Was The Papacy Established By Christ?

triablogue ^ | June 23, 2006 | Jason Engwer

[betty boop]

I'm trying, TRYING to tell my Catholic friends, not God, that God WILL NOT CONTRADICT HIMSELF.

Indeed. I deem that impossible already. Why do you feel you need to instruct me in this matter?

[ADSUM]

I see the problem, you can be selective in your choice of meanings, instead of using common sense.

When I said consumed, it was meant to “engage fully” or to be Christ-like. That is to love God with you heart, mind and soul and to do God’s will.

Some people promote an especially attractive idea: All true Christians, regardless of how they live, have an absolute assurance of salvation, once they accept Jesus into their hearts as “their personal Lord and Savior.” The problem is that this belief is contrary to the Bible and constant Christian teaching.

Keep in mind what Paul told the Christians of his day: “If we have died with him [in baptism; see Rom. 6:3–4] we shall also live with him; if we persevere we shall also reign with him” (2 Tim. 2:11–12).

If we do not persevere, we shall not reign with him. In other words, Christians can forfeit heaven (CCC 1861).

The Bible makes it clear that Christians have a moral assurance of salvation (God will be true to his word and will grant salvation to those who have faith in Christ and are obedient to him [1 John 3:19–24]), but the Bible does not teach that Christians have a guarantee of heaven. There can be no absolute assurance of salvation. Writing to Christians, Paul said, “See, then, the kindness and severity of God: severity toward those who fell, but God’s kindness to you, provided you remain in his kindness, otherwise you too will be cut off” (Rom. 11:22–23; Matt. 18:21–35, 1 Cor. 15:1–2, 2 Pet. 2:20–21).

Note that Paul includes an important condition: “provided you remain in his kindness.” He is saying that Christians can lose their salvation by throwing it away. He warns, “Whoever thinks he is standing secure should take care not to fall” (1 Cor. 10:11–12).

[Elsie]

Read the preceding verse: Christ is specifically speaking to Peter. And the following verse: He refers to the group as plural.

I guess that ALL of these Early Church Fathers were WRONG!

---

As regards the oft-quoted Mt. 16:18, note the bishops promise in the profession of faith of Vatican 1,

 

Likewise I accept Sacred Scripture according to that sense which Holy mother Church held and holds, since it is her right to judge of the true sense and interpretation of the holy scriptures; nor will I ever receive and interpret them except according to the unanimous consent of the fathers. — http://mb-soft.com/believe/txs/firstvc.htm

Yet as the Dominican cardinal and Catholic theologian Yves Congar O.P. states,

Unanimous patristic consent as a reliable locus theologicus is classical in Catholic theology; it has often been declared such by the magisterium and its value in scriptural interpretation has been especially stressed. Application of the principle is difficult, at least at a certain level. In regard to individual texts of Scripture total patristic consensus is rare...One example: the interpretation of Peter’s confession in Matthew 16:16-18. Except at Rome, this passage was not applied by the Fathers to the papal primacy; they worked out an exegesis at the level of their own ecclesiological thought, more anthropological and spiritual than juridical. — Yves M.-J. Congar, O.P., p. 71

And Catholic archbishop Peter Richard Kenrick (1806-1896), while yet seeking to support Peter as the rock, stated that,

“If we are bound to follow the majority of the fathers in this thing, then we are bound to hold for certain that by the rock should be understood the faith professed by Peter, not Peter professing the faith.” — Speech of archbishop Kenkick, p. 109; An inside view of the vatican council, edited by Leonard Woolsey Bacon.

Your own CCC allows the interpretation that, “On the rock of this faith confessed by St Peter, Christ build his Church,” (pt. 1, sec. 2, cp. 2, para. 424), for some of the ancients (for what their opinion is worth) provided for this or other interpretations.

• Ambrosiaster [who elsewhere upholds Peter as being the chief apostle to whom the Lord had entrusted the care of the Church, but not superior to Paul as an apostle except in time], Eph. 2:20:

Wherefore the Lord says to Peter: 'Upon this rock I shall build my Church,' that is, upon this confession of the catholic faith I shall establish the faithful in life. — Ambrosiaster, Commentaries on Galatians—Philemon, Eph. 2:20; Gerald L. Bray, p. 42

• Augustine, sermon:

"Christ, you see, built his Church not on a man but on Peter's confession. What is Peter's confession? 'You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.' There's the rock for you, there's the foundation, there's where the Church has been built, which the gates of the underworld cannot conquer. — John Rotelle, O.S.A., Ed., The Works of Saint Augustine , © 1993 New City Press, Sermons, Vol III/6, Sermon 229P.1, p. 327

Upon this rock, said the Lord, I will build my Church. Upon this confession, upon this that you said, 'You are the Christ, the Son of the living God,' I will build my Church, and the gates of hell shall not conquer her (Mt. 16:18). — John Rotelle, Ed., The Works of Saint Augustine (New Rochelle: New City, 1993) Sermons, Volume III/7, Sermon 236A.3, p. 48.

• Augustine, sermon:

For petra (rock) is not derived from Peter, but Peter from petra; just as Christ is not called so from the Christian, but the Christian from Christ. For on this very account the Lord said, 'On this rock will I build my Church,' because Peter had said, 'Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God.' On this rock, therefore, He said, which thou hast confessed, I will build my Church. For the Rock (Petra) was Christ; and on this foundation was Peter himself built. For other foundation can no man lay than that is laid, which is Christ Jesus. The Church, therefore, which is founded in Christ received from Him the keys of the kingdom of heaven in the person of Peter, that is to say, the power of binding and loosing sins. For what the Church is essentially in Christ, such representatively is Peter in the rock (petra); and in this representation Christ is to be understood as the Rock, Peter as the Church. — Augustine Tractate CXXIV; Philip Schaff, Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers: First Series, Volume VII Tractate CXXIV (http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/npnf107.iii.cxxv.html)

• Augustine, sermon:

And Peter, one speaking for the rest of them, one for all, said, You are the Christ, the Son of the living God (Mt 16:15-16)...And I tell you: you are Peter; because I am the rock, you are Rocky, Peter-I mean, rock doesn't come from Rocky, but Rocky from rock, just as Christ doesn't come from Christian, but Christian from Christ; and upon this rock I will build my Church (Mt 16:17-18); not upon Peter, or Rocky, which is what you are, but upon the rock which you have confessed. I will build my Church though; I will build you, because in this answer of yours you represent the Church. — John Rotelle, O.S.A. Ed., The Works of Saint Augustine (New Rochelle: New City Press, 1993), Sermons, Volume III/7, Sermon 270.2, p. 289

• Augustine, sermon:

Peter had already said to him, 'You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.' He had already heard, 'Blessed are you, Simon Bar-Jona, because flesh and blood did not reveal it to you, but my Father who is in heaven. And I tell you, that you are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my Church, and the gates of the underworld shall not conquer her' (Mt 16:16-18)...Christ himself was the rock, while Peter, Rocky, was only named from the rock. That's why the rock rose again, to make Peter solid and strong; because Peter would have perished, if the rock hadn't lived. — John Rotelle, Ed., The Works of Saint Augustine (New Rochelle: New City, 1993) Sermons, Volume III/7, Sermon 244.1, p. 95

• Augustine, sermon:

...because on this rock, he said, I will build my Church, and the gates of the underworld shall not overcome it (Mt. 16:18). Now the rock was Christ (1 Cor. 10:4). Was it Paul that was crucified for you? Hold on to these texts, love these texts, repeat them in a fraternal and peaceful manner. — John Rotelle, Ed., The Works of Saint Augustine (New Rochelle: New City Press, 1995), Sermons, Volume III/10, Sermon 358.5, p. 193

• Augustine, Psalm LXI:

Let us call to mind the Gospel: 'Upon this Rock I will build My Church.' Therefore She crieth from the ends of the earth, whom He hath willed to build upon a Rock. But in order that the Church might be builded upon the Rock, who was made the Rock? Hear Paul saying: 'But the Rock was Christ.' On Him therefore builded we have been. — Philip Schaff, Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1956), Volume VIII, Saint Augustin, Exposition on the Book of Psalms, Psalm LXI.3, p. 249. (http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/npnf108.ii.LXI.html)

• Augustine, in “Retractions,”

In a passage in this book, I said about the Apostle Peter: 'On him as on a rock the Church was built.'...But I know that very frequently at a later time, I so explained what the Lord said: 'Thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my Church,' that it be understood as built upon Him whom Peter confessed saying: 'Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God,' and so Peter, called after this rock, represented the person of the Church which is built upon this rock, and has received 'the keys of the kingdom of heaven.' For, 'Thou art Peter' and not 'Thou art the rock' was said to him. But 'the rock was Christ,' in confessing whom, as also the whole Church confesses, Simon was called Peter. But let the reader decide which of these two opinions is the more probable. — The Fathers of the Church (Washington D.C., Catholic University, 1968), Saint Augustine, The Retractations Chapter 20.1:.

• Basil of Seleucia, Oratio 25:

'You are Christ, Son of the living God.'...Now Christ called this confession a rock, and he named the one who confessed it 'Peter,' perceiving the appellation which was suitable to the author of this confession. For this is the solemn rock of religion, this the basis of salvation, this the wall of faith and the foundation of truth: 'For no other foundation can anyone lay than that which is laid, which is Christ Jesus.' To whom be glory and power forever. — Oratio XXV.4, M.P.G., Vol. 85, Col. 296-297.

• Bede, Matthaei Evangelium Expositio, 3:

You are Peter and on this rock from which you have taken your name, that is, on myself, I will build my Church, upon that perfection of faith which you confessed I will build my Church by whose society of confession should anyone deviate although in himself he seems to do great things he does not belong to the building of my Church...Metaphorically it is said to him on this rock, that is, the Saviour which you confessed, the Church is to be built, who granted participation to the faithful confessor of his name. — 80Homily 23, M.P.L., Vol. 94, Col. 260. Cited by Karlfried Froehlich, Formen, Footnote #204, p. 156 [unable to verify by me].

• Cassiodorus, Psalm 45.5:

'It will not be moved' is said about the Church to which alone that promise has been given: 'You are Peter and upon this rock I shall build my Church and the gates of Hell shall not prevail against it.' For the Church cannot be moved because it is known to have been founded on that most solid rock, namely, Christ the Lord. — Expositions in the Psalms, Volume 1; Volume 51, Psalm 45.5, p. 455

• Chrysostom (John) [who affirmed Peter was a rock, but here not the rock in Mt. 16:18]:

Therefore He added this, 'And I say unto thee, Thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my Church; that is, on the faith of his confession. — Chrysostom, Homilies on the Gospel of Saint Matthew, Homily LIIl; Philip Schaff, Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers (http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/npnf110.iii.LII.html)

• Cyril of Alexandria:

When [Peter] wisely and blamelessly confessed his faith to Jesus saying, 'You are Christ, Son of the living God,' Jesus said to divine Peter: 'You are Peter and upon this rock I will build my Church.' Now by the word 'rock', Jesus indicated, I think, the immoveable faith of the disciple.”. — Cyril Commentary on Isaiah 4.2.

• Origen, Commentary on the Gospel of Matthew (Book XII):

“For a rock is every disciple of Christ of whom those drank who drank of the spiritual rock which followed them, 1 Corinthians 10:4 and upon every such rock is built every word of the church, and the polity in accordance with it; for in each of the perfect, who have the combination of words and deeds and thoughts which fill up the blessedness, is the church built by God.'

“For all bear the surname ‘rock’ who are the imitators of Christ, that is, of the spiritual rock which followed those who are being saved, that they may drink from it the spiritual draught. But these bear the surname of rock just as Christ does. But also as members of Christ deriving their surname from Him they are called Christians, and from the rock, Peters.” — Commentary on the Gospel of Matthew (Book XII), sect. 10,11 ( http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/101612.htm)

• Hilary of Potier, On the Trinity (Book II): Thus our one immovable foundation, our one blissful rock of faith, is the confession from Peter's mouth, Thou art the Son of the living God. On it we can base an answer to every objection with which perverted ingenuity or embittered treachery may assail the truth."-- (Hilary of Potier, On the Trinity (Book II), para 23; Philip Schaff, editor, The Nicene & Post Nicene Fathers Series 2, Vol 9.

[betty boop]

So it’s a matter of what an individual wants to believe it is?

Evidently, a lot of people nowadays are of that opinion. But I am not one of them.

What I'm trying to point to is the limited utility of the Holy Scriptures if they are not illuminated by God's Grace, through the action of the Holy Spirit. Without that, the Holy Bible is a dead letter.

Which is to say that "sola scriptura," unilluminated by the power of the Spirit, comes close to bibliolatry — worship, not of God, but of a text which has been drained of its Spirit.... It might as well be an ordinary user manual, or a cookbook, or a scientific text.

Because this is my belief, my dear brother MHGinTX accuses me as a proselytizer of "mystery religion." But for heaven's sake, Christianity is deeply, deeply mysterious at its foundation, and miraculous through and through.

[Elsie]

" I will give you ONLY the keys . . ."

Dang!

I'm told it was...

"I will give ONLY you the keys . . ."

[Elsie]

Saints are those in Heaven with Christ.

Teaches Catholicism.

The bible is SILENT on this subject.

[Elsie]

You are not required to believe in the Truth. Catholic teaching.

[Elsie]

It is amazing that some profess belief in Jesus and that they are saved before they die, yet fail to understand the words that Jesus spoke directly about His Body and Blood several times and offered them to the Apostles at the Last Supper (the Real Presence).

Yes; it IS amazing!

Two; count 'em TWO! Real Presences® at once!

[Elsie]

I thought you knew that God was everywhere and He knows all that you are doing.

Since when has Jesus EVER been recorded as being in TWO places at once?

[Elsie]

God is the Truth and all are welcome to believe in God and do God’s will as Jesus taught that was reported in the Bible and orally.

 

John 6:28-29

Then they asked him, “What must we do to do the works God requires?”

Jesus answered, “The work of God is this: to believe in the one he has sent.”

[Elsie]

But I don’t accept your spin on God’s words.

And we don't accept Rome's.

Now what?

[Elsie]

According to the teaching of theology a revealed fact can be proved solely by recurrence to the sources of faith, viz. Scripture and Tradition, with which is also bound up the infallible magisterium of the Church.

Well; the Koran surely illustrates THIS point!

[MHGinTN]

He that hath ears let Him hear what The Word tells us. Luke 22:15-20

15 And He said to them, “I have earnestly desired to eat this Passover with you before I suffer; for I say to you, I shall never again eat it until it is fulfilled in the kingdom of God.”

17And when He had taken a cup and given thanks, He said, “Take this and share it among yourselves; for I say to you, I will not drink of the fruit of the vine from now on until the kingdom of God comes.” [The liquid in the cup was fruit of the vine; Jesus had just given them a teaching about He is The Vine and the life in the vine gives life to the branches and those not exhibiting life are cur off]

19And when He had taken some bread and given thanks, He broke it and gave it to them, saying, “This is My body which is given for you; do this in remembrance of Me.” [Scriptures teach us that not one bone was broken of His body during the crucifixion] And in the same way He took the cup after they had eaten, saying, “This cup which is poured out for you is the new covenant in My blood." [WEB]

If had not noticed, Jesus POUR OUT the wine in the cup, as the commandment of God is to pour the blood out upon the ground and not to drink it. Was it wine Jesus poured out, or the leftovers of blood he transubstantiated into the cup? ... It was wine used to fuflfill the commandment as a prefiguring of what was about to come with His actrual blood of the New Covenant.

[MHGinTN]

So be it.

[Elsie]

Too much arguing over words.

Bye; y’all...

[MHGinTN]

I apologize for pinging you to the scriptures passages. I assure you that will never happen again.

[daniel1212]

The Catholic Church holds Peter as the first Pope but their doctrine does not come from peter because he gave very little and the ones he gave is not disagreed on except the meaning.

This is erroneous because in the first place the doctrine of Rome on Peter is not based so much on what Peter or Paul wrote but on the gospels and the words to Peter in Mt. 16 and his leadership among the 11 in about half of Acts.

However, his explicit command to be baptised in Acts 2:38 is a primary text for Rome for one of their most primary doctrines, that of baptism itself effecting regeneration and justification thereby, and paedobaptism, while Paul states that Christ sent him not to baptize but to preach. Yet both are preaching justification by a heart-faith that confesses the Lord Jesus, with no essential difference being btwn doing so by mouth or by body language in baptism, neither of which are meritorious in obtaining .justification.

While on the other hand the Protestant Churches with the least ritual and doctrine hold Paul up as their example while they are actually going by the teaching of peter.

That is simply not the case. You just stated that Peter supplied gave very little doctrine, while it is abundantly evident that Prot doctrine comes predominately from the writings of Paul, as he is the chief doctrinal writer. And they tend to minimize baptism in conversion.

Moreover, as shown by the grace of God in an extensive thread not long ago, it is clear that there is no real conflict btwn the gospel Peter preached vs that of Paul, nor is there in other aspects of teaching.

[St_Thomas_Aquinas]

The papacy is actually well-attested in Scripture and in the writings of the early Christians.

Scripture

The Bible tells us that Jesus is the King of the eternal and redeemed Davidic Kingdom. (Luke 1:32)

In the ancient Davidic kingdom, the palace majordomo served as the representative of the king (or vice-regent) in the king's absence. (Isaiah 22:15-25)

The authority of this office was represented by an over-sized key which the vice-regent wore around his neck. (Isaiah 22:22)

As the King of the eternal House of David, Jesus holds the Key of David. (Rev. 3:7)

Jesus gave the "keys of the kingdom," representing the office of the vice-regent of the eternal, redeemed House of David, to Peter. (Matthew 16:19)

Early Christians

St. Irenaeus

"The blessed apostles [Peter and Paul], having founded and built up the church [of Rome] . . . handed over the office of the episcopate to Linus" (Against Heresies 3:3:3 [A.D. 189]).

Tertullian

"[T]his is the way in which the apostolic churches transmit their lists: like the church of the Smyrneans, which records that Polycarp was placed there by John, like the church of the Romans, where Clement was ordained by Peter" (Demurrer Against the Heretics 32:2 [A.D. 200]).

The Little Labyrinth

"Victor . . . was the thirteenth bishop of Rome from Peter" (The Little Labyrinth [A.D. 211], in Eusebius, Church History 5:28:3).

Cyprian of Carthage

"The Lord says to Peter: ‘I say to you,’ he says, ‘that you are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my Church, and the gates of hell will not overcome it. . . . ’ [Matt. 16:18]. On him [Peter] he builds the Church, and to him he gives the command to feed the sheep [John 21:17], and although he assigns a like power to all the apostles, yet he founded a single chair [cathedra], and he established by his own authority a source and an intrinsic reason for that unity. . . . If someone [today] does not hold fast to this unity of Peter, can he imagine that he still holds the faith? If he [should] desert the chair of Peter upon whom the Church was built, can he still be confident that he is in the Church?" (The Unity of the Catholic Church 4; first edition [A.D. 251]).

"Cornelius was made bishop by the decision of God and of his Christ, by the testimony of almost all the clergy, by the applause of the people then present, by the college of venerable priests and good men, at a time when no one had been made [bishop] before him—when the place of [Pope] Fabian, which is the place of Peter, the dignity of the sacerdotal chair, was vacant. Since it has been occupied both at the will of God and with the ratified consent of all of us, whoever now wishes to become bishop must do so outside. For he cannot have ecclesiastical rank who does not hold to the unity of the Church" (Letters 55:[52]):8 [A.D. 253]).

"With a false bishop appointed for themselves by heretics, they dare even to set sail and carry letters from schismatics and blasphemers to the chair of Peter and to the principal church [at Rome], in which sacerdotal unity has its source" (ibid., 59:14).

Eusebius of Caesarea

"Paul testifies that Crescens was sent to Gaul [2 Tim. 4:10], but Linus, whom he mentions in the Second Epistle to Timothy [2 Tim. 4:21] as his companion at Rome, was Peter’s successor in the episcopate of the church there, as has already been shown. Clement also, who was appointed third bishop of the church at Rome, was, as Paul testifies, his co-laborer and fellow-soldier [Phil. 4:3]" (Church History 3:4:9–10 [A.D. 312]).

Pope Julius I

"[The] judgment [against Athanasius] ought to have been made, not as it was, but according to the ecclesiastical canon. . . . Are you ignorant that the custom has been to write first to us and then for a just decision to be passed from this place [Rome]? If, then, any such suspicion rested upon the bishop there [Athanasius of Alexandria], notice of it ought to have been written to the church here. But now, after having done as they pleased, they want to obtain our concurrence, although we never condemned him. Not thus are the constitutions of Paul, not thus the traditions of the Fathers. This is another form of procedure, and a novel practice. . . . What I write about this is for the common good. For what we have heard from the blessed apostle Peter, these things I signify to you" (Letter on Behalf of Athanasius [A.D. 341], contained in Athanasius, Apology Against the Arians 20–35).

Council of Sardica

"[I]f any bishop loses the judgment in some case [decided by his fellow bishops] and still believes that he has not a bad but a good case, in order that the case may be judged anew . . . let us honor the memory of the apostle Peter by having those who have given the judgment write to Julius, bishop of Rome, so that if it seem proper he may himself send arbiters and the judgment may be made again by the bishops of a neighboring province" (Canon 3 [A.D. 342]).

[caww]

....”What I’m trying to point to is the ‘limited utility’ of the Holy Scriptures ‘if they are not illuminated by God’s Grace’, through the action of the Holy Spirit.’’’’ Without that, the Holy Bible is a dead letter.......................
Which is to say that “sola scriptura,” unilluminated by the power of the Spirit, comes close to bibliolatry — worship, not of God, but of a text which has been drained of its Spirit.... It might as well be an ordinary user manual, or a cookbook, or a scientific text.”....

Now I understand and agree.
Thank you for clarifying this.

[Springfield Reformer]

I appreciate your response, but I fear it is you who has misread both Scripture and Augustine.

First I would ask you this:  Did Augustine's "coals of fire" have dual application too? No, obviously not.  He is not saying the coals of fire are both figurative and literal at the same time in the same way. And if this is so, it is irrational to make an exception the other metaphors about which he teaches here.  He specifically identifies the problem with eating literal flesh as seeming to invite us to a criminal act.  Notice he does not use the typical modern Catholic polemic of attempting to excuse the act, to say that God has left off the prohibition to consume human flesh and blood.  If so, he would not be arguing it was criminal.

Instead, in support of finding a figure, he tells us no criminal act is implied, and so we may look for a metaphor.

But you seem to think Augustine was trying to have it both ways on this issue, right within this very text.  Scanning the text, I can find nothing in it that corresponds to your theory that he was somehow concerned with cutting off parts of the body of Christ.  Nothing like that at all.  Now I don't say Augustine never said such a thing.  But you have represented that your alleged real-presence confirming elements are in this very text, as part of it's context, and I say that is not the case.

I suggest caution here.  Unless I am mistaken, it gets dangerously close to a violation of forum rules to misrepresent the content of sources.  

However, in your defense, I did find this in Augustine's treatment of Psalm 99:

But when our Lord praised it, He was speaking of His own flesh, and He had said, “Except a man eat My flesh, he shall have no life in him.” John 6:54 Some disciples of His, about seventy,  were offended, and said, “This is an hard saying, who can hear it?” And they went back, and walked no more with Him. It seemed unto them hard that He said, “Except you eat the flesh of the Son of Man, you have no life in you:” they received it foolishly, they thought of it carnally, and imagined that the Lord would cut off parts from His body, and give unto them; and they said, “This is a hard saying.” It was they who were hard, not the saying; for unless they had been hard, and not meek, they would have said unto themselves, He says not this without reason, but there must be some latent mystery herein. They would have remained with Him, softened, not hard: and would have learned that from Him which they who remained, when the others departed, learned. For when twelve disciples had remained with Him, on their departure, these remaining followers suggested to Him, as if in grief for the death of the former, that they were offended by His words, and turned back. But He instructed them, and says unto them, “It is the Spirit that quickens, but the flesh profits nothing; the words that I have spoken unto you, they are spirit, and they are life.” John 6:63 Understand spiritually  what I have said; you are not to eat this body which you see; nor to drink that blood which they who will crucify Me shall pour forth. I have commended unto you a certain mystery; spiritually understood, it will quicken. Although it is needful that this be visibly celebrated, yet it must be spiritually understood.

Available here: http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/1801099.htm

But notice that nothing in the above passage confirms transubstantiation.  Quite the opposite.  Augustine is explicit.  "You are not to eat this body which you see..."  This is something that to give life must be spiritually, and not carnally, understood.  Again, you could preach that from any Baptist pulpit and be warmly received.

But going back to his treatise, "On Christian Doctrine," there is nothing remotely like what you suggest.  Rather, he doubles down on the full measure of distinction between the sign and the thing signified, and marks it out as weakness to confuse the two, to treat them as if they were really the same thing:

Now he is in bondage to a sign who uses, or pays homage to, any significant object without knowing what it signifies: he, on the other hand, who either uses or honors a useful sign divinely appointed, whose force and significance he understands, does not honor the sign which is seen and temporal, but that to which all such signs refer. Now such a man is spiritual and free even at the time of his bondage, when it is not yet expedient to reveal to carnal minds those signs by subjection to which their carnality is to be overcome. To this class of spiritual persons belonged the patriarchs and the prophets, and all those among the people of Israel through whose instrumentality the Holy Spirit ministered unto us the aids and consolations of the Scriptures. But at the present time, after that the proof of our liberty has shone forth so clearly in the resurrection of our Lord, we are not oppressed with the heavy burden of attending even to those signs which we now understand, but our Lord Himself, and apostolic practice, have handed down to us a few rites in place of many, and these at once very easy to perform, most majestic in their significance, and most sacred in the observance; such, for example, as the sacrament of baptism, and the celebration of the body and blood of the Lord. And as soon as any one looks upon these observances he knows to what they refer, and so reveres them not in carnal bondage, but in spiritual freedom. Now, as to follow the letter, and to take signs for the things that are signified by them, is a mark of weakness and bondage; so to interpret signs wrongly is the result of being misled by error. He, however, who does not understand what a sign signifies, but yet knows that it is a sign, is not in bondage. And it is better even to be in bondage to unknown but useful signs than, by interpreting them wrongly, to draw the neck from under the yoke of bondage only to insert it in the coils of error.

As for Tertullian, it is merely projection of later developed doctrine to suggest he embraced transubstantiation.  In fact, as you yourself mention, the best way to understand what he said is see it in context to his debate with Marcion.  The notion of a figure is that in the Platonic model of reality, for every type there is an antitype, not meaning the opposite of something, but the higher reality for which the type stands.  In this model, both are real and have their own true substance. The bread and the wine continue to exist as such.  But they point to a higher reality that must be fully real on it's own for the figure to be true.  

And that is Tertullian's whole point.  Jesus did have a real body, so having the bread and wine as figure of that body makes sense if and only if that body was itself real.  As he says:

Then, having taken the bread and given it to His disciples, He made it His own body, by saying, This is my body, that is, the figure of my body. A figure, however, there could not have been, unless there were first a veritable body

The above statement is something any evangelical or Protestant would agree with.  It is perfectly true, and has absolutely no bearing on the much later appearance of the transubstantive novelty invented by Radbertus and refined by Aquinas.

As for your voluminous quote from Catholic Answers, it is all old and tired material, presented and refuted probably hundreds of times already in this forum.  Therefore I hope you will forgive me if in the interest of brevity I dispense with it in a summary rebuttal:

1)  God can do miracles. Duh. Yes, we get that.  We have in many cases even experienced such miracles ourselves, so we know God can do anything.  But there's a big gap between  knowing what God can do and insisting He did something with zero evidence of said act. Zero evidence.

2) Parsing the passage into however many different heavenly breads does absolutely nothing to advance transubstantiation.  The article's argument is riddled with unsupportable conjecture presented as conclusion.  In law school such conclusory answers routinely were graded as Fs, because they do nothing but express an opinion.  They do not show what the text actually teaches.

3) Trogo.  Chewing versus merely eating.  As the below article discusses, this again does nothing to support a literal understanding of the contested statements in John 6:

For a more in-depth view, see this: http://fallibility.blogspot.ca/2013/08/to-eat-to-chew-and-to-eschew-romes.html

In short form, there are at least three flaws in the RC argument that the word for eating ("trogo", supposedly, "to chew") signals an exit from metaphor.  

A) First, no physical act or object, however vivid, is excluded from potentially being used as metaphor.  That reflects a misunderstanding of what metaphor is.  In fact, the more vivid the imagery, the better the metaphor.  And the more original, the better.  There is no rule that it must have been done this way before.  All that is needed is something to represent and something by which to represent it.  The rest is up to the God-given ability we all have to recognize metaphor.

B) Second, per the linked article above, the word trogo was by the time of John's Gospel becoming a common substitute for eating, and it may be an etymological fallacy to assign it anything beyond that sense, just ordinary eating.

C) But even if we accept the hypothesis that trogo is more intense, Tertullian himself demonstrates this intensified sense of spiritually consuming Christ, not in bland terms, but in such vivid terms as to show the urgency of the believer in seeking union with Christ:

Constituting, therefore, His word as the life-giving principle, because that word is spirit and life, He likewise called His flesh by the same appellation; because, too, the Word had become flesh, John 1:14 we ought therefore to desire Him in order that we may have life, and to devour Him with the ear, and to ruminate on Him with the understanding, and to digest Him by faith.

Available here: http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/0316.htm

How can "devouring Him with the ear" be anything but a metaphor? So this "trago can't be a metaphor because it's too intense" argument is flat out wrong. Intensity is fine, even in the metaphors of John 6.

4) What about the already existing Hebrew metaphors, wherein eating a person's flesh or drinking their blood was a metaphor for strong hostility toward that person?

For a more in-depth view, see this: http://fallibility.blogspot.com/2014/02/eating-flesh-and-drinking-blood.html

Here's the "executive summary:"

The existence of a negative metaphor does not preclude the creative conversion of such a metaphor to something positive.  God can do as He wishes, right?  So, as the article points out, it is a false dilemma to suggest that there are only two choices, either a negative metaphor, or a literal meaning, because there is a third option, a positive metaphor, one describing an intense and life-sustaining belief in Jesus, that is just as possible.  It depends on the structure of the text itself. Does it meet the criteria for metaphor? If so, then let it say what it says, even if it isn't what you were expecting.

But most compellingly, the notion of drinking someone's blood is not always presented in strictly negative terms:

And he said, Be it far from me, O LORD, that I should do this: is not this the blood of the men that went in jeopardy of their lives? therefore he would not drink it. These things did these three mighty men.
(2 Samuel 23:17)

So we see that David, in using this metaphor, was giving honor to those warriors of his who had risked their lives for their king, even in this small pleasure.

But there is another layer to this.  The positive sense of the metaphor, that we must believe in Jesus to have eternal life, would not have come about unless Jesus had been rejected of men, and His body broken, and His blood shed, by men who did indeed hate him.  In that sense we have a metaphor of amazing beauty and power, in that out of the darkness of condemnation under the law, Christ in giving himself to be reviled of men, transformed that darkness into the glorious light of His Gospel, that we can be saved by believing in Him, and what He has done for us in His love for us.

Conclusion:

It was good of you to attempt some meaningful refutation.  I appreciate it. In the end, however, you have not succeeded.  The best read of John 6 remains this: If we are to enjoy eternal life with God the Father, we must come to Jesus, and must receive Him by faith as Messiah and Son of God, must receive that by His wounds we are healed.  His words are spirit, and they are life.

Peace,

SR