Probably only a "hitch-hiker" would ask questions like; Is a photon matter? Is a photon energy? Is matter converted to energy in a nuclear reaction? and expect to get a clear answer.
Again there are clear answers just not within the messy framework of classical physics that layman are familiar with.
You need to recognize the problem that average English speech simply is not a suitable framework to try and derive a really technical answer of science.
Try another technical field like computer programming and using only layman speech. Do you think you can answer a technical question which would remotely make sense given the restriction?
Stuff is just stuff it doesn't have to match ambiguous and often historically wrong layman definitions.
Energy is one of those funny concepts in classical physics that it has been treated historically as something "real and physical" yet there is no basis for that belief.
There is a lot of discussion of this in teaching of science at the moment along these lines
http://www.learner.org/workshops/energy/workshop1/real.htmlI am definitely one of the ones, urging that they not teach something that is totally misleading.
