The Eucharist, Transubstantiation, Fractals and the Trinity

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JSBACHlover
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26 Oct 2013, 8:26 pm

Mindsigh wrote:
I was hoping someone Catholic would chime in on this.


Well, by definition of my profession (see profile) I'm a Catholic.

Here are some things to consider, mostly for mental enjoyment:

1. That which has finite existence cannot be the cause of its own existence. Hence there must exist some cause Whose Existence is Non-Finite. Hence God is simply Ipsum Esse -- Being Iteself.

2. Because of #1, even a universe without a temporal beginning requires a creator (see #1) because energy and mass can exist (and therefore do exist) as finite quantity.

3. However, since the universe as effect must in some way reflect the qualities of its cause, it must bear a trace of infinitude. Fractality is one such mathematical expression of the fusion and interplay between the finite and the infinite in mathematics, and which can be applied to describe things and events in the universe.

4. Fractality is therefore analogous/representative of the Incarnate Second Person of the Trinity, who is fully finite (Man) and fully infinite (God).



Mindsigh
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26 Oct 2013, 8:52 pm

The thing that started me wondering was the idea that even a crumb of consecrated bread or a drop of Precious Blood contains the whole Body, Blood Soul and Divinity. And the famous Mandelbrot set picture popped into my head and there;s the 3 circles,,,


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JSBACHlover
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26 Oct 2013, 9:11 pm

The Eucharist is infinity contained in the finite. But I can't say I know how to relate the Trinity to it, except that the Eucharist is made by the Father sending down His Spirit to create on the altar the Son.

It is (and much theological ink has been spilled on this) IMPOSSIBLE to prove the existence of the Trinity from reason alone. It is a Truth that can only be revealed, but once revealed we can begin to see traces of threeness in all things. E.g. A concept requires an interior thought which requires a communicating word; subject verb predicate; sender action receiver; f(x) = y; and so on.



AspE
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28 Oct 2013, 1:26 pm

The trinity was created to appeal to Celtic pagans, who had goddesses with three forms.



techstepgenr8tion
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28 Oct 2013, 4:43 pm

AspE wrote:
The trinity was created to appeal to Celtic pagans, who had goddesses with three forms.

Somehow the Sephir Yetzirah broke the Hebrew Letters in to 3, 7, and 12 - 3 monthers, 7 doubles, and 12 singles (7 doubles correlates to planets of ancient astrology, 12 singles for twelve signs of zodiac).

Apparently in Jewish mysticism there is a trinity of sorts albeit they have it being three elements net of earth - ie. primal air, water, and fire (Aleph, Mem, and Shin). It sounds like they have these as something preeminent to creation and to some extent I think this may fuel their claim of Jesus as a Kabbalist. Dion Fortune in her 'Cosmic Doctrine' had a specific place for the three mothers in positing a super-universe or universe of universes which is claimed to have seven spheres, twelve lines of return from exterior to interior (core being the eternal stillness) and the three rings at the very exterior of the universe being the primordial ring of light or creation, the ring-chaos, and the ring-pass-not, the first two of which create countervailing forces that consolidate matter but also pull the universe into expansion (one acts to expand the domain in what's deemed the great unmanifest whereas the other essentially clumps it's light and matter).

There's another author, a Christian mystic of some renown, named Cynthia Bourgeault who has a book called 'The Holy Trinity and the Law of Three'. I haven't read it nor do I know exactly which direction she's going in, however I do notice that most esoteric forms have a way of merging at similar consensus. In the various forms of Kabbalism/Qabalism the tree of life and its ten sephira have three trinities (first being the supernals - Kether, Chokhmah, Binah) with Malkuth being the only sephira by itself but claimed somewhat ambiguously to be Kether of the next tree (I don't know if this is pointing at Malkuth of Atziluth linking down to Kether of Briah or if it's quite literally a claim that they'd be the same item).

Trinities are a very big thing in the mystic/esoteric realm. Perhaps one of these days I'll have a chance to read Cynthia's book. My best guess is that the threes or trinities are thesis, antithesis, synthesis (I've heard it presented that way in several books albeit I'm not sure whether it extrapolates to the whole concept in all cases). The claims with the supernals and second/third trinities of the Tree of Life are that the first (eg. Kether) forms a reflection (eg. Chokmah) and an understanding that it is not it's reflection (eg. creation of Binah). In that sense it would be a claim that Christ is of the Father but separate in some ways and a third being, the Holy Spirit, is created directly of their acknowledgement of one another. Being raised Catholic I was taught that all three - Father, Son, and Holy Spirit existed forever in all directions and in that sense there was no creation of the Son nor synthesis of the Holy Spirit. I don't know what to make of that, in the universe, multiverse, cosmos, or whatever we want to call the absolute of our environment it may be a tangent timeline where no aspect of God would have any beginning, end, or creation of a trinity from a unity because it would be an event with no relationship to the timeline we live on. Claims abound as well that it takes living in the physical as we do for time and space to exist in the way that we're accustomed to them.



CSBurks
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28 Oct 2013, 10:26 pm

I don't think there's a creator, and I don't think you need a religion to enjoy bread and wine.