::snort::
Except that when he was speaking of the Body of Christ there? He was talking about the People of God as the Body of Christ, not Christ’s literal Body. That’s why the next phrases are “Church of Christ”. So, yeah, the people of God are not consumed.
Funny.
“He was talking about the People of God as the Body of Christ, not Christs literal Body.”
He was talking about the Eucharist, which symbolizes Christ and His body (us). His entire discourse is on explaining what the Eucharist is, which from his point of view is a spiritual lesson in unity.
From Sermon 227:
“That bread which you can see on the altar, sanctified by the word of God, is the body of Christ.2 That cup, or rather what the cup contains, sanctified by the word of God, is the blood of Christ. It was by means of these things that the Lord Christ wished to present us with his body and blood, which he shed for our sake for the forgiveness of sins. If you receive them well, you are yourselves what you receive. You see, the apostle says, We, being many, are one loaf, one body (1 Cor 10:17). That’s how he explained the sacrament of the Lord’s table; one loaf, one body, is what we all are, many though we be.
In this loaf of bread you are given clearly to understand how much you should love unity. I mean, was that loaf made from one grain? Weren’t there many grains of wheat? But before they came into the loaf they were all separate; they were joined together by means of water after a certain amount of pounding and crushing. Unless wheat is ground, after all, and moistened with water, it can’t possibly get into this shape which is called bread. In the same way you too were being ground and pounded, as it were, by the humiliation of fasting and the sacrament of exorcism. Then came baptism, and you were, in a manner of speaking, moistened with water in order to be shaped into bread. But it’s not yet bread without fire to bake it. So what does fire represent? That’s the chrism, the anointing. Oil, the fire-feeder, you see, is the sacrament of the Holy Spirit.”
This is why he concludes in saying “Is the body of Christ consumed, is the Church of Christ consumed, are the members of Christ consumed? Perish the thought!” Because the Eucharist “signifies” ALL of those things, and not just Christ Himself.