But he does say you are eating the body and blood of the Lord. Verse 27 says whoever eats and drinks unworthily “will be answerable for the body and blood of the Lord”. And go to verse 29...”For all who eat and drink without discerning the body, eat and drink judgment against themselves.”
On the second coming argument, you make an interesting point, but one doesn’t exclude the other. Surely you’ve noticed in the Gospel this “tension” about the Second Coming that academics and liberals love to point out. That the Christian community believed Christ was coming soon—within “this generation”? That “tension” is largely an academic fiction IMHO, and results directly from academics not recognizing that Christ was believed in the earliest days to be coming at the end of the world *and* was held to be coming at evey divine liturgy. This is somewhat speculative on my part, but I think recognizing the Eucharistic sensibilities of the early Christians largely solves the “problem” of the Second Coming that all the academics love to rave about. There was no problem at all. Christ did come in the form of the Eucharist within that very generation, and he will come Himself without the sacramental veil at the end of time. I believe both comings are touched on by Paul in 1 Cor 11:26.
But if the body is the body in front of them that they are getting ready to partake of, then why didn't he say so??? Instead he says you are eating bread.
Furthermore, which "body" was given for the forgiveness of sins??? The one that hung on the cross or the one that the church is supposedly eating??? discerning or discernment requires the ability to distinguish between things, like the difference between that which was offered once and for all time and that which is done daily in remembrance of that which was offered once and for all time.
Remember the Lord's Supper was a Passover Supper. The Passover was [and still is] celebrated annually for thousands of years, but only the first Passover had any efficacious effect for the children of Israel back in Egypt. Every other Passover since that first one was and still is a REMEMBRANCE ceremony of that once and for all time event.