The Eucharist: The Body of Christ? ("Respectful Dialogue" thread)

Our Sunday Visitor (via Catholic Culture) ^ | 1/2005 | Marcellino D'Ambrosio, Ph.D.

[markomalley]

The Catholic Church teaches that in the Eucharist, the communion wafer and the altar wine are transformed and really become the body and blood of Jesus Christ. Have you ever met anyone who has found this Catholic doctrine to be a bit hard to take?

If so, you shouldn't be surprised. When Jesus spoke about eating his flesh and drinking his blood in John 6, his words met with less than an enthusiastic reception. "How can this man give us his flesh to eat? (V 52). "This is a hard saying who can listen to it?" (V60). In fact so many of his disciples abandoned him over this that Jesus had to ask the twelve if they also planned to quit. It is interesting that Jesus did not run after his disciples saying, "Don't go — I was just speaking metaphorically!"

How did the early Church interpret these challenging words of Jesus? Interesting fact. One charge the pagan Romans lodged against the Christians was cannibalism. Why? You guessed it. They heard that this sect regularly met to eat human flesh and drink human blood. Did the early Christians say: "wait a minute, it's only a symbol!"? Not at all. When trying to explain the Eucharist to the Roman Emperor around 155AD, St. Justin did not mince his words: "For we do not receive these things as common bread or common drink; but as Jesus Christ our Sav­ior being incarnate by God's word took flesh and blood for our salvation, so also we have been taught that the food consecrated by the word of prayer which comes from him . . . is the flesh and blood of that incarnate Jesus."

Not many Christians questioned the real presence of Christ's body and blood in the Eucharist till the Middle Ages. In trying to explain how bread and wine are changed into the body and blood of Christ, several theologians went astray and needed to be corrected by Church authority. Then St. Thomas Aquinas came along and offered an explanation that became classic. In all change that we observe in this life, he teaches, appearances change, but deep down, the essence of a thing stays the same. Example: if, in a fit of mid-life crisis, I traded my mini-van for a Ferrari, abandoned my wife and 5 kids to be beach bum, got tanned, bleached my hair blonde, spiked it, buffed up at the gym, and took a trip to the plastic surgeon, I'd look a lot different on the surface. But for all my trouble, deep down I'd still substantially be the same ole guy as when I started.

St. Thomas said the Eucharist is the one instance of change we encounter in this world that is exactly the opposite. The appearances of bread and wine stay the same, but the very essence or substance of these realities, which can't be viewed by a microscope, is totally transformed. What was once bread and wine are now Christ's body and blood. A handy word was coined to describe this unique change. Transformation of the "sub-stance", what "stands-under" the surface, came to be called "transubstantiation."

What makes this happen? The power of God's Spirit and Word. After praying for the Spirit to come (epiklesis), the priest, who stands in the place of Christ, repeats the words of the God-man: "This is my Body, This is my Blood." Sounds to me like Genesis 1: the mighty wind (read "Spirit") whips over the surface of the water and God's Word resounds. "Let there be light" and there was light. It is no harder to believe in the Eucharist than to believe in Creation.

But why did Jesus arrange for this transformation of bread and wine? Because he intended another kind of transformation. The bread and wine are transformed into the Body and Blood of Christ which are, in turn, meant to transform us. Ever hear the phrase: "you are what you eat?" The Lord desires us to be transformed from a motley crew of imperfect individuals into the Body of Christ, come to full stature.

Our evangelical brethren speak often of an intimate, personal relationship with Jesus. But I ask you, how much more personal and intimate can you get? We receive the Lord's body into our physical body that we may become Him whom we receive!

Such an awesome gift deserves its own feast. And that's why, back in the days of Thomas Aquinas and St. Francis of Assisi, the Pope decided to institute the Feast of Corpus Christi.

[Quix]

Thanks for the important points . . . quite valid, I think.

[1000 silverlings]

lol, probably started during Prohibition

[OLD REGGIE]

"Isn’t the command to eat the bread and drink the wine..."

Well, it was so until the RCC decided the 'ugh' peasants in the cheap seats were unworthy to share the wine with the hoi-poloi.

[OLD REGGIE]

You are not required to partake of both the wine and the eucharist to receive communion. One may, but partaking of one or the other is no less receiving than than getting both.

Is there any particular reason why the general practice for more than one thousand years (communion in both kinds) was changed?

[pgyanke]

This is such a phony argument on its face! If the “church” leaders of Israel were faithful to the Covenant of God, there would have been no need for Deuteronomy and its strictures... nor the need to be released from it.

[1000 silverlings]

Multicolor spasms of bold italic logorrhea do not meet the test of serious adult discourse. In fact, the Playskool word salad routine makes you look foolish.

Since none of us are Kennedys, this doesn't excite us

[hosepipe]

[ Well, it was so until the RCC decided the 'ugh' peasants in the cheap seats were unworthy to share the wine with the hoi-poloi. ]

LoL... Its like watching the Three Stooges playing Church..

[hosepipe]

LoL...

[Petronski]

Was that supposed to make sense?

[OLD REGGIE]

There ya go again . . . trying to teach snorting critters with curly tails to sing . . .

I think you know by now that the RC edifice is not interested in UNrubberized historical TRUTH! LOL.

The writing of the Church Fathers is on the CCM (Catholic Cafeteria Menu). The RCC reserves unto itself the right to choose snippets which support their argument and put the remainder on the compost pile.

[Mad Dawg]

Guess where I read Augustine on how Jesus was the Rock in the quote we always argue about...IN my Breviary. The second reading from the Office of Readings for Saint Pius V, whose memorial is today.

Not the compost pile.

[hosepipe]

[ This is such a phony argument on its face! If the “church” leaders of Israel were faithful to the Covenant of God, there would have been no need for Deuteronomy and its strictures... nor the need to be released from it. ]

You FORGET.. The Jews lost the Ark of the Covenant.. which was the entire reason to even HAVE a temple.. No Ark, No GOd.. Then synagogues had to be invented.. and a "logic" to support the synagogue(TALMUD).. Which was composed of two side/parts the Mishnah and the Gemara(Talmud).. The Mishnah was some Rabbis opinions of what the Torah "REALLY" meant.. and the Gemara was another bunch of Rabbis opinions on what the first group of Rabbi's "REALLY" meant.. WHich produced the Yiddish maxim.. "Where ever you have two Jews, you have three opinions"..

Religious "christian" orthodoxy soon the learned wisdom of this entire gambit(they thought).. and produced synagogues then called churchs and councils producing teachings(Trent, Nicea etc.) for the new RABBI's(VOILA a christian TALMUD)..

"And thats the way it was"- Cronkeit... AND IS..

[HamiltonJay]

I’m not sure where you got the idea that it was common practice for thousands of years. In formal churches which you are used to, in relatively civilized western societies it is more common for both to be offered, but that it has always been required or that way is not accurate.

The church has existed in much of its early history, and in parts of the world THROUGHOUT its history underground... the eucharist has often been taken to those who could not attend mass itself, or if the mass was held undeground, for whatever reasons. As well as within cultures where alcohol is not tolerated.

In fact more than one martyr has died protecting the eucharist they were charged with delivering under such circumstances. The catholic church has never viewed the recieving of both the host and the blood required for communion. Only 1 is required to partake in the sacrament, and this has been the Catholic churches belief in this matter for far more than just the modern era.. it is traced back to the very beginings of the church.

[Petronski]

Cronkite is an anglicization of the German word Krankheit, meaning disease.

Somehow it seemed appropriate to note that at this time.

[Petronski]

The practice on these threads is to falsely define some aspect or teaching of the Catholic Church and then mock or critique that false information.

It is called The Game.

[hosepipe]

[ Cronkite is an anglicization of the German word Krankheit, meaning disease. Somehow it seemed appropriate to note that at this time. ]

Walter Cronheit is indeed suffering with a social disease..
He is a democrat/Marxist/Socialist..
--------------------------

Democracy is the road to socialism. -Karl Marx

Democracy is indispensable to socialism. The goal of socialism is communism. -V.I. Lenin

The meaning of peace is the absence of opposition to socialism. -Karl Marx

[1000 silverlings]

I referred to this thread as a game that Protestants could not win when self-appointed thread attack nannies were in charge. No one else calls what goes on here, a game, other than the nannies.

[HamiltonJay]

Well you can’t blame them, most are in heretical offshoots of the RC church... so they have been taught hatred of the church throughout their lives.

[Petronski]

No one else calls what goes on here, a game, other than the nannies.

Not true.

All I expect, all anyone could ask, is that criticism be based on facts, not strawmen and slanders; and that criticism be conducted in a spirit of Christian charity. The vast majority of Catholics, Protestants, Baptists, Buddhists, Atheists, etc. on Free Republic succeed in doing so, even more of them try.

[OLD REGGIE]

In other words, whatever the senses perceive-even with the aid of those instruments men are forever inventing to increase the reach of the senses- is always of this same sort, a quality, a property, an attribute; no sense perceives the something which has all these qualities, which is the thing itself. This something is what the philosophers call substance; the rest are accidents which it possesses. Our senses perceive accidents; only the mind knows the substance”

If you want some fun ask one of the "experts" to describe when and how the theory of "substance" and "accidents" was developed. In order to keep it simple ask for a definition of 1,000 words or less.