By Robin G. Jordan
From a historic Anglican perspective the doctrine of the objective real presence is predicated upon a number of what may be described as exegetical errors. The primary error involves interpreting a passage of Scripture without regard to its context. Roman Catholics, Anglo-Catholics, Eastern Orthodox, Oriental Catholics, and Copts approach the texts related to the institution of the Lord’s Supper with preconceived notions of what they mean. They assume that Jesus was speaking literally when he referred to the bread as his body and the cup as his blood. However, the context of these passages suggests otherwise.
First in these references Jesus is clearly looking forward to his impeding death. Second he concludes each reference with the instructions to “do this in remembrance of me.” In other words, when the disciples gather to break bread together and to share a cup of wine to do so as a memory or recollection of his death. In Matthew 26:29, Mark 14: 25, and Luke 22: 18 Jesus goes on to refer to the contents of the cup as “fruit of the vine,” that is, wine. This is a strong evidence that Jesus was speaking figuratively when he referred to the bread as his body and the cup as his blood. The larger context of his institution of the Lord’s Supper at a Passover meal also supports this interpretation.
Roman Catholics, Anglo-Catholics, Eastern Orthodox, Oriental Catholics, and Copts conclude that Jesus is talking about the Lord’s Supper in the Bread of Life discourse in the Gospel of John because Jesus makes reference to eating his flesh and drinking his blood. They ignore the context of this discourse.
The Bread of Life discourses follows the miraculous feeding of the five thousand. This miracle occurred early in Jesus’ ministry well before the Last Supper and the institution of the Lord’s Supper. In the discourse Jesus is addressing those who had decided to follow him in hopes that he would perform more miracles in which he would provide them with bread. He is telling them that they are following him for the wrong reason. They should be following him for the spiritual nourishment that he can provide to their souls, not for loaves of bread. The source of this spiritual nourishment is himself. He is not speaking of himself being consumed literally but figuratively. You can take a morsel of bread and put it in your mouth. But unless you chew it up, swallow it down, and digest, you will gain no nourishment from it. If they want to benefit from the spiritual nourishment that he can provide, they must do more than put their faith in his power to perform miracles. They must put their faith in him in toto, much in the same way as we chew up a morsel of bread, swallow it down, and digest it. The bread becomes a part of us.
This interpretation of the Bread of Life discourse is consistent with the other “I am” discourses in the Gospel of John. In all of these discourses Jesus is speaking figuratively and referring to the relationship of the believer to him. Roman Catholics, Anglo-Catholics, Eastern Orthodox, Oriental Catholics, and Copts not only assume that Jesus is talking about the Lord’s Supper in the Bread of Life discourse but also he suddenly switches from speaking figuratively to literally. They have no basis for this assumption other than their preconceived notions of what he is saying. What they are doing is reading their own meaning into the text rather drawing the meaning out of the text.
Roman Catholics, Anglo-Catholics, Eastern Orthodox, Oriental Catholics, and Copts also assume that 1 Corinthians 10:16 is a references to Christ’s substantive presence in the consecrated elements.
Is not the cup of thanksgiving for which we give thanks a participation in the blood of Christ? And is not the bread that we break a participation in the body of Christ?But is that what the apostle Paul is saying when he wrote this passage? In 1 Corinthians 11:26 Paul refers to the Lord’s Supper as a proclamation of Christ’s death. This suggests that Paul may be speaking figuratively. He goes onto say:
Therefore, whoever eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty of sinning against the body and blood of the Lord. Each one must examine himself before he eats of the bread and drinks of the cup. For anyone who eats and drinks without recognizing the body eats and drinks judgment on himself. (1 Corinthians 11: 27-29, NIV)Roman Catholics, Anglo-Catholics, Eastern Orthodox, Oriental Catholics, and Copts assume the body and blood of the Lord to which Paul refers in this passage is a reference to Christ’s substantive presence in the consecrated elements. They also assume that the “body” in 1 Corinthians 11:29 is a reference to Christ’s substantive presence in the bread. But are their assumptions correct?
Paul was a devote Jew, a Pharisee, before he became a believer and an apostle. The Mosaic Code prohibits the eating of blood. The Council of Jerusalem decided not to impose the Mosaic Code upon Gentile converts to Christianity with two exceptions. They should abstain from sexual immorality and from eating blood. Paul also places a strong emphasis upon the atonement in his writings. Therefore it is well within the realm of possibility that Paul is speaking figuratively in 1 Corinth 11: 27.
Note that Paul urges the members of the church at Corinth to examine themselves before they eat the bread and drink of the cup. If he was referring to Christ’s substantive presence in the consecrated elements, why did he not urge them to examine themselves before eating Christ’s body and drinking his blood? The fact that he refers to the bread as bread and the cup as the cup is not insignificant. It also points to Paul’s use of figurative language in these passages.
The context of 1 Corinthians 11:29 also indicates that the “body” to which Paul refers in this passage is the Body of Christ, the Church. The wealthier Corinthians were starting the Lord’s Supper before all the members of the church had arrived, consuming the food that they had brought with them and leaving nothing for the latecomers who were in all likelihood slaves. They were failing to view the latecomers as members of Christ’s Body.
The Thirty-Nine Articles of Religion articulate two important principles in regard to what the church may teach and how the church may interpret Scripture. The first principle is that the church may not teach anything that is contrary to Scripture. The second principle is that the church may not expound a passage of Scripture so that it contradicts another passage of Scripture.
Teaching that Christ is substantively present in the consecrated elements violates both principles. If Jesus is speaking figuratively in the Synoptic Gospel accounts of the institution of the Lord’s Supper, teaching that he is speaking literally is contrary to Scripture. If Jesus is speaking figuratively in the Synoptic Gospel accounts of the institution of the Lord’s Supper, then the church cannot teach that Paul was speaking literally in his account of the Lord’s Supper.
The eucharistic theology of historic Anglicanism does not deny that those who “rightly, worthily, and with faith” receive the outward sign of the sacrament do not receive the inward grace. It teaches that the manner in which “the Body of Christ is given, taken, and eaten, in the Supper” is a heavenly and spiritual one. It further teaches that means by which the Body of Christ is received and eaten in the Supper is faith. What is involved is a spiritual feeding. The bread and the wine as the symbols and the tokens of Christ’s Body and Blood point to this spiritual reality.
Having risen from the dead and ascended into heaven, Christ is seated by the Father’s side. He cannot be in heaven and also in the bread and wine. However, the believer is united to Christ by the Holy Spirit. It is through this mystical union with Christ that the believer is able to receive spiritual nourishment from Christ, “to feed upon him in your heart by faith with thanksgiving.”
As Richard Hooker explains in his magnum opus, Of the Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity, “The real presence of Christ’s most blessed body and blood is not therefore to be sought for in the sacrament, but in the worthy receiver of the sacrament.” In this view “Christ’s body and blood is only present as the communicant receives the bread and wine of the Eucharist. This means that Christ’s body and blood is not present before or after the reception but only during the act of receiving.” [1]
At the same time the eucharistic theology of historic Anglicanism refrains from being overly-precise in explaining how we feed upon Christ, recognizing that it is a mystery and allowing some latitude for differences of opinion on this matter.
The eucharistic theology of historic Anglicanism, however, reject the belief that the sacrament is like the fire berry that the star at rest in C. S. Lewis’ Narnia Chronicles story, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, consumes each day to burn away his old age until he is young enough to once more tread the heavens in the great dance. It rejects the Roman Catholic teaching that the sacrament infuses sanctifying grace into the human soul, purifying the soul from sin so that the soul may enter heaven one day. There is no basis for this teaching in Scripture. The Holy Spirit sanctifies us directly. He does not nudge us to receive the sanctifying grace of the sacraments as the Roman Catholic Church teaches.
While historic Anglicanism denies any substantive presence of Christ in the consecrated elements, it is reverent in its treatment of the symbols and tokens of Christ’s Body and Blood.
The form of prayer that Anglicans historically have used to set apart the bread and wine for sacramental use consists of an introductory dialog—the Sursum Corda; a preface, a proper preface for major church festivals; the Sanctus, or Thrice-Holy; the Prayer for Humble Access, a commemoration of Christ’s saving work, a petition that those who receive the outward sign of the sacrament will receive its inward grace, and the words of institution. The two prayers refer to the communicants and not to the elements. The only sacrifice referred to in this form of prayer is Christ’s. There is also no invocation of the Holy Spirit.
Archbishop Cranmer omitted the invocation of the Holy Spirit from this form of prayer for several reasons. The Holy Scriptures teach that the Holy Spirit sanctifies people and not inanimate objects. An invocation of the Holy Spirit shifts the focus of the form of prayer from the communicants to the elements. It suggests that the elements undergo a change. An invocation of the Holy Spirit is also redundant.
There is a parallel between the petition for the communicants in the 1552 Communion service and the petition for the baptismal candidate in the 1552 baptism service. Both humbly ask God to grant that those receiving the outward sign of the sacrament also receive its inward grace.
This parallel is obscured in the 1662 revision of the 1552 baptism service. Influenced by the 1637 Scottish baptism service the Restoration bishops added a petition for the sanctification of the water in the font. This petition, however, is redundant.
Both the 1552 baptism service and its 1662 revision assume that God set apart water for the purpose of baptism with the baptism of Jesus in the Jordan River. A similar assumption is implied in the 1552 Communion service. When Christ instituted the Lord’s Supper, he set apart bread and wine for the purpose of that commemorative meal. There is no need to ask God to set apart what he has already set apart. The setting apart of the matter of the sacrament for sacramental use occurs when the matter is used for that purpose.
For Archbishop Cranmer the sacramental action, the people’s eating and drinking, had far greater important than the elements themselves. It was in the eating and drinking, not the elements themselves, that Christ was present in the hearts of those who believed in him.
The role of the minister of the sacrament in historic Anglicanism is that of a humble steward serving a meal on his master’s behalf. His role is not that of a consecrator of the sacrament or a dispenser of sacramental grace.
The two eucharistic prayers in The Book of Common Prayer 2019 shift the focus away from the communicants to the minister of the sacrament and to the elements. They also shift the focus away from the communicants’ eating and drinking to the minister’s consecrating and offering the elements.
This is a radical shift away from historic Anglicanism’s understanding of the Lord’s Supper back to an unreformed Catholic understanding of the Mass. Due to this shift these prayers cannot be viewed as Anglican in the historic sense. Neither can the eucharistic theology of the ACNA’s Prayer Book 2019. This may not be a problem for Anglo-Catholics in the Anglican Church in North America but it is a problem for Anglicans who are Protestant and Reformed in their theological outlook.
For a further examination of the historic Anglican understanding of the Lord’s Supper, see “The Lord's Supper Explained: The Historic Anglican View of the Sacrament” and “The Lord’s Supper Explained: The Historic Anglican View of the Sacrament—Part 2.”
[1] Richard Hooker c. 1554 – 1600 Anglican Divine,Anglican Eucharistic Theology
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