Ok, I feel this is not going anywhere.
The early Church
did teach transubstantiation - regardless of whether today you want to consider it erroneous. That’s why I pointed you at
this article with the pertinent quotes. Another relevant selection can be found
here.
There was full consensus on that… Not even one of them, not even one, ever said that this was symbolic or metaphorical. That’s a fact - whether you reject real presence or not.
Honestly, I (and I believe many of us, if not all) have dealt with very similar statements denying almost everything, from the Trinity to Jesus being God to the primacy of Peter, to the Holy Spirit not existing at all or being a metaphor for God’s power, to there being no such thing as heaven or hell, or saints…I cannot think of one thing I have not heard being denied by some community, and not just denied, but with a nice explanation full of biblical quotes and trying to show how mistaken the Roman Catholicism is about all of that. Yours is not an exception, rather, the norm, in this context.
You still have not answered where does your doctrine come from. It is clearly not a “traditional” protestant doctrine. Must be a doctrine developed by some modern community, maybe a few decades old, perhaps even a century old, give or take.
I think the discussion has been very interesting, but we cannot just keep spending time arguing over anything anyone comes up with. I mean, the apostles spent a great deal of time rejecting heretics as they would come up, but nowadays anyone can pretty much say whatever they want and do whatever they please and still call themselves Christians and claim they’re the only Church. William, I am not talking about you or your community, of course, since I don’t know about your doctrine. I am just making a generic statement.
I think the point we are really missing here is not so much whether the Church was right or wrong in discerning the Real Presence of Christ, and how it was described. I think the point - to me irreconcilable - is that not anyone can come up with their own interpretation of the Scriptures. The Church had kept and brought together a Sacred Tradition from the times of the apostles, rejecting heretics by pointing out where they were mistaken. Now we have heretics developing their own doctrines, publishing them on booklets (c) 2012, and kicking away centuries of theological studies.
I would never follow any of those teachings, not because I am not open to the idea of being wrong, but because I do not find them reliable. I mean, name a community and anyone with a bit of knowledge about them can tell you exactly what part of the Sacred Tradition of the Catholic Church they took and how they distorted it.
I mean, Ignatius, Bishop of Antioch, already condemned this heresy between the year 80 and the year 110 AD - that’s
over 1900 years ago…
They abstain from the Eucharist and from prayer, because they do not admit that the Eucharist is the flesh of our Savior Jesus Christ, the flesh which suffered for our sins and which the Father, in His graciousness, raised from the dead.
Take care, then who belong to God and to Jesus Christ - they are with the bishop. And those who repent and come to the unity of the Church - they too shall be of God, and will be living according to Jesus Christ. Do not err, my brethren: if anyone follow a schismatic, he will not inherit the Kingdom of God. If any man walk about with strange doctrine, he cannot lie down with the passion. Take care, then, to use one Eucharist, so that whatever you do, you do according to God: for there is one Flesh of our Lord Jesus Christ, and one cup in the union of His Blood; one altar, as there is one bishop with the presbytery and my fellow servants, the deacons.
I’ll personally stick to the advice of this Church Father.
