If I had to rate the Articles, this one would be at the bottom. Why did this church insist on going against the wisdom of “Good Queen Bess” and insist that the wicked don’t receive the Eucharist? This is one of many reasons why I find Anglican Eucharistic theology overcomplicated and, in this case, unBiblical. The point of the Scriptures is that those who receive it unworthily do receive it, but the consequences of doing so, from Judas to the sinful Corinthians, are dire. Little wonder Bossuet, who wasn’t much on women running the church, gave Elizabeth I a pass the way he did in his History of the Variations of the Protestant Churches.
Once we get past this, there are errors on both sides.
The Roman Catholics, swept up in the enthusiasm of their Eucharistic theology, overlook the fact that one really needs to be in a state of grace to properly receive the Sacrament. “But Christ is really present in the Sacrament…” He was on the Cross and they mocked him! As one priest from my Aggie days said, if you encounter Jesus you are either changed or scandalised. And that, I would add, goes for the Eucharist as well.
On the other hand those who would push us to one version or another of Bill Clinton’s Eucharistic Theology: It Depends on What ‘Is’ Is diluted the reality of the Lord’s Supper, a path too many have followed in the centuries since.
Positive Infinity 