(May 13, 2015 at 11:28 pm)SteelCurtain Wrote: The assertion that this is what actually happens is patently ridiculous. Just saying "Jeebus says" carries no weight. You have made a claim that cannot be tested. You say the bread and wine changes, but its physical characteristics are not altered. By what measure has it changed, then?
Perhaps ridiculous to you, yet invoking Christ carries weight in a theological context. The measure in question is theological. Now, we're not going to rush the USDA beef carcass inspectors in to examine the host after the priest consecrates it. Good thing. But for whatever theological reasons they have, transubstantiation makes sense to Catholics.
Indeed, Carson has linked it to Jesus' use of a nominal sentence in "this is my body." English can use nominal sentences to denote either representation or identity; our language doesn't mark the verb "to be" for identity, in the way that Latin marks "sum." If Catholic theology was relying on the Latin Vulgate, the identity sense of the verb would be much stronger than what English conveys with "is."
(May 13, 2015 at 11:38 pm)Randy Carson Wrote: If God says something, then it IS true whether you understand it or not.
That's unlikely to fly on Atheist Forums. I believe in God and assume he is true in his doings, though I'm less confident that personal revelation, or even statements in the bible, always represent God saying something directly, or at least saying it in words like humans do, because I'm not sure gods rely on words like we do. We use phrases like "the word" in connection with deity to assert that the deity thinks and communicates, but our cognitive limits force us to equate this thinking and communication to our own, which does use words and language. Human languages are highly fallible, however. A perfect being need not be limited by what words can express.
If I'm wanting to steer an atheist gently toward sympathy or understanding for theism, I can't just say "because God says it's so in the bible." The only currencies really accepted here are scientific and philosophical truths, with even the latter getting a jaundiced eye at times.
In theology itself the bible, while to be read carefully and revered, is only one source among many. I can't limit myself just to what one collection of texts says. Christian thought outside the bible, the texts of other religions, and yes, science and philosophy, including atheism and humanism, should have a role in helping us form our understandings of deity.
