Can Christ Hear in the Eucharist?
A Short Essay
Recently, I came across a scholastic question I have not really given much thought to while reading Doronzo: Does Christ exercise acts of sensation in the Eucharist? To put it another way: Can Christ hear and see you in the Eucharist? Obviously, due to the sublime and perfect knowledge of His humanity, the Church dogmatically teaches that Christ lacks all ignorance (cf. St. Gregory I, Sicut aqua), but here we are asking about a specific mode of knowledge. When we go before the Blessed Sacrament in adoration and place our petitions before Christ, does it work as any other prayer does, or does Christ hear and see us by His sacramental existence?
Obviously, all agree that Christ in the Sacrament elicits spiritual acts of the intellect and will (in all the modes of knowledge and love commonly distinguished in Christology). Yet, the question of the sensible acts of Christ is much more difficult due to the fact that sensible acts depend on corporeal faculties. To see, an eye is needed. To hear, an ear is needed. Yet, in the Sacrament, these faculties are not present as extended. [1]
The Opinions on the Matter
This simple question has led to a multiplicity of opinions, disputed among theologians.
In order to understand this, recall that there is a distinction between immanent and transient actions. Immanent actions are those acts that are performed such that their effect remains in the agent. For our purposes, we can distinguish immanent acts into sensitive (hearing, tasting, seeing, etc.) and spiritual (knowing, willing, etc.). Transient actions are those acts that are performed such that their effect is outside of the agent (running, painting, striking, etc.).
First, there are some theologians who deny that it is at all repugnant for Christ to exercise natural acts of sensation in the Eucharist. It is important to note the term “natural,” as these theologians hold that such acts of sensation require no elevation above nature. Hence, no miracle is required according to their opinion.
α) Certain Nominalist theologians hold that Christ in the Sacrament naturally acts and is acted upon as if He were present bodily at that very place. Due to this presence, all transient and immanent acts are natural to Him. Hence, it would obviously follow that acts of sensation are natural to Him. However, God impedes Christ’s transient acts insofar as it is necessary to conceal the mystery. According to these theologians, far from requiring a miracle, some of the actions of Christ in the Eucharist must be impeded in order to conceal the mystery and allow for the exercise of faith.
β) Others slightly modify this position, holding that transient actions of Christ upon exterior bodies are natural (and, a fortiori, immanent actions), but not passions — that is, being acted upon by exterior bodies.
γ) Some hold that Christ naturally elicits acts of the senses, but that He does not acquire new species according to the mode of sacramental presence. Hence, in their opinion, it is not right to say that Christ naturally “hears” you insofar as He is acquiring the sound through the sacramental species, but only that, when receiving such through another mode, He can perform the act of hearing, seeing, etc., as He is present in the Sacrament.
Second, others state that such acts of sensation are not natural to the sacramental presence of Christ but require a miracle. This is divided into two opinions, disagreeing on whether the fact of this miracle is certain or not. To understand this, remember that knowledge of supernatural realities requires Divine Revelation. Hence, while we may discourse on whether such an act is possible or even probable, this does not tell us whether it has actually occurred. An analogous case is that of the fate of unbaptized infants. It is revealed to us that baptism is required for infants in order to be saved. Clearly, it is possible and perhaps even probable that God gives extraordinary graces to these infants, but this has not been revealed to us. Hence, we do not have certain knowledge of the matter.
α) The first opinion holds that the miracle is required by the purpose and end of the sacrament. Its defenders argue that the end of the sacrament is not only that Christ enters into spiritual communion with the faithful, but also bodily communion, which requires acts of sensation. Many theologians hold this opinion, including St. Bonaventure, Lessius, Suarez, Ysambert, Lapide, Serra, Gonet, Franzelin, and Hugon, among others. The classic work written in defense of this position is Cardinal Álvaro Cienfuegos’s Vita abscondita.
β) Others hold that this reasoning is not certain. Hence, while they concede that such a miracle is possible — or perhaps even probable — they deny that the reasoning necessarily leads to the conclusion posited. Even some of the apparent defenders of the first opinion (e.g., Hugon) seem in fact to be defenders of the second.
Third, there are those who hold that not only does Christ not elicit such acts of sensation, but that it is also impossible for Him to do so. They argue from the very nature of sensation, which requires some sort of bodily contact between a corporeal organ and the thing sensed through a sensible medium. Hence, for example, a person hears another man by means of an ear through sound carried in the air. Yet Christ in the Sacrament does not have, in Himself, quantitative contact with bodily things. This would require some sort of passion on the part of Christ insofar as the organs of sensation would have impressions made upon them from external sources.
Which Is Correct?
I incline toward the third opinion: that it neither occurs, nor could it possibly occur, that Christ performs sensible acts in the Sacrament. To understand why this makes sense, recall that transubstantiation takes place on the part of the substance of the bread and the substance of the wine. Christ’s presence in the Eucharist is not materially extended in space as the bodily presence of other things is, but rather only in the mode of substance.
From this principle it follows that we ought to refuse to predicate of Christ in the Blessed Sacrament of the Altar anything that requires the quantitative contact of Christ in the Sacrament with what is around Him, which would imply material and extrinsic extension, local presence, etc.
Yet, when it comes to bodily actions — such as the acts of the senses — such local extension is required. For the powers and faculties of sensation are bodily accidents, received into the substance by reason of quantity, from which they receive their extended mode of being and operating. This last point is crucial. The bodily accidents are received into the substance by reason of quantity. Yet, it is clear that there is no quantitative and extrinsic extension of Christ’s body in the Sacrament. Hence, it necessarily follows that Christ can no more perform external acts of sensation in the Eucharist than He can be white or tall in the Eucharist. Christ cannot be white or tall in the Eucharist since whiteness and tallness presuppose some sort of material extension. The same applies to external acts of sensation.
[1] It is important to note that the faculties of Christ’s body are indeed present, yet with an intrinsic distinction and order rather than an extrinsic distinction and order. Hence, the Roman Catechism states that “in this Sacrament are contained not only the true body of Christ and all the constituents of a true body, such as bones and sinews, but also Christ whole and entire.” In order for the sensible faculties to perform their connatural acts, it is necessary that they be present with material and extrinsic extension, since these are naturally corporeal organs.