I don’t know why, though. I mean, yeah, in particular it’s a tough doctrine; it has been since the beginning (see John 6 for an early account). But to doubt some mystical paradox just for not fitting into a tidy, cozy mindset?
God is transcendent. Some things are supposed to be beyond normal understanding.
I mean, sometimes General Relativity and quantum mechanics freak me out--what is matter, why is there such a thing as phase velocity beyond mathematical tidiness?--but when I get close to a mental BSOD, I stop thinking about it and go do something else; I don't start doubting my Garmin.
Okay, relativity and electronics are on some practical level comprehensible, quantifiable, but I think what's going on is ex-Catholics are just disenchanted and Transubstantiation is just an excuse. After all, it's the Catholic Church that is big on the Real Presence, so if that's not real, who's to say I can't use birth control?
I have some sympathy, if not in that last case. It's a critical tenet and the New Testament even talks about people who take ill and die for receiving unworthily, so people who abstain in good conscience are just being honest and humble.
So maybe I do know why. It's just usually not packaged up with the excuses I do hear.
God is transcendent. Some things are supposed to be beyond normal understanding.
I mean, sometimes General Relativity and quantum mechanics freak me out--what is matter, why is there such a thing as phase velocity beyond mathematical tidiness?--but when I get close to a mental BSOD, I stop thinking about it and go do something else; I don't start doubting my Garmin.
Okay, relativity and electronics are on some practical level comprehensible, quantifiable, but I think what's going on is ex-Catholics are just disenchanted and Transubstantiation is just an excuse. After all, it's the Catholic Church that is big on the Real Presence, so if that's not real, who's to say I can't use birth control?
I have some sympathy, if not in that last case. It's a critical tenet and the New Testament even talks about people who take ill and die for receiving unworthily, so people who abstain in good conscience are just being honest and humble.
So maybe I do know why. It's just usually not packaged up with the excuses I do hear.
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