Replies

RM7-””I see Catholics live a spiritual life that revolves around a 20 second encounter with what they believe is Christ and then their lives move on in he same direction..they do not know him more or understand him more,””

I see this statement coming from someone ignorant of Catholicism who waste’s their life posting an anti-Catholic agenda on FR and live their lives hoping that someone on their long ping list will puff them up and agree with them-meanwhile you have no idea how many devout Catholic’s understand Christ,pray fervently and serve others in humble charity in a Christlike life.

RM7””there is not one moment that He and I are not in spiritual union.. “”

That would make you sinless if there is not one moment you’re not in union with Christ.

Do you think Christ is in union with you during sins you commit?In the act of sin you’re separated,not united

RM-7””I have a question..what if the RC church is wrong and the bread is NOT the actual body of Christ, but it is actually a memorial ..””

Every single early Church father without a single exception believed Eucharist to be the actual Body of Christ present and I have been blessed enough to witness miracles associated with Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament,so it is impossible that the Catholic Church is wrong.Sadly, it is you who is wrong.

There are many well documented Eucharistic miracle’s through the ages ,even a Video of the Sacred Host that bled beating like a human heart on December 8, 1991 during the celebration of midnight Mass for the Feast of the Immaculate Conception in Betania, Venezula
video link http://www.dsanford.com/miraclehost/hostvideo.wmv

The miraculous bleeding Sacred Host is reserved in the Augustinian Nuns Chapel, Los Teques for all to see

Eucharistic miracles around the world
http://www.therealpresence.org/eucharst/mir/a3.html

“Every single early Church father without a single exception believed Eucharist to be the actual Body of Christ present...it is impossible that the Catholic Church is wrong.Sadly, it is you who is wrong.”

It is a bit more complex than that.

2. The Eucharist as a Sacrifice.

This point is very important in relation to the doctrine, and still more important in relation to the cultus and life, of the ancient church. The Lord’s Supper was universally regarded not only as a sacrament, but also as a sacrifice,422 the true and eternal sacrifice of the new covenant, superseding all the provisional and typical sacrifices of the old; taking the place particularly of the passover, or the feast of the typical redemption from Egypt. This eucharistic sacrifice, however, the ante-Nicene fathers conceived not as an unbloody repetition of the atoning sacrifice of Christ on the cross, but simply as a commemoration and renewed appropriation of that atonement, and, above all, a thank-offering of the whole church for all the favors of God in creation and redemption. Hence the current name itself—eucharist; which denoted in the first place the prayer of thanksgiving, but afterwards the whole rite.423

The consecrated elements were regarded in a twofold light, as representing at once the natural and the spiritual gifts of God, which culminated in the self-sacrifice of Christ on the cross. Hence the eucharistic prayer, like that connected with the typical passover, related at the same time to creation and redemption, which were the more closely joined in the mind of the church for their dualistic separation by the Gnostics. The earthly gifts of broad and wine were taken as types and pledges of the heavenly gifts of the same God, who has both created and redeemed the world.

Upon this followed the idea of the self-sacrifice of the worshipper himself, the sacrifice of renewed self-consecration to Christ in return for his sacrifice on the cross, and also the sacrifice of charity to the poor. Down to the twelfth and thirteenth centuries the eucharistic elements were presented as a thank-offering by the members of the congregation themselves, and the remnants went to the clergy and he poor. In these gifts the people yielded themselves as a priestly race and a living thank-offering to God, to whom they owed all the blessings alike of providence and of grace. In later times the priest alone offered the sacrifice. But even the Roman Missal retains a recollection of the ancient custom in the plural form, “We offer,” and in the sentence: “All you, both brethren and sisters, pray that my sacrifice and your sacrifice, which is equally yours as well as mine, may be meat for the Lord.”

This subjective offering of the whole congregation on the ground of the objective atoning sacrifice of Christ is the real centre of the ancient Christian worship, and particularly of the communion. It thus differed both from the later Catholic mass, which has changed the thank-offering into a sin-offering, the congregational offering into a priest offering; and from the common Protestant cultus, which, in opposition to the Roman mass, has almost entirely banished the idea of sacrifice from the celebration of the Lord’s Supper, except in the customary offerings for the poor.

The writers of the second century keep strictly within the limits of the notion of a congregational thank-offering. Thus Justin says expressly, prayers and thanksgivings alone are the true and acceptable sacrifices, which the Christians offer. Irenaeus has been brought as a witness for the Roman doctrine, only on the ground of a false reading.424 The African fathers, in the third century, who elsewhere incline to the symbolical interpretation of the words of institution, are the first to approach on this point the later Roman Catholic idea of a sin-offering; especially Cyprian, the steadfast advocate of priesthood and of episcopal authority.425 The ideas of priesthood, sacrifice, and altar, are intimately connected, and a Judaizing or paganizing conception of one must extend to all.

From Volume 3

http://www.ccel.org/s/schaff/history/3_ch07.htm

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-religion/2379242/posts

RM7-”I see this statement coming from someone ignorant of Catholicism who waste’s their life posting an anti-Catholic agenda on FR and live their lives hoping that someone on their long ping list will puff them up and agree with them-meanwhile you have no idea how many devout Catholic’s understand Christ,pray fervently and serve others in humble charity in a Christlike life.

1st of all it is R N mom as in nurse.. Secondly I was a cradle Catholic, educated by Franciscans, Srs of Namur and Srs of Mercy ..Catholic educated through College. I was a lector,liturgist,CCD teacher ,and speaker at woman's retreats, my guess is I have forgotten more Catholic doctrine than you have ever known.

Instead of being insulting try addressing the issues..if you are incapable of that try a catholic forum where they will believe everything you say.

Christ did not come for the righteous..OR SELF RIGHTEOUS ..He came for sinners like me.. Poor.lost in good works and an effort to make myself acceptable to God ... little did I know then that all of my works in church and for charity were filthy rags before God, and I could do NOTHING to recommend myself to him.

So my friend, you are right about my spiritual condition, it is one that daily must repent and thank God for my Savior Christ.....I know that my salvation rests not on me or my works but on the work of Christ.. I am a filthy rotten sinner that has a loving Father that adopted her in spite of who and what she was and is..

What a glorious God we have..

Did the church fathers agree on ALL DOCTRINE WITHOUT EXCEPTION? or were they fallible human beings? Could they have error in their teachings? Are they infallible like scripture?

The theory of transsubstantion was not developed until the 9th century by a monk Paschasius Radbertus . At that time a monk named Ratranmus wrote: “The bread and wine are the body and blood of Christ in a figurative sense”

This controversy continued until the 13th century... it was not "resolved "until the the Lateran Council in 1215

The Doctor of the Church, Duns Scotus, admits that transubstantiation was not an article of faith before that the thirteenth century....so you assertion that it was always held to be the real body and blood is just not accurate. It was not a doctrine of faith until that time, before that if you were Catholic you were allowed to believe it was or was not the actual body of Christ.

There can be discussion of what church fathers actually thought or taught, keeping in mind Augustine’s advice “to guard us against taking a metaphorical form of speech as if it were literal.

You know the biggest miracle is when the Holy Spirit moves in an unregenerate man and He is born again. It is a gift of Gods grace that not one man deserves, yet that in Gods mercy He extends to an unworthy creation.. all other miracles pale in comparison.. And in case you wonder..no I do not believe a piece of bread is worthy to be prayed before or honored or that IT can preform any miracle.. I would look elsewhere for the cause of that