(This post is part of a series on the 39 articles of the Church of England)
This post follows on from yesterday’s on the twenty-eighth article about the Eucharist. I don’t particularly want to get stuck in the Reformation debates, and, as I noted yesterday the development of Anglican spirituality in Eucharistic hymnody, as well as the development of theology in the structure and content of Eucharistic rites, has moved beyond those debates in many respects, sometimes recovering parts of the mediaeval tradition, more often returning to the liturgy of the patristic era.
The single most influential text in this reshaping of modern liturgies is the historically problematic Apostolic Tradition, once almost universally attributed to Hippolytus and early third-century Rome, but now disputed as to both provenance and date (see the Hermeneia Commentary). The Eucharistic Prayer from the ordination rites described in this underlie both the English Anglican Eucharistic Prayer B, and Roman Catholic Eucharistic Prayer 2 (= South African Anglican Prayer 3). The overall structure that underpins the modern Western rites can still be argued for as a mainline development within the Church, but much greater stress is now put on historical diversity, a diversity that has begun to be reflected in the Common Worship prayers.
While there are still recognizable theological differences between RC and Anglican liturgies, it is again possible to talk of a common Western rite in which there is also a renewed emphasis on the role of the Holy Spirit and the eschatological horizon. In Anglican rites, particularly, there is a considerable move away from a “magic words” approach to the narrative of institution. While in most Eucharistic Prayers the invocation of the Holy Spirit to consecrate the elements precedes the narrative, in common with the Roman rite, in two (F & G) this epiclesis follows the narrative and anamnesis, after the fashion of Eastern rites. The whole prayer is held to be consecratory, rather than any particular element within it, so that it is the response of God to the prayer that is seen as efficacious and transformative.
The Reformation debates, by contrast, focussed heavily on the words of institution alone. This was always going to problematic, since at one level, we have a metaphor (the language of body and blood) applied to symbols (bread and wine) representing an event yet to happen (the sacrifice of Calvary). The early seeds of rationalism sown at the Renaissance which would come to full flower in the Enlightenment seems to struggle with this combination of metaphor, symbol and representation. So one ends up with the entirely inappropriate wooden literalness of discussing whether Jesus’ risen body can only be in one place at one time.
In this post-Renaissance context, transubstantiation had itself become problematic. First, of course, because it was poorly understood, and seemed to the new humanists to encourage magical views and superstition. Secondly, because it was always problematic to envisage substance independent of its accidents. Thirdly, and perhaps above all, because the new humanists had no patience with Aristotelian metaphysics, but were often neo-Platonists in a new guise. As such they seemed to miss the point that in its original Thomistic form, transubstantiation insisted that the change in the elements could only be known by faith, and not by the senses.
In reframing this question it seems to me that the forward-looking direction (to God’s final kingdom) of the Eucharistic celebration needs to be taken into account quite as much as the backward-looking direction (to the sacrifice of Christ on the cross). This is part and parcel of the biblical narratives in the Synoptics and Paul:
He said to them, “I have eagerly desired to eat this Passover with you before I suffer; for I tell you, I will not eat it until it is fulfilled in the kingdom of God.” Then he took a cup, and after giving thanks he said, “Take this and divide it among yourselves; for I tell you that from now on I will not drink of the fruit of the vine until the kingdom of God comes.” (Luke 22:15-18 – the last verse is paralleled in Matt and Mark)
For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes. (1 Corinthians 11:26)
This future orientation also picks up the Passover theme, which is a historical remembrance of a liberation into future freedom. I also place myself with those who see “remembrance” as having a forward looking dimension. When God remembers things, he acts in the present and future according to his past pledges. And in prayer, God’s people may invite him to remember these promises (see. e.g. Ps 20:3-4, Ps 74:2, Ps 132:1, 1 Macc 4:10, 2 Macc 1:2). There are interesting parallels (for those of us who think Paul’s language in Rom 8:32 and Gal 2:20 justifies them) in later traditions about the Binding of Isaac, where the prayers not only assume Isaac’s binding is an effective sacrifice, but invite God to remember this sacrifice. It is, I judge, impossible to think in terms of any remembering of Jesus and his sacrifice that is not also a remembering before God, and therefore an invitation to God to act in accordance with this ultimate example of his faithfulness that Christians call a new covenant.
The supper, then, has a prayerful and eschatological orientation, which is precisely why the work of the Spirit is invoked in its celebration, for the Holy Spirit is the mode of our participation in the resurrection of Christ, and the one through whom we begin to experience the life of the world to come. So transformation of the elements, that they may truly feed us with the life of Christ, the bread of heaven, is seen against the horizon of the power of God who promises, in fidelity to his work in Christ, to transform all things. Christ is truly present in the elements, because his life is the life we share by the Sprit now, and in eternity. They focus the promise of God’s transformation on real material things, real food and drink, as a foretaste of the promise that the world has a future in which we shall be nourished by Christ without sacramental mediation, and that’ God’s remembrance of Christ’s sacrifice, and his own covenant promises, will change all things.
These tokens of creation are transformed as vehicles of Christ’s presence, as a promise that we will be saved not out of the world, but with all creation. It is in this context that we may speak of (Schillebeeckz’s term) transfinalization, not simply as a change in purpose, though it is that, but as a change oriented towards that final horizon when God will be all in all, and all creation’s substance will be shot through with the divine life.
