jesus. And as you know, it says too, I will raise him up at the last day. It it guarantees the resurrection, too. But so these two keys, the the first one that by coming to him and believing in him is how we partake of his body and his blood. And then that the words that I speak unto you, they are spirit and they are life, because the flesh profit, it's nothing. I think these are both keys to understanding this passage. He's that he's speaking spiritually, and it's his words that convey life.

SPEAKER_04 28:27

Yeah, I I think that's very good. And I mean, if if it does just mean that you have to eat a consecrated host and then you're saved for forever, which if you follow that, that's what it has to mean, then just give consecrated host to everybody in the world, and everybody's gonna go to heaven. They're forced to, right? Because if you eat my flesh, I will raise you up at the last day. If that's what he means, eat this flesh, well then just go break into a Catholic church in the middle of the world. Correct.

SPEAKER_02 28:53

It doesn't even say that it requires faith.

SPEAKER_04 28:56

Right. It just says do it. Right. So clearly in the context, this stands not opposed to all the other scriptures where it is belief that is the key to salvation. This is not somehow uh a switcheroo, you know, where it's now you have to do this extra thing, which is get to, you know, an event where you know there's a consecrated host. So that's John 6. Um, let's go on to Luke chapter 22. And this again would be a verse that would would look, you know, in some sense very clear. So um I'm just gonna read a few verses. We know this very well. Um when this is gonna be Luke 22, verse 17. This is at the Last Supper. When he had taken the cup and given thanks, he said, Take this and share it among yourselves, for I say to you, I will not drink of the fruit of the vine from now on until the kingdom of God comes. And when he had taken some bread and given thanks, he broke it and gave to them, saying, This is my body which is given for you. Do this in remembrance of me. And in the same way he took the cup after he had eaten, saying, This cup which is poured out for you is the new covenant in my blood. And and etc. And we can read other passages uh which are you know basically the same account, like in Mark, and I think Matthew might have one too. So um he says here, Mark, this is my body. He's holding some bread, you know, reaching out, handing it to them, and he says, This is my body which is given for you. Um how do we understand that?

SPEAKER_02 30:37

Well, I say first that I don't believe that those who were the disciples who were sitting with the Lord Jesus at the table on that night, the night he was betrayed, um that when the Lord Jesus held up the bread in his hand and said, This is my body, I don't think they had any idea that he actually meant that it was literally his body that he was holding in his hand. I I don't think that thought even crossed their minds. Um we will see that later on, um particularly concerning the um the cup of wine, he refers to it as um as the fruit of the vine, after the so-called words of consecration. By the way, we didn't mention in transubstantiation, you did mention the consecration, but what it specifically is, is that when the priest who's acting in persona christi, that is in the place of Christ, he claims, at the Mass, when he pronounces the words, This is my body, that's when the bread miraculously changes into the body of Christ, and he says, This is my blood, the wine miraculously changes into the blood of Christ. So, but we see that when the Lord Jesus said these words, which they claim was what was the moment this change took place, he later refers to these as bread and wine, or particularly in Paul does in 1 Corinthians, we'll get to 1 Corinthians 11, I think, uh next perhaps. But um so we see that no change was viewed as having taken place, but that he was he was setting forth an illustration of figure uh to the disciples of what this would represent when they would come together in remembrance of him.

SPEAKER_04 32:37

Yeah, and I think that that's good. There was one thing that J pointed out where he said, I might, you know, if you're in my house, I might take you over and point to a picture and I might say, This is my mother. And uh you would not have any sort of a concept in your mind to say, literally, his mother is what this picture is. You would understand that you can use that language, and what you are intending to say is that this is a picture of my mother, this is what you are to look at and understand as my mother.

SPEAKER_02 33:11

Yeah, well, one more really good example of that is as you recall when the children of Israel were going through the wilderness, and um there was the rock from which they got their water when Moses spoke to the rock and later struck the rock, water gushed out forth. Uh Paul says in um I think it's 1 Corinthians, he says, That rock was Christ. Those are words just as plain as this is my body. But who would take the rock in the wilderness to be the literal body, blood, soul, and divinity of Christ?

SPEAKER_04 33:52

Yeah, that's very good, Mark. I never thought of that, and that's a very appreciate that.

SPEAKER_02 33:57

I think actually it was Augustine who brought that, brought up that subject too. That's good. Uh well he mentioned that um and Darby brings that out when he's going through the church fathers. But yeah, those are words just as plain. That rock was Christ, but it wasn't literally the body, blood, soul, and divinity of Christ. Aaron Ross Powell, Jr.

SPEAKER_04 34:16

It was a figure of Christ, right? A very apt figure of Christ that we are supposed to look back on and see as a figure of Christ, but it wasn't actually Christ. He had not been born yet. Correct at that time.

SPEAKER_02 34:30

And of course, it was a very serious thing for Moses to strike the rock because it represented Christ.

SPEAKER_04 34:36

I think that's good. I think the only thing else I want to say on this passage is that we should look at these words and we should view them with I I don't want this conversation to result in us in any way not looking on the bread and the wine with reverence. And it is not something that we we take and we say, oh, it's just a symbol, it doesn't matter. And that's I think a good segue into 1 Corinthians 10 and 1 Corinthians 11, because that's one of Paul's main points in 1 Corinthians chapter 11. Maybe we go, should we go to 11 first, 1 Corinthians 11, and then come back to chapter 10? Would that be all right? Sure. Because I think there's a good segue there, and we'll finish on chapter um 10. So let's go to chapter 11, and this is uh uh just just a uh retelling, if you will, in some sense of what we just read in Luke uh 22. So I'm just gonna read some of these verses. Luke uh 1 Corinthians 11, verse 23. I received of the Lord that which also I delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus, the night on which he was betrayed, took bread. When he had given thanks, he break it and said, This is my body, which is for you, do this in remembrance of me. In the same way he took the cup also after supper, saying, This cup is the New Testament in my blood, do this as oft as you drink it in remembrance of me. For as often as you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until he comes. Therefore, and this is kind of the point where that this is the point that a Catholic would use. Whoever eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner shall be guilty of the body and blood of the Lord. But a man must examine himself, and in so doing he is to eat of the bread and drink of the cup. For he who eats and drinks, eats and drinks judgment to himself if he does not judge the body rightly. For this reason, many among you are weak and sick, and a number sleep. So essentially, I'm just going to summarize it in one of the ways that this could be looked at. You've got the body and the blood of Christ sitting up there on the on the table, and the Corinthians are coming together and they're they're there to remember the Lord, but they're also having their own meal. It'd be like if we all came to a breaking of bread meeting, but uh we kind of had our own meal and we were talking, and and we, you know, some some people had this great big feast and they were starting to get drunk and everything else. And then at some point or other we're like, oh, let's remember and and do this thing where we break the bread and do that, and and so then we do that too. And meanwhile, somebody's over there starving and somebody's drunk, and you know, you're just not giving any kind of reverence to the emblems that are on the table, as we would call them, the bread and the wine that are on the table. And so Paul looks at this and he says, You do you know why people are getting sick in your assembly and dying? It's because of this. This is why people are getting sick and dying. It's because you're guilty concerning the body and the blood of Christ. So that's what's happening. Now you can look at this and you can say, from a Catholic perspective, you can say, Well, there you go. The body and the blood of Christ are there, and they're guilty concerning the body and blood of Christ. So how do you, how should we understand this, Mark?

SPEAKER_02 37:53

Well, first of all, just like the Lord Jesus Himself, after the words of consecration, so-called, Paul refers to the emblems as bread and cup, not as body and blood. So he's going back to what they really are in substance in actuality. But they do represent uh in figure the body and the precious body and blood of Christ. And so we do discern the Lord's body in the bread figuratively, and we do uh therefore examine ourselves before we eat of it, precisely because that bread indeed represents his body and is to be regarded with reverence. And so, because of what they symbolize, because of what they are in figure, we regard them with reverence, and to partake of them, therefore unworthily, without having confessed our sins and being in a in a right um fellowship with the Lord, uh, to partake of them in an unworthy manner, in a to do so lightly, you might say, without due regard for the reverence that is due to them, because of what they symbolize, is a very serious thing and uh is not is not to be taken lightly. So we are to judge ourselves before we partake of the bread and the cup because of what they represent, our precious the precious body and blood of our Lord.

SPEAKER_04 39:32

This is a really weak example. It comes to mind just now. But um why do people, and this isn't to be political at all, or to take a side or whatever, but why do people get all excited when you see somebody burning an American flag, for instance? Why? You're not burning America, you're not going and destroying it with nuclear bombs or something like that. Why do people get so outraged over an action like that? Or why would anybody do an action like that? It's because it's a symbol, isn't it? And um, you know, it's interesting. I remember there was one time I was at the office and we there was a big American flag outside the office, and just a small office, so only four or five of us in that office, and there was uh we had to take the flag down and take it and and put a new flag up. I for I forget why exactly we were doing it, but I think the old one just had gotten ripped or something like that. And the our manager called us all outside, and like I said, there's only like I think there were maybe six of us at the time, so not like a big group, but we're all outside, and he says, You need to help us get this flag off the pole. And uh to me, I was looking at it and thinking, uh, it looks like a one-person job to me, but okay, you know, my boss says help, I'll help. And they take this flag down. And you know, the interesting thing was he he was clear, he knew a lot more about now, I understand, but he said, We can't let the flag touch the ground. And so it came down, and as soon as you could reach it, he grabbed, you know, the corner and handed it to me. And other people took other corners, and as this flag came down and they unattached it from the line, it was very carefully taken so it never touched the ground. It was folded up very neatly, carefully in this special way, and then you're supposed to take it, and there's a right disposal way for an American flag. And then we put the new flag up. And we all stood back, and he it was an interesting thing, standing back, looking up at that American flag. And uh my boss said, we should salute the American flag. And it was actually a moment where I did, I saluted it, and I uh do love uh this country in some sense and uh appreciate it anyway. And um, there was such honor paid to just a flag. How much more honor and gravity and reverence should we pay to that which symbolizes the body in the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ?

SPEAKER_02 42:03

That's a very good illustration. Very good.

SPEAKER_04 42:06

So I I hope that that's uh clear. I mean, we're not taking a lot of time on these, but um certainly happy to answer any more questions if anybody has additional questions. Let's go to 1 Corinthians 10 um and read from that one. So 1 Corinthians 10 and verse uh, let's just start at verse 15. I speak as to wise men, you judge what I say. Is not the cup of blessing which we bless a sharing in the blood of Christ? Is not the bread which we break a sharing in the body of Christ? Since there is one bread, we who are many are one bread, for we all partake of the one bread. Now, again, you can look at this and you can say the cup of blessing which we bless. Well, that undoubtedly is the bread, uh, is is the cup of wine that's on the Lord's table or at any sort of a communion event. Um, the cup of blessing which we bless, is it not a sharing in, or KJV has communion? Um there it's a difficult word to uh translate, but it just means a participation in, I think is another word, participation in the blood of Christ. In other words, as we take this cup and we all hand it around, we all are sharing in, participating in the blood of Christ. In other words, what we all take in, as we all drink this cup, is the blood of Christ, is what it's saying. And then the bread which we are breaking, isn't it a sharing in the body of Christ? As we all go around, we all take of this bread, because he's very specific in the next verse, we who are many are one body, for we all partake of the one bread. So we all take of this one piece of bread and we eat it. And as we do that, we are eating what he calls here the uh body of Christ. So I think a Catholic can look at this, at least I've read, Catholic would look at this and say, Can you get any clearer than this? You're eating bread, and he says you're you're taking all. Sharing in the body of Christ, why don't you believe what God says in his word? So what would you say to this one, Mark?

SPEAKER_02 44:09

Well, again, it just goes back to what the bread and cup represent. And so there's that sense representatively speaking we share in the body and blood of Christ. But uh he does again refer to um being all partakers of that one bread, so he does go back to describe it as bread. And remember, because in transubstantiation, it's not bread any longer. Right. Um so he goes back to calling it that. These are just uh rhetorical um uses in the Word of God for um for symbolism, really, and and for figurative language, I think it's it's pretty plain to me that you can speak this way without meaning uh taking it in a literalistic way. And especially in the context of the other passages that we've gone over and in 1 Corinthians 11, there, uh we see that um it's representative of his body and blood and is therefore to be treated reverently. But uh I see I'm not I don't believe we're at all compelled to take this in a literal sense.

SPEAKER_04 45:28

Yeah, and I I think like like you said, he is calling it bread, right? Right after he has just said we're eating of the the the body of Christ, or we're sharing, I should say not eating, but we're sharing the body of Christ. Important distinction that we're not eating the body of Christ, we are sharing in the body of Christ. But he says that we are eating the bread, for we all partake of that one bread. I I take it this way, that what he is saying, because this is all in the context of idolatry, which we don't have time to really get into how that ties in, but what he is saying is that you have this event that you are coming to where you all are eating of that which you consider to be the blood of the body of Christ. You all are drinking that which you consider to be the blood of Christ, not literally, but symbolically, as we would say. But as we sit down at the Lord's table, as we eat that bread at the Lord's Supper, we do eat it, uh, not thinking, oh, I'm eating the Lord's body, but understanding that I am taking and sharing with everybody else that's in this room that which symbolizes his body. And in that sense, I am eating his body. Anyways, the point I'm trying to make is that we really are sharing in the body of Christ. We really are sharing in the blood of Christ, but it's in our understanding, it's in our uh thought. Anything else on 1 Corinthians 10, Mark? No, that sounds good. So those are the the kind of the four passages that we're gonna go through. They are the main passages. There really aren't other passages that I'm aware of anyway, that in a very clear way present transubstantiation. All of those are very clear. Um, you can understand where the argument is from the Catholic perspective. Um, you can also see hopefully what our understanding is and and how we are looking at these. We're not dodging them in any way or trying to talk around them. This is how we understand the intention of their meaning. Let's go on and talk, and we're just gonna uh very briefly, I'll just touch on transubstantiation and the fathers. Did you have much on that?

SPEAKER_02 47:45

Well, other than to say that they didn't they didn't teach transubstantiation, many of them spoke, I think, of of a real presence, so you might take it from from what they said, wouldn't you agree with that uh without getting a lot of quotations? Um and this over time um they began to um uh incorporate uh the teachings of Aristotelian metaphysics into their idea of uh of transubstantiation, this change that took place. And we we we do just I I was gonna say a lot about that, but suffice it to say that transubstantiation um which was defined as a dogma in 1215 AD, so these uh 9th, 10th, and 11th century uh Catholic theologians um were very much influenced by Aristotle and and um really heathen metaphysics and his his theory of um substance and accidents, but it would take a long time. I I could explain those things, but uh maybe we should just suffice it to say that that played a big role in how this concept came about.

SPEAKER_04 49:01

Yeah. I I think that's good. I think maybe all we need to say about transubstantiation and the fathers is just that I'm just gonna give a quote here from J D. Um he says this there he was talking, this is from families familiar conversations that you've referenced to me. And he was talking about this, and he says to this Catholic apologist that he was talking to, his Catholic apologist brought up the Church Fathers and said, Oh, well, what about the Church Fathers? You know, they they agree with me and whatever else. And J D says this quote I suspect, like many who rest upon them, meaning the fathers, you have not searched them. Yeah. And then what follows is 20 pages. And I, if anyone is interested, I can send this to you or send a link to you because it's online. Or there's a I have it in a physical book, but it is online. And there are 20 pages in my physical book, anyway, where he goes through quote after quote after quote after quote of church fathers who do not agree emphatically with transubstantiation. And we keep quoting Chrysostom throughout here. I don't know why I'm picking on him, but he keeps coming up. I'm just gonna give one quote from him and then I don't have anything else on church fathers. Chrysostom says in his letter to Caesareus. Now people will question whether this is genuine and all that, but uh lots of people do take it as genuine. Quote, for as before the bread is sanctified, we call it bread, but divine grace sanctifying it means of a priest, by means of a priest, it is freed from the appellation. That's like the name or the title, of bread, but is held worthy of the appellation of the Lord's body, although the nature of bread remains in it, and we announce it not as two bodies, but as one. So uh, and then there's there's other ones, and I'm just gonna skip over them. But some of these, it is interesting. It was helpful for me as I went back and I read some of these. Um I could not have said my own position more clearly than some of these church fathers. And it was interesting reading something from 200, 300, 400, and saying that is emphatically exactly what I would say about this. And that was, you know, we don't put a lot of stock in that and in the church fathers as a whole because of all the issues, but it was nice to know that that they're there, if you will, in this particular area.

SPEAKER_02 51:22

There is another um, I don't know if you want to get into it at the moment. I know we're running short of time. Um there's more to the Eucharist than just what takes place uh when Catholics attend Mass. You know, when we have our remembrance of the Lord on Lord's Day and the breaking of bread, it's all confined to that hour and a half or so, and then when it's over, we, you know, that's pretty much I mean, that's it until next week, and we do it again. Um but in Catholicism, there's a lot that goes on after with regard to the Eucharist that is not connected to the Mass, but it's a very significant part of this whole story. And I don't know if you want to get into that. I'm talking about Eucharistic adoration, um, talking about Eucharistic processions um and all of these things, and uh what happens when the Eucharist um, as was the case many times throughout the centuries, when there were not the means of preservation, when it would um, you know, get eaten by mice and rats, and that may seem like a crude thing to bring up, but this was something that was debated and discussed at great length amongst Catholic theologians in the Middle Ages. Um, and there's a lot that can be said about that, but those are the implications of that belief.

SPEAKER_04 52:49

Well, I think let me let me ask you this from our perspective. I'll tell a quick story and I'll get I'll get your thoughts on it. This one time we were breaking bread, and Sally was um uh she was with the baby in the baby room. And so the way we did it in Palmyra was the husband would take it in to you know his wife because he didn't know what state she was in or whatever. So um the person who was handing around the emblems gave it to me. I took it in to her, and uh she took it, and then I came out. It happened to be just as I came out that one of the other people had taken uh an exceptionally large piece by accident, and he had eaten apparently what he wanted, and he had decided he didn't want the rest, and he had got up and he walked for it and he was going to throw it away, this additional piece. And I'm standing there and he walks in front of me, he's between me and the person who's handing around the emblems, and it's clear what he's about to do. He's about to throw it in the trash. And I felt this horror come over me. And I just felt, this is so wrong. And I looked at the, he was an older brother who was handing around the emblems, and he and our eyes locked, and we both knew what each other was thinking, and he just shrugged his shoulders and you know, kind of like, I and so he threw it away and went back, and we continued on with it. I felt and still feel that was very dishonoring to the Lord. What do you think?

SPEAKER_02 54:20

Oh, I I'm a little bit shocked by the story because I agree with you. I I would be I would I would be horrified to see that as well, because we are still we are remembering the Lord right in the very act of it. And so we see what is represented in that bread, and it should not be discarded uh in that manner like that at that moment. I would have put it back on the plate or something, but um so but with but we but we would say when it is over, it is over. Right. And you know, so often sometimes someone will take the uh leftover bread home and and you know eat eat it with the meal or something. Um but in Catholicism, when the leftover wafers, these are considered to be the the actual body, blood, soul, and divinity of Christ. So they put them in a golden box called a tabernacle up on the altar. And uh anytime during the week or if someone will walk into the church, that tabernacle is up there with Jesus inside that they believe he's really in there. And so you you genuflect, you you bow the knee because that's Jesus in there, and then you can go in there and you can pray to him and you can talk to him because he's in there. Um there's that, and then there's I sent you a photo, I don't know if you got it, about what a monstrance is, because I wanted you to have a visual. That's kind of like a golden display case with a little round glass window in it, and they put a host in there, and so everyone can see it. And sometimes they'll put one of these up on the altar, and it'll be there 24-7, and you can walk into church anytime and worship that that host. And uh, you can go on YouTube now and they have um live stream 24 hours a day, every day. Uh many of these channels you go to, and it just all it is is a monstrance on an altar. Nothing's moving, nothing's happening, but you tune in and you can worship there because you're looking at it, at this live stream of it, you know. And then I mentioned the the um Eucharistic processions where the priest will will pick up this monstrance and hold it above his head, and a whole group of people will follow him outside of the church into the neighborhood, and they'll march down the street with it, with a bunch of uh cat lay Catholics following, and they're holding up this little like tent or uh this little um uh yeah, like a tent or awning over the priest and the monstrance. They're holding this up, you know, and so it's this this big display as they process down the street and everybody's supposed to worship the the monst, and he's holding up above his head. Uh so these kind of activities that we would never dream of uh when we just simply remember the Lord in his death on at the breaking of bread, these things go on even after Mass in other contexts.

SPEAKER_04 57:18

And needless to say, there's no scriptural support for anything. No, no, not at all. Anything like that. So what it comes down to, I thought one of the great evils of transubstantiation, because aside from it just being wrong, I mean, I think hopefully we've shown that it is wrong doctrinally, but aside beyond it just being wrong, what you have done is you have taken the actual person, body, blood, soul, nerves, bones, everything, divinity even of Christ, and put it in something that man can control. And so he's now here on the earth, and like you said, you can do a procession, you can worship him, you can do all of this sort of sort of stuff. Um, I'm just gonna give this quote. I know it's a common quote that's given in talks like this is from Father, quote, Father, you know, John A. O'Brien in his book, The Faith of Millions. Um, he says, quote, when the priest announces the tremendous words of consecration, he reaches up into the heavens, brings Christ down from his throne, and places him upon our altar to be offered up again as the victim for the sins of man. The priest speaks in lo, Christ, the eternal and omnipotent God, bows his head in humble obedience to the priest's command. End quote. Now, I've heard that come up. James White brought that up, for instance, in a debate, and a Catholic kind of, you know, said, Oh, come on, he's just being poetic, you know, he didn't really mean it, you know, exactly like that, you know. But they can't deny that that is what the doctrine naturally leads to is that I, as a priest, any priest, can control God. I can make him appear whenever I decide to make him appear, and then people can worship him and everything else.

SPEAKER_02 59:00

And just one other thing as to the implications of this. And I just want to mention this because, and this is again not not to be crude, but because it was something so much debated during the Middle Ages, so it's not a minor subject, really. The implications of this are because it happened so many times that that rats and mice would would eat the consecrated hosts that that were left out or unattended to. And um I'll do I I was gonna say a lot more about this, but suffice it to say, I'm gonna read a quote from Darby on this subject. He says, All spiritual apprehension is lost in this doctrine, and the Roman doctors, not liking to retain in their knowledge, just as the heathen of old, the truth of the Godhead, have been allowed of God to fall into these degrading thoughts and worship with divine worship that which a mouse can eat. And though the divinity is there with the soul, body, and blood, it is all inert and cannot hinder the mouse's eating it, nor move, nor give a sign of life, and what ought to have been a symbol of Christ's dying love and dealt with in so using it as being such, but they have carnalized and degraded everything in their sacramental system. I would say that uh not I mentioned that they debated this amongst theologians at length over the centuries. I just mentioned that Thomas Aquinas supported the view that it remains the body-blood of Christ at all times, um, even when it is eaten by uh as he said, sinner or animal has taken it. It still remains the so think of the implications of that. It's just it's hard to fathom.

SPEAKER_04 1:00:50

Yeah, you you end up with just all kinds of uh you you basically end up, I mean, just for instance, take there have been in 2024, for instance, they they have found a bunch of this bread, you know, they call it consecrated hose. They're found under the pew, sometimes, you know, chewed and spat out or otherwise discarded, and it goes into the trash in a dustpan, you know, some crumb of it or something like that that falls, and whatever else the case may be, it suffers corruption. It goes to a landfill, stuff eat it, bacteria eat it, mold eat it, it goes to gas, it disappears, whatever. It suffers corruption. And yet we have the clear statement of God in Acts 2, when he says God had sworn to him with an oath to seat one of his descendants on the throne. That's to David, and he looked and spoke of the resurrection of Christ, that he was neither abandoned to Hades nor did his flesh suffer decay. This Jesus God raised up to which we are all witnesses. Well, in this kind of a theory, first of all, Christ is is everywhere. There's like a thousand Christs right now, and his su his flesh, his physical body or whatever, is going to suffer decay and has suffered decayed billions of times over the over the last 2,000 years. That on its own ought to bring horror to this thought of. And the interesting thing is that it does kind of bring some sense of horror to the Catholics, and so they do address this and they do, you know, say this is really bad and you need to eat it all, and all this sort of stuff.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:28

You say thousands of Christ. They believe that every crumb is a whole body, blood, soul, and divinity of Christ. Every crumb. And so uh what the what they'll have when they're when the priest is distributing the hosts to the people, you'll have someone standing there, an altar boy holding a gold dish called a patent, patent, I believe it's called, in case a crumb falls, because they don't want that to fall to the floor. Right. Because even a crumb is considered a whole Christ. So no matter how many times you subdivide, you divide and subdivide a host, you can break it into a million pieces, well, then you have a million, you have a million whole Jesuses. Literally. That's what they teach, that's what they believe.

SPEAKER_04 1:03:20

And so I I as a person can create Christ, because I can take a consecrated host, and then I can cut it in half, and there you go. I, as a layperson, have just created a whole new Christ. Well, I never thought of that, but that's true.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:34

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:03:34

That's what's so I think that's probably enough said, and we need to wrap this up. I I think that I hope that this kind of a thing is something that I mean, it's not something we like talking about. It's not something we like doing a podcast about, because it I think it really shows a great dishonor to the Lord Jesus Christ. Um, but I think it's important that we understand exactly what this is, that it's not something that's just like, oh, they believe that, we believe this, you know, no big deal. This is a big deal we're talking about the person of Christ. Um that's all I think that I have to say on this subject of transubstantiation. I hope it's clear. I hope it's clear what the Bible says. I hope it's clear that uh what the Lord Jesus meant when he said, This is my body and this is my blood. Um, anything to close us out, Mark?

SPEAKER_02 1:04:22

No, nothing to add really, just to summarize, to say that, you know, when we do remember the Lord Jesus and his death on Lord's Day, the breaking of bread, it's a very precious thing to see that loaf on the table and that cup of wine and to take into our hearts what it does represent. And it it does uh initiate uh um a heart of worship in our heart or should in our hearts. Um it should cause us to want to worship and remember him because we are taking into account what it represents, and we do cherish that and we do reverence that.

SPEAKER_04 1:05:02

Thank you for listening to the Axe242 Podcast today. This is Alex Nash. I am the host of the podcast. The guest speaker today was Mark Sell. And if you have any questions or if you have any comments or concerns, please reach out at Axe242 podcast at gmail.com. The next podcast will be on the subject of baptismal regeneration. We look forward to catching up with you on that one.