Presence, space and relating mind

In a previous post, Presence, space and mind, I wrote about how presence need not always imply physical proximity but could be mediated by tokens such as letters, or electronic signals and that the crucial thing was that the tokens enabled and carried forward a relationship. At the end of that previous post I noted that there was still some exploration of the idea to be done:  

to think about the way that relationship can be mediated by tokens and the conditions for successful mediation of relationship which might be relevant to the Eucharist.

So it seems that presence need not be equated to physical proximity. However, we should note that this is not to imply that God is not present. Some of what we need to explore is that God is always and everywhere present so eucharistic presence is not a presence in distinction to absence, but it is rather the kind of presence being mediated. God's 'normal' or 'ordinary' ubiquity is supplemented or interpreted by the communicative tokens of bread and wine in the eucharist. God is present anyway and in the eucharist that presence is 'enhanced' by a collection of inter-related signifiers in a communicative economy based in narratives of Divine-human interaction.

So this is beyond merely 'physical' presence (that is presence alongside, over or through the physical universe rather than of a physical body). It is a storied presence invoked upon and by broken bread and outpoured wine and their place in the stories so invoked. So the presence is not only physical but it is collectively-mental; a presence within the minds and affectivities of disciples. This is a 'place' where the normal and ordinary presence of God does not automatically exist: it can only be there by some degree of welcome and acknowledgement. Which welcome and acknowledgement are called forth and substantiated by the rite. Perhaps, then, this gives a further credence to the notion of "transsignification" as a way of understanding the eucharist.

There is a real presence of Christ in the social-mindscape of the congregation. 'Real' in the sense that it is not merely a subjective construction of the human congregants but it is a presence-in-sign whereby the self-giving of Christ is appropriated subjectively within the social-mindscape as the physical rite is enacted. Just as word or gesture is needed to convey a personal and relational presence so is the rite important in conveying the Christ presence into the social-mindscape. The reality of the presence beyond the subjectivity of the congregants derives from the given-ness of the sign/s by God. As a letter conveys a real presence by virtue of it being sent by the author to renew or to keep alive a relationship, so this rite conveys a real presence by virtue of being 'sent' by God.

And what is communicated is particularly signified as not simply presence or availability but more precisely the given-ness-unto-death of the God-man Jesus. The tokens communicating the real presence-in-social-mindscape are more precisely communicating the self-donation of the Word of God through deathly passion and 'resurrascension'. This too goes beyond mere presence and interprets presence as 'for us' and solidary as well as committed and saving. This is God conveying commitment to relating positively to us by re-presenting to us what God has been doing to create a positive relationship with the implication of inviting us to respond in kind. The presentation and the response come together in the co-ordinating signs that make up the rite: the actions of taking, blessing, breaking and consuming the bread and the wine,

And such presence involves both time and space.It is in the rite that the communication takes place -as the rite is 'read' by the congregants, the relationship via the deathly passion and resurrascension is renewed as a real presence in the mindscape. a real presence that becomes us at the very least by changing and reinforcing our neuronal patterns and their connections with the various aspects of our lives over time.

I think there's a little more to unpack ... watch this space.

Presence, space and mind

Where is cyberspace? Where is our conversation when I'm sending signals and receiving them in a spot in north east England whereas you might be holding up your end of the conversation in ... well ... it could be Antarctica. So where is the conversation? Presumably in both places and in the medium of signal-travel. More precisely 'in' our minds mediated by sound and light waves, radio waves, electronic processing, bio-neural processing ... a conversation isn't such a simple thing and nor is presence. We all know of times when someone (perhaps we ourselves) have been present physically but not personally or relationally. And we can, to some extent, be present relationally /personally  but not physically -though some way of linking minds/persons is needed as it is hard to conceive of relating without some exchange of information but that can be done at a distance. Physical mediation cannot be entirely withdrawn.

And so I found myself musing on a sentence from John M Hull's article in the last Church times (non-subscribers won't be able to see the whole article for a couple of weeks or so). "The Reformers, in opposing transubstantiation, insisted that the real presence of the body of Christ could not be on earth, because it was already in heaven, at the right hand of God." And of course, the Roman Catholic antecedent is a very physical understanding of the presence tied as it was to the 'accidents' of particular pieces of bread and wine. And as I read the paragraphs in which that sentence appears, I felt that the whole argument was misconceived and missing an important dimension.

Perhaps the main difficulty was not exploring more fully what presence might mean beyond physical proximity. To be fair it was probably hard to conceive of relating or personal presence aside from physical presence when technologies for extending communicative reach were relatively unsophisticated. Our technologies enable us to experience and so to conceive of relating at a distance and so can help us to reframe the way we think about 'the real presence of Christ'.

By that I'm not suggesting that we should have a technological understanding, but to take hold of the conceptual space opened up by ICTs to recognise presence not merely in physical terms. So we can take seriously the idea that God is all about relating and that relational presence is not fully dependent on physical presence so much as personal presence and that personal and relational presence isn't always dependent on a bodily presence. Physical and bodily need not be the same thing, we now understand.

Once we understand relational presence as more to do with signalling -that is exchange of information having a bearing on the maintenance and development of a relationship- than with simply the medium, it reframes the whole issue. For example, a note or letter, or email can be a relational presence. (And let's just pause briefly to note that these are in a sense more tactile and permanent forms of signalling than speech, gesture or expression, but essentially the same sort of thing in respect of relational mediation). In appropriate circumstances a token can be a relational presence. A prearranged signal can mediate a presence and sometimes more -the song 'Tie a Yellow Ribbon round the Old Oak Tree' illustrates just such a token.

So, I'm proposing that we don't need to try to conceive of the presence of Christ in the Eucharist in physical terms (and therefore we don't need to get into discussion about whether Christ's body can be in two 'places' at once and how heavenly placement might co-ordinate with earthly placement and so forth). What might be more useful is to think about the way that relationship can be mediated by tokens and the conditions for successful mediation of relationship which might be relevant to the Eucharist.

That's the exploration of the next post on this topic -which I hope to do in a little while. This one was about laying down a re-framing of the issue in principle.

Dear tokens of his Passion