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Author Topic: Is Christ's body omnipresent?  (Read 678 times) Average Rating: 0
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Volnutt
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« on: October 26, 2011, 09:24:25 PM »

This seemed to be the crux of Calvin's rejection of the Real Presence. He believed that for Christ's body to be in more than one place at the same time would represent a blurring of the Human and Divine Natures.

I know Orthodoxy also has the explanation of the Divine Liturgy being a catching up to Heaven, which also seems to me to explain away Calvin's conundrum. But even so, does Orthodoxy teach Christ is bodily everywhere?
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NicholasMyra
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« Reply #1 on: October 26, 2011, 09:26:23 PM »

This seemed to be the crux of Calvin's rejection of the Real Presence. He believed that for Christ's body to be in more than one place at the same time would represent a blurring of the Human and Divine Natures.
Saints can bi-locate.
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Ortho_cat
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« Reply #2 on: October 26, 2011, 09:27:07 PM »

Christ remains fully human and fully God. His human Body is glorified, yet still fully human. He did not cast aside his humanity after the resurrection/ascension. Yet, as God he is present everywhere and "fillest all things".
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William
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« Reply #3 on: October 26, 2011, 09:28:05 PM »

Christ is omnipresent according to His divinity and circumscribed according to His humanity.
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« Reply #4 on: October 27, 2011, 12:20:17 AM »

I believe that Christ's divine nature would make Him to be omnipresent, but His human body (I would think) is still subject to physical constraints. I think this is one of the things that makes the sacrament of the Eucharist so unique.
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« Reply #5 on: October 27, 2011, 10:23:53 AM »

This seemed to be the crux of Calvin's rejection of the Real Presence. He believed that for Christ's body to be in more than one place at the same time would represent a blurring of the Human and Divine Natures.
Saints can bi-locate.

I don't think this is true. There is either a very quick movement, a spiritual manifestation, or the work of the saint's angel, not an actual being in two places physically at the same time.
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« Reply #6 on: October 27, 2011, 11:13:18 AM »


His resurrected body “ascended into Heaven, and sits at the right hand of the Father;
and He shall come again with glory to judge the living and the dead;
Whose Kingdom shall have no end.”

This is all I know on the subject, but it seems to me that the answer is yes. 
I think this because God (the Father) is everywhere.   But Heaven is not thought of as a just a place here, I think it also is the place where God is both outside His creation and in it. 
And it is always impossible to use the logic of the created world to explain what has not yet been revealed by God about Himself. 


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« Reply #7 on: October 27, 2011, 11:49:11 AM »

I believe that Christ's divine nature would make Him to be omnipresent, but His human body (I would think) is still subject to physical constraints.

It isn't. He walked throught walls after His resurrection. Also, I don't think Christ's body can be separated from the rest of Him. If God is omnipresent, then incarnated Christ including His body is omnipresent.
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« Reply #8 on: October 27, 2011, 12:17:36 PM »

What about Christ's walking on water? "For to run upon the sea is foreign to the human nature, but it is not proper to the divine nature to use bodily feet. Therefore that action is of the incarnate Word, to whom belongs at the same time divine character and human, indivisibly." - St Severus of Antioch

I know that he's not an EO saint but I feel that this fits in with the subject.

For to be omnipresent is foreign to the human nature, but it is not proper to the divine nature to be circumscribed. If the Word can walk on water and read the hearts of man, why can't He be present in more than one place? After the union His divinity is not to be separated from His flesh.

Nestorians divide the divinity from the flesh. Also, it is believed that St Ignatius is speaking of the Gnostics in this following quote; they deny Christ had true flesh.

"They abstain from the Eucharist and from prayer, because they confess not the Eucharist to be the flesh of our Saviour Jesus Christ, which suffered for our sins, and which the Father, of His goodness, raised up again." - St Ignatius of Antioch, Epistle to Smyrnaeans, 7,1

The spiritual presence of the Eucharist is either Nestorian, Gnostic, or some other heresy.
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HabteSelassie
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« Reply #9 on: October 27, 2011, 03:14:28 PM »

Greetings in that Divine and Most Precious Name of Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ!

This seemed to be the crux of Calvin's rejection of the Real Presence. He believed that for Christ's body to be in more than one place at the same time would represent a blurring of the Human and Divine Natures.

I know Orthodoxy also has the explanation of the Divine Liturgy being a catching up to Heaven, which also seems to me to explain away Calvin's conundrum. But even so, does Orthodoxy teach Christ is bodily everywhere?

Since the Union is complete, Christ's Body is indeed omnipresent because His Body is also the Hypostasis of the Divine Word.  As Christ exists through His hypostasis, and His hypostasis is mutually Divine and Human, then His Body is therefore Omnipresent according to His Divinity, and yet corporeal because of His humanity.  It is deified Flesh, just as an iron bar becomes ignited and red hot in the fire, taking on the properties of fire while remaining iron, so to is His Body then Divinely Omnipresent while yet remaining physically finite. 

stay blessed,
habte selassie
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« Reply #10 on: October 27, 2011, 06:29:49 PM »

Thanks for your answers, everyone!
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« Reply #11 on: October 27, 2011, 07:02:00 PM »

I didn't know this was an objection of Calvin, though I've definitely heard it raised before. I always thought the feeding of the multitudes addresses this objection (note I don't say "solve" or "answer"). The Feeding of the Multitudes are clearly miracles which prefigure the Eucharist, but crucially the finite bread and fish at the beginning of the miracle is shared among thousands, with baskets of leftovers! How to explain that? Usually, the people raising the initial objections (if they're Christians) don't really have an answer, and have never thought to speculate on how Christ did what He did, because they accept the miracle at face-value. The Orthodox do the same with both the miracle of the feeding of the multitudes and the miracle of the Eucharist.
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« Reply #12 on: October 27, 2011, 07:31:12 PM »

I didn't know this was an objection of Calvin, though I've definitely heard it raised before. I always thought the feeding of the multitudes addresses this objection (note I don't say "solve" or "answer"). The Feeding of the Multitudes are clearly miracles which prefigure the Eucharist, but crucially the finite bread and fish at the beginning of the miracle is shared among thousands, with baskets of leftovers! How to explain that? Usually, the people raising the initial objections (if they're Christians) don't really have an answer, and have never thought to speculate on how Christ did what He did, because they accept the miracle at face-value. The Orthodox do the same with both the miracle of the feeding of the multitudes and the miracle of the Eucharist.
Yeah, I've thought it in terms of the Feeding as well. It's a very intriguing angle.
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« Reply #13 on: October 28, 2011, 03:13:23 AM »

What about Christ's walking on water? "For to run upon the sea is foreign to the human nature, but it is not proper to the divine nature to use bodily feet. Therefore that action is of the incarnate Word, to whom belongs at the same time divine character and human, indivisibly." - St Severus of Antioch

I am under the impression that most EO would agree with what I am about to say, forgive me if this is not the case:

Christ was capable of walking on water because He is Man.  Had He been ONLY Man, He would have been capable of doing this, much as St. Mark the Anchorite was capable of moving a mountain twice in a row with nothing more than his speech.  Man, when in union with God, is capable of controlling nature - that is as it was meant to be.
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