Body and Blood

[4thofeleven]

So, I’m sure everyone’s seen this article about atheists outdoing religious people on a survey about religious knowledge? Doesn't surprise me, but that's not what I find interesting about the results. What fascinates me is this bit:

“Forty-five percent of Catholics did not know that their church teaches that the consecrated bread and wine in holy communion are not merely symbols, but actually become the body and blood of Christ.”

 

I’d be really curious to see what the actual question asked there was – I assume it was a simple yes/no question, which makes an incorrect result that high really surprising. It’s fascinating, considering how significant the doctrine of Transubstantiation was throughout the last thousand years of Christian history and how much of a symbolic issue it became in dividing the Catholic and Protestant churches during the Reformation. I’m wondering how much of this is ignorance of the doctrine, and how much of it is modern Catholics actually consciously rejecting it.

 

I’d also love to know if there are similar patterns among Catholics outside the US…

Comments

[inner_v0ice]

I know, it really is quite astonishing. Looking at most of the great debates in Church history--I always think with chagrin that if any of those guys asked me what I thought, there's a good chance that I would pick the wrong answer and get branded a heretic...
(which probably means that I am technically a heretic right now and just don't know it. SHHH DON'T TELL ANYONE. >_> )

Possibly it's because these debates have already occurred so long ago that the religious leaders don't take as much care to teach about them any more? Maybe they generally feel that it's old news and so they don't have to lecture their parishioners about it?