Transcript

What's the difference between the Lutherans and the Catholics on the Lord's Supper?

You guys asked this question.

In fact, I got this question twice this last week.

Sam says, "Hello, Pastor Wolfmueller.

Can you explain the difference between the Catholic communion versus the Lutheran communion?" And later, Tom writes, "Pastor Wolfmueller, my wife and I have recently come to Lutheranism.

We've been describing ourselves as Calvinistic Baptists.

She was raised Baptist, I was raised Catholic.

We're struggling with the Lutheran beliefs on baptism and the Lord's Supper.

We think it's more than what the Baptists teach.

With your Evangelical background, can you point us to some resources that would help?

Thanks, Tom." You got it.

So, here's the topic, what's the difference between the Lutherans and the Baptists on the supper?

I think you guys are asking this question because, well, number one, for a lot of people, the Lutheran view of the Lord's Supper is difficult, uh, to understand.

And I think especially, it looks like, from the Evangelical perspective, it looks like the Lutherans, uh, basically have the same doctrine as the Catholics or basically five different views of the Lord's Supper.

There's the symbolic view, the Baptist view, which says that it's a memorial meal.

It's simply, we do this in remembrance, which means we have bread and we have wine, or bread and juice, and we get together and eat the bread and juice.

Then you have the Reformed idea, and that's the idea that, uh, that you have the real presence, that you have the spiritual presence of the body of Jesus, but that's it.

No bread, no wine.

You have the Lutheran view, which is the idea that the words "this is my body" are simply true, that we have the body and the blood.

You have the Roman Catholic view, that's the doctrine of transubstantiation.

And then you have the Orthodox view, which who knows what that view is.

It's, it's a mystery.

They love the fact that the word mystery is a Greek word.

And I think the idea is that from the perspective of the memorial meal, it's hard to tell the difference between the Lutherans and the Catholics.

So, we got to make that distinction.

All right, so I want to make this distinction for you guys between the Lutheran view of the Lord's Supper and between the Roman Catholic view.

And for that, we're going to need to go to the books.

All right, I think we're going to do this in three parts.

First, what is the thing, what does the church say that the Lord's Supper is?

Second, what is the act?

And third, what is the benefit of the supper?

And we're going to compare and contrast the Lutheran doctrine.

So first, what is the thing?

The thing with the Catholic Church is transubstantiation.

Now, transubstantiation is a bit of a thing to explain.

I want to first read to you from the Council of Trent, and I'm going to try something new.

Do you see?

Look at this.

This is, this is a, uh, this is me thinking, "How can I not have to sit there and type this thing in?" Answer, I can show you the page, and with this little button indicate that you should pause it.

Uh, can I zoom in on this and make it focus?

This is the Council of Trent on s- transubstantiation.

If you want to read the words yourself, you got...

This is a pause shot right there.

Here's what it says.

"And because that Christ, our Redeemer, declared that which he offered unto the species of bread to be truly his own body, therefore, it has ever been a firm belief of the Church of God, and this holy synod doth now declare it anew, that by the consecration of the bread and of the wine, a conversion is made of the whole substance of the bread into the substance of the body of Christ, our Lord, and the whole substance of the wine into the substance of his blood, which conversion is, by the Holy Catholic Church, sys- uh, suitably and properly called transubstantiation." Now, what is that?

Let me show you on the board.

Transubstantiation.

Trans means to change, and substance, uh, it means substance or essence.

And this comes from an old Aristotelian distinction.

Aristotle taught us that a thing, like this fox, for example.

For some reason, Pastor Flammy does not like my example of a fox.

But this fox has a substance or an essence of foxiness, and it also has accidents as well.

Now, how would you describe a fox?

You would say, "Well, a fox has a pointy nose, it bounces all over the place, uh, it has a big bushy tail, and it's red." Well, let's say, in a very friendly manner, we put a clown nose on this fox.

We give him a glass of wine to drink so that he's not bouncing around.

We shave his tail so that he has this kind of pokey little tail, like that.

And, and let's color him purple.

Now, what we've done is we've changed the accidents of the fox, but we...

Oh, focus.

Focus.

We've changed the accidents of the f- We've changed the accidents of the fox, but we haven't changed the substance.

It remains a fox.

The fox-...

is a fox, essentially.

Well, what the Roman Catholics say, they take this Aristotelian distinction and they say, "In the supper, what happens is you have a change of the substance." So that, say you have bread and you have wine, and the bread re- keeps the accidents of bread, and the wine keeps the accidents of wine.

But the essence itself, the substance is changed to the body of Christ, and to the blood of Christ.

So that's how the Catholic Church gets the doctrine of transsubstantiation.

Well, is that what the Bible teaches, transsubstantiation?

The answer is, we don't need...

There's a good distinction, this Aristotelian distinction between the accidents and the essence of a thing.

But we should not need, and this is really the Lutheran response, we don't need Aristotle to understand Jesus.

We can just trust what the scriptures say.

Now, a lot of times people say that the Lutherans teach consubstantiation.

Uh, but we d- we don't, we...

The whole point of the Lutheran response to this business is that we just need the Bible.

We don't need a substantiation for anything.

We, we don't teach consubstantiation.

We don't teach any substantiation.

We just simply stick with the words of Jesus, where Jesus says, "Is." Let me show it to you.

This is the small called articles, uh, where Luther talks about it.

Ooh, let me, let me make another pause note here.

Ooh, I've got a idea.

Who, whoever, uh, whoever types all of these pause quotes, uh, into the quotes, the first person to put them into the comments, I'm going to send a copy, a free copy of the large catechism.

How about that for a, for a awesome way to not do any work?

Here, here's what, here's what Luther says.

Oh, pause.

Can you focus camera?

What is your deal today?

There's what Luther says about transsubstantiation.

It says this, "As regards transsubstantiation, we care nothing about the sophistical subtlety by which they teach that bread and wine leave or lose their own natural substance, and that there remains only the appearance and color of bread, and not true bread.

For it is in the perfect, it is in perfect agreement with the Holy Scriptures that there is and remains bread, as Paul himself calls it, 1 Corinthians 10:16, 'The bread which we break,' and 1 Corinthians 11:28, 'Let him so eat that bread.'" So there is your pause quote from Dr. Luther.

I got to come up with a cool sound effect.

So what do Lutherans say that the thing is?

Well, we simply say that it is the body, the bread is the body, and the wine is the blood of Jesus, and we don't get any more complicated than that.

Second, what is the thing itself?

What is the work?

What is the act?

Here's the Council of Trent.

Oh, this is getting fancy now.

Here's another pause quote for you, the Council of Trent, which says, uh, "The divine sacrifice is celebrated in the mass.

That same Christ is contained and emulated in an unbloody manner, who once offered himself in a bloody manner on the altar of the cross.

The Holy Synod teaches that this sacrifice is truly propitiatory." It actually says that.

Look, "This sacrifice is truly propitiatory," that means it takes away sins, "and that by means thereof, is affected that we obtain mercy and find grace and seasonable aid, if we draw nigh unto God, contrite and penitent with a sincere heart, and upright faith, with fear and reverence.

For the Lord, appeased by the oblation thereof, and granting the grace and gift of penance, forgives even heinous crimes and sins.

For the victim," Jesus, it's talking about, "is one and the same, the same now offering by the ministry of the priests who then offered himself on the cross, the manner alone of the offering being different." So that the Roman Catholic Church believes that the, uh, sacrifice of the mass is a propitiatory sacrifice.

Here, I'll give you another pause quote, ha, from the condemnations of the Council of Trent.

Pause this one, and read it.

Ooh.

Boom.

It says, "If anyone says that the bare commemoration of the sacrifice consummated on the cross, but is not a propitiatory..." Focus.

"...

but is not a propitiatory sacrifice or that it profits only him who receives, and that it ought not to be offered for the living and for the dead for sins, pains, satisfactions, and other necessities, let him be anathema, cursed to hell." So that the sacrifice of the mass is a propitiatory sacrifice.

Now, what do the Lutherans teach about this?

We'll go to the small catechism, and look at this.

"It is the true body and blood." What is it, first?

"It is the tr-" "It is the true body..." So man, don't worry, I'll get a new camera sometime soon.

"It is the true body and blood of our Lord Jesus Christ under the bread and wine for us Christians to eat and drink instituted by Christ Himself." And then, what is the benefit?

"It is shown in the words given and shed for you for the forgiveness of sins.

Namely that in the sacrament, forgiveness of sins, life and salvation are given through these words.

For where there is forgiveness of sins, there is also life and salvation." So we say it is the body and blood of Jesus for the forgiveness of sins.

That's what Jesus says, "Given and shed for you, for the forgiveness of sins." And this gets us already into the third thing....

the benefit.

We've got the benefits covered by the Lutherans, so we just have to see what the Catholic Church says are the benefits.

And looking in the catechism of the Catholic Church, they list seven benefits.

Where'd my little pause go?

Let's just take a look at the first one.

"Holy Communion augments our union with Christ.

The principal fruit of receiving the Eucharist in Holy Communion is an intimate union with Christ Jesus.

Indeed, the Lord said, 'He who eats my flesh and drinks my blood abides in me and I in him.' Life in Christ has its foundation in the Eucharistic banquet.

'As the living Father sent me, I live because of the Father, so he who eats of me will live because of me.'" All John 6.

The second benefit is strength.

The third benefit is separation from sin.

The fourth benefit is charity.

The fifth f- benefit is also charity.

The sixth benefit is unity with the mystical body of Christ.

The seventh benefit is it commits us to the poor.

And the eighth, oh, there's eight, the eighth benefit is that it is the unity feast of all Christians.

Now, in regards to this, I want to read you one other thing which is really interesting that I found right over here.

This is the Council of Trent.

This is another pause quote.

This is, uh, hmm, now I don't know where this is, canon, uh, five, and look what it says here.

Right there.

It says, "If anyone sayeth either that the principal fruit of the most Holy Eucharist is the remission of sins, or that other effects do not result therefrom, let him be anathema." In other words, the Council of Trent says that if you say that the chief benefit of the Lord's Supper is the forgiveness of sins, you are damned to hell.

That's what it says.

Let's summarize.

The Catholic Church takes the word...

Oh, let's move this up here like this.

Yes.

The Catholic Church takes the word of God and adds philosophy and gets transubstantiation.

They take the word of God and they add their doctrine of the priesthood.

Oh, I didn't even show you guys about the how, if anyone says that the words, "This is my body," don't institute a new priesthood, they're anathema, and you get the sacrifice of the mass.

And they take the word and they mix it up with their own doctrine of salvation and they get the main benefit is strength for love.

So that this is the system, like this.

Now, I would suggest that the Lutherans say, "Look, we got to, we want to have the doctor of justification, we want to have the understanding of the office and ministry, we want to take out philosophy," and what you get is the word.

What is the supper?

It, it's what Jesus said, "This is my body." Well, how does it happen?

Well, because the word says, "This is my body." And what's the benefit?

The forgiveness of sins, given and shed for you for the remission of sins.

Why does this matter?

And what does it matter if we say transubstantiation or consubstantiation?

What does it matter if we say it's union with Christ or the forgiveness of sins?

What, why does it matter if we say that it's done by the priest to have an indelible character, or that the power is of the word?

Well, what matters is what Jesus wants to give to us.

I mean, if Jesus didn't say anything about it, we could make up our own stuff all the time, but Jesus is the one who said, "Do this in remembrance of me." So we want to do what he says in remembrance of him.

Jesus knows best what we need, and he knows that in this life of sin, what we need is his body and his blood for the forgiveness of our sins.

So we, uh, rejoice in the simplicity and the clarity of what Jesus says.

So there it is, that's the difference between the Lutheran and the Catholic view of the Lord's Supper.

The conclusion?

We should all be Lutheran.

Thanks, by the way, for the questions.

You guys are great and, um, and keep 'em coming.

This is a new, um, I, I, I'm excited about it now, this theology blog sort of thing.

Uh, hopefully it tells the doctrine and teaches it in an engaging way.

You can see more of it here.

Here's some videos and subscribe to the channel.

We'll try to see how often we can make these videos and answer the questions, so if you've got questions, um, put them below.

And also, really, the first person to, to type all those comments, those pause quotes, uh, into the thing, I'll send a copy of the large catechism to you.

So, uh, so thanks for your help there.

See you soon.