This is an excerpt from a report by the Lepanto Institute.
On March 13, the Association of U.S. Catholic Priests (AUSCP) posted an event notice on its website for a “Eucharistic Revival” featuring “AUSCP member and former Assembly presenter” Fr. Jim Bacik.
Fr. Bacik, according to his website bio, is a well credentialed theologian, who has held teaching positions at a number of Catholic universities. A cursory review of his materials found him to be stereotypically modernist and a good fit for AUSCP. His presentations include the promotion of such condemned ideas as the “Fundamental Option,” (a theory, condemned in Veritatis Splendor, that we make a fundamental choice for or against God, rather than fall based on our individual moral choices), the ordination of women to the priesthood and a dissident understanding of homosexuality.
Following the Eucharistic Revival event, the AUSCP posted video of Fr. Bacik’s presentation to its website.
The talk consists of Fr. Bacik answering a number of fictional questions concerning Mass and the Eucharist.
The first question, from a character named Abraham, sets the overall tone of the presentation. Abraham is a traditionalist who doesn’t like music or the sign of peace. Fr. Bacik emphasizes that liturgy is a communal activity and a “common meal.” Later, around the twenty-minute mark, Fr. Bacik explains that some tell him Mass is a sacrifice, to which he responded, “[I]t doesn’t turn me on.” He goes on to state that the Mass is a ritual gift exchange rather than a sacrifice. Other highlights include his discussion at an hour and one minute calling Abp. Cordileone a “culture warrior” for his response to Nancy Pelosi while then going on to praise Cdl. McElroy’s approach on making the Eucharist “common ground.”
However, the most alarming aspect of the talk is where Fr. Bacik swerves into downplaying or downright denying transubstantiation.
AUSCP posted an event notice on its website.
Beginning around 13 minutes into the talk, Fr. Bacik presents the story of a woman named Sarah who is challenged by her Presbyterian husband concerning her belief in transubstantiation. Father Bacik first downplays transubstantiation by claiming that Catholics aren’t “tied” to that as a teaching. Father Bacik then tells Sarah that she can explain Christ’s presence in the Eucharist to her husband as “transignification,” by saying:
Trent said that [transubstantiation] was a “suitable way” of describing the Eucharist. Most theologians don’t think we’re tied to that. The Vatican did repeat it in the 1950s … but, um, I think most theologians would say we’re not tied to that. So, you can tell your husband, “OK, you don’t like it. I don’t have to hold it as a Catholic.”
Here’s another. Try this. How about thinking of what happens in the Eucharist as transignification. So, that bread and wine, because of the Eucharistic prayer, is no longer merely bread and wine. They don’t just throw it away when the Mass is over. It took on, through the Mass, a “new significance.” So, you could tell your husband, “No, I don’t hold [transubstantiation], I hold transignification. When I go to Communion, that’s Jesus — for me. That’s Him nourishing me, that’s Him strengthening me, that’s helping me get through my day — tough day — and the dog-eat-dog world that I live in.” Transignification. Try that on your husband; see how that works.
The problem here is that Fr. Bacik is instructing his audience to hold a condemned view of Jesus’ presence in the Eucharist.
Read the rest at Lepanto Institute.
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