“Please explain how believing that the Last Supper was to be symbolic means I am denying Christ.”
Not one of the Church Fathers ever believed as you do, they ALL knew that Our Lord was and is and always will be present in the Holy Eucharist. You choose, there is ONE WAY to God and that is through Our Lord. Period. One Church, one Truth. You choose.
And you know this how? The early Church was quite fractured; witness the whole "can Gentiles be Christians" or the issue of circumcision. Or even the split of Timothy and Paul. Far from the unified doctrine you claim, it was quite unsettled.
What WAS settled, and what apparently many now forget, was that what mattered was the personal faith. The actions was irrelevant; if a man believes in his heart that Jesus Christ is Lord then he is saved. Communion not required; where does the Lord say we need to have communion in order to be saved?
Personally, I believe that communion is symbolic and meant to remind everyone who partakes in communion that Christ died for us. And I believe there is plenty of scriptural and historical support for that position. Does that mean I am a heretic? If you are going to annoint yourself as Jesus and determine my salvation then so be it.
I would merely point you to your own Church and the Lanteren Council in 1215 to realize that it was NOT settled doctrine within the Catholic church for the first 1200 years. Far from it, in fact...
But when you put doctrine above the actual words of Christ, I think you have made your decision of what is really your god. The CHURCH is not an institution or doctrine or a set of missals; WE - believers - are the BODY of Christ. WE are the Church. The structure is a convenient way of gathering, but the Church cannot save you. Only Jesus can. Elevating the Church above a personal relationship with Jesus IS heretical and is in direct contradiction with His own words.