I think the first Christians, that is St. Paul's Peeps gathered around the Eucharist. It was central to their ecclesiology. His congregations would not have considered a worship existence outside of the centrality of the Eucharist. I think you can say you think they were wrong, but I don't think you can deny that the Eucharist was at the center of their understanding of what it meant to be church.
I also think that when you abandon the sacrament as so many churches have, you cut the bond that Christ left us, and as St. Paul reminds us, until such time as he returns.
The Last Supper which became the Lord's Supper was not administered or bequeathed to us meaninglessly. The Eucharist is the sacrificed Body and Blood of Jesus Christ. As C.S. Lewis said, "He said Take and Eat, not take and understand."
The most significant theological battle of the Reformation was the understanding of the Eucharist, and because the Reformers could not come to an understanding, unity was broken before it even began.
Calvin said of Zwingli as regards his understanding of it being a purely spiritual memorial, that he tore down the bad at the expense of building up the good. Luther refused to shake Zwingli's hand when he extended it to him at Marlburg (sp?). Luther didn't consider Zwingli a Christian, which I think was high-handed of him, but you can see from this how important it was, and in many churches it's now been completely abandoned. It's not a good idea to not take Christ at His Word regardless of however one chooses to decipher it all.
I've read and heard people refer to the Last Supper and the administration of the Eucharist as a command, but I don't see it that way at all.
He gifted us the Eucharist as this Mystical bond, something we could take in our hands to remind us that 'lo I'm with you until the consummation of the ages.'
To depart from the understanding of the first Christians and St. Paul as regards the centrality of the Eucharist we do at our own peril, and when done will and has taken an enormous ecclesial toll.
AG, I haven't followed this conversation but I happened to noticed this comment. The first recorded efforts of people getting together of the early church was for the purposes of prayer (Peter was in jail, they assemble to pray for him.). There is no evidence that they celebrated the Eucharist at this time.
I don't wish to minimize the Eucharist since there is clear historical and scriptural evidence that it soon became a part of the worship. But the meaning of the Eucharist was confusing, so much so that Paul had to issue clarification for the Corithians. By the early first century most of these disagreements calmed down and the Eucharist was a focus of getting together.
I know a number of our Catholic friends would disagree with me but there is also historical evidence (albeit not much) that there was a disagreement in the Church as to the meaning of the Eucharist; whether the Eucharist was symbolic or imparted grace. (Please don't anyone ask me to cite sources. Don't I have an honest face? But for one citation see; Radbertus & Ratramnus: A Ninth Century Debate over the Lord's Supper
What strikes me most about the Eucharist and the Mass, rest on other history and the establishment of the formal practice of the Eucharist in the Church by the Fourth Lateran Council of 1215. Before the 1215 Council, the Holy Wars had been going on for over two hundred years. The Church, who was asking good Catholics to fight for them, was starting to lose members who did not wish to fight and die in some far off land (much like Vietnam). The Fourth Lateran Council declared the only way to receive God's grace was through the Eucharist and the only way to receive the Eucharist was by having it administered by a priest through the Church and by attending Church. In my mind this was a very clever way to keep membership among a number of Middle Ages peasants.
The policy for the Eucharist was never about sound doctrine nor can it be traced to sound doctrine. It is clear that the early church held the Eucharist in high esteem, but for the Lateran Council to make it necessary to attend Church so that it could be administer to by a priest was not in keeping with scripture. Instead it smacks of a political decision made by Church leaders to keep membership.
In that department, I am a professional. :)
[Paul's] congregations would not have considered a worship existence outside of the centrality of the Eucharist. I think you can say you think they were wrong, but I don't think you can deny that the Eucharist was at the center of their understanding of what it meant to be church.
I also think that when you abandon the sacrament as so many churches have, you cut the bond that Christ left us, and as St. Paul reminds us, until such time as he returns.
I think that Harley made an excellent case that whether the first Christians centered around the Eucharist is highly debatable. So far as I am aware, there is no scripture indicating that Paul centered his worship around the Eucharist as practiced today by Roman Catholics. If there was, then I would probably BE a Roman Catholic. :)
To me, it always comes down to the sovereignty of God and what kind of relationship He intended to have with us. With the Eucharist, and the meaning behind it, we have a group of men squarely in between us laymen and God. God doesn't dispense grace to us individually, men of the Church do. Salvation doesn't come from God directly, it comes through the men of the Church through the sacraments, etc. Anything important has to go through a buffer of fallible men.
In my mind this is a very distant relationship with God. It makes much more sense to me that if God loves us as much as the Bible appears to tell us that He does, that He would want a much more personal relationship with us. I do not believe that can happen through middlemen. In my honest opinion, the Eucharist, as I understand its practice, is much more centered on the Church, than on God. I am not at all saying that I think it is an anti-Christian practice, or going anywhere near there. I'm just saying that I think the priorities are in the wrong place.
Finally, I find myself unable to hold the position that Paul practiced the Eucharist, as it is today, but that he was wrong. Given his conversion experience, I don't see how he could have been so wrong on something so important. It has been my experience here that Roman Catholics find Paul to be their least favorite Apostle precisely because he is so clear in teaching Reformed theology. It seems extremely unlikely to me that Paul would preach a personal relationship with Christ, but then practice a sacrament that diminishes the intimacy.