If the Eucharist is Jesus

[Pancras]

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I’d like you to know, irishpatrick, that I’ve heard this topic turned over before, but there’s something about the way you say it that sounds really good. Have you been thinking about this for a long time? When was the first time you thought and prayed about John 6:53+? How many years has it been?
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[irishpatrick]

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I’d like you to know, irishpatrick, that I’ve heard this topic turned over before, but there’s something about the way you say it that sounds really good. Have you been thinking about this for a long time? When was the first time you thought and prayed about John 6:53+? How many years has it been?
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I have a deep love for the Lord in the Eucharist–and believe 100% that it truly is His Real Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity. I have held this love for the Lord in the Eucharist for many years. Jesus promised He would be with until the close of the age…and He is with us both in Spirit and in His Real Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity in the Eucharist.

 

[Pancras]

I have a deep love for the Lord in the Eucharist–and believe 100% that it truly is His Real Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity. I have held this love for the Lord in the Eucharist for many years. Jesus promised He would be with until the close of the age…and He is with us both in Spirit and in His Real Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity in the Eucharist.

You can take consolation in Him being true to His promise in granting this grace because it is manifest in you, irishpatrick, and I’d like to extend my congratulations to you that you have cooperated with His grace, for that is the part that is ours: cooperation with the grace of God. The effects of it on different people exemplify the differences in people, which is more than meets the eye at first glance. It is a life-long process to let His grace work in our souls.

 

[irishpatrick]

You can take consolation in Him being true to His promise in granting this grace because it is manifest in you, irishpatrick, and I’d like to extend my congratulations to you that you have cooperated with His grace, for that is the part that is ours: cooperation with the grace of God. The effects of it on different people exemplify the differences in people, which is more than meets the eye at first glance. It is a life-long process to let His grace work in our souls.

Those a very kind words–thank you. The same applies to you as well.

 

[Pancras]

Those a very kind words–thank you. The same applies to you as well.

I wasn’t looking for compliments, but coming from you, that means a lot to me.

How do you say, “Thank you very much” in Gaelic? . . . . . . . :irish3:

Today (Saturday 5-17) was the Feast Day in the old calendar of St. Paschal Baylon. I’m sure you’d like to hear about his life of holiness, if you don’t already know. He was a Franciscan friar, not a priest (as too was St. Francis of Assisi, the Seraphic Father, the Holy Founder of the Order), and he was happy to confine himself to menial tasks of janitorial services for the monastery (curiously, much as did the young Antonio who would later become St. Anthony of Padua, also a Franciscan, but a priest). This monk, Brother Pasquale (you can almost hear them call him, “Ehhh, Brother Pasquale, come clean the spilled soup in the refectory,” but in Italian, of course), had a deep and profoundly abiding love for the Holy Eucharist that endured his entire life without fail. After his death, his incorrupt body was laid in state in the chapel for some time, during which time when Mass was offered, during the Consecration, his mortal remains would sometimes move, and his eyes would open, and he would appear to adore the elevated host in the priest’s hands. Then, when the priest would lower the host and the chalice, Brother Paschal’s eyes would soon close again, and his head once more would rest on his coffin pillow as he resumed the state of repose in his eternal rest.

It is not unrelated to recall that St. Anthony had raised several people from the dead, for various reasons such as to receive Holy Baptism or to testify identifying the decedent’s murderer, or for some such specific reason. Their body would appear to be healed of any putrefaction it may have had before the Saint’s blessing and command, and then after which purpose had been served, the dead person would lie back down in the grave to resume his former condition of physical corruption.

 

[irishpatrick]

I wasn’t looking for compliments, but coming from you, that means a lot to me.

How do you say, “Thank you very much” in Gaelic? . . . . . . . :irish3:

Today (Saturday 5-17) was the Feast Day in the old calendar of St. Paschal Baylon. I’m sure you’d like to hear about his life of holiness, if you don’t already know. He was a Franciscan friar, not a priest (as too was St. Francis of Assisi, the Seraphic Father, the Holy Founder of the Order), and he was happy to confine himself to menial tasks of janitorial services for the monastery (curiously, much as did the young Antonio who would later become St. Anthony of Padua, also a Franciscan, but a priest). This monk, Brother Pasquale (you can almost hear them call him, “Ehhh, Brother Pasquale, come clean the spilled soup in the refectory,” but in Italian, of course), had a deep and profoundly abiding love for the Holy Eucharist that endured his entire life without fail. After his death, his incorrupt body was laid in state in the chapel for some time, during which time when Mass was offered, during the Consecration, his mortal remains would sometimes move, and his eyes would open, and he would appear to adore the elevated host in the priest’s hands. Then, when the priest would lower the host and the chalice, Brother Paschal’s eyes would soon close again, and his head once more would rest on his coffin pillow as he resumed the state of repose in his eternal rest.

It is not unrelated to recall that St. Anthony had raised several people from the dead, for various reasons such as to receive Holy Baptism or to testify identifying the decedent’s murderer, or for some such specific reason. Their body would appear to be healed of any putrefaction it may have had before the Saint’s blessing and command, and then after which purpose had been served, the dead person would lie back down in the grave to resume his former condition of physical corruption.

Great post. I do pray that more people will come to understand what Jesus gives us in the Eucharist.

 

[DaisyNJesus]

It seems to me that the Eucharist is the single most powerful tool for Evangelizing, because if the Eucharist is what the Church claims–than that means it is (God), and all believers of all faiths should want to partake of that amazing Grace-filled and saving gift. However, if the Eucharist is merely bread and wine, than for all the history of the Church, Catholics would have been routinely committing grave sin by worshipping falsely.

I think it is a simple proposition…if the Catholic Church is correct about the Eucharist (which obviously stems from Jesus’s teachings and statements, and Scripture), than everyone should be Catholic.

It is indeed.
Many of us became Catholic because of this belief in the Eucharist. But let us not forget that a Church-life where this is the only reason to stay is rather poor, humanly speaking. It certainly suffices for the Christians, who do not think they need anything but the tabernacle, solitude and silence… but there are many other questions and issues. And well, people who leave, I think, never leave because of the Eucharist, but because the Eucharist does not seem to transform all those who profess it to to be the very life of the Church. Does that make sense?

 

[irishpatrick]

It is indeed.
Many of us became Catholic because of this belief in the Eucharist. But let us not forget that a Church-life where this is the only reason to stay is rather poor, humanly speaking. It certainly suffices for the Christians, who do not think they need anything but the tabernacle, solitude and silence… but there are many other questions and issues. And well, people who leave, I think, never leave because of the Eucharist, but because the Eucharist does not seem to transform all those who profess it to to be the very life of the Church. Does that make sense?

Yes, you make a lot of sense.

However, your post reminds me (again) of the Bread of Life discourse, toward the end, when the majority of followers of Jesus left Him because His teachings were too difficult for them to accept. After the majority left Him, Jesus then asked the twelve if they too would leave, and to that query Simon Peter said: “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life; and we have believed, and have come to know, that you are the Holy One of God.”

It seems clear that Peter (and the other Apostles) also had many other issues and questions, yet they believed Jesus completely–so they remained with the Lord because they knew Jesus had the words of eternal life. Therefore, if the Apostles found reason to remain with the Lord even though the teaching about the Real Presence was quite hard to accept, it seems Catholics today should be willing to do the same. After all, no matter our questions or issues in other areas, the Eucharist is God (Jesus) and we are far more likely to come to understand the answers to those questions if we remain close to Him in the Blessed Sacrament.

Thanks for a great post.

 

[R_C]

Does that make sense?

It does and it doesn’t.

It does because of common-sense reasons.

It doesn’t because if community (parish?) life is not satisfying, it’s our fault. We can join another parish, enter parish groups, consider third orders and lay confraternities. And worse comes to worst, we can START a new parish group or something. In short, if we are unaware of the breadth and width and depth of the Catholic Church and of Catholicism we are bound to look elsewere, but if we have a grasp at what the Church is (and at the fact that we ARE Church) then we can’t look elsewhere. In fact, it kind of becomes our duty to make things better…

It also doesn’t because God alone suffices. Why would creatures matter at all?

That’s like saying: I don’t like that priest so I won’t confess with him. Why does his human nature matter at all before the dignity of the Holy Orders by which he forgives me of my sins or rather, Christ through him?

The Eucharist is God on Earth…we could spend our life looking at Him there, like a Bride wearing a veil, until the day comes when He, the Bridegroom, lifts the veil and we “see Him face to face”.

This may sound detached, but again, I just came from Adoration…He has this way of holding on to the heart even after you walk away…truly, get to know Him, go visit Him often…bring Him all worries, concerns, good and bad experiences, desires, aspirations, prayer requests…let Him deal with everything…

Let me tell you a little anecdote. Yesterday we were serving Mass and one of the altar server is a young kid. We serve in cassock and surplice. After Mass, we remove our surplices and go pray at the foot of the altar. When prayer was over, all servers walked away. However, when he stood up, his younger sister - she must be 3 or something - was standing right behind him. As soon as he turned, she gave him a hug without saying a word. He smiled, hugged her back, and tried to walk out but she would not let go…she kept walking with him, and after letting go of his cassock, she kept following him wherever he went, without saying a word.

Can we follow Christ in the Church like that little girl was doing?

 

[irishpatrick]

There is no problem that the Lord cannot solve–and He waits for us in Catholic tabernacles across the world. Think of how the world would be transformed if 90% of all Catholics believed in the Real Presence.

 

[millstreet]

A question about the Real Presence. By transsubstantiation the bread and wine becomes the body and blood of Jesus. I think if you try to picture that, as would be the natural thing for many people to do, it is understandably hard to accept. But Jesus is divine, the physical body was a vessel. Is there any reason the body and blood have to be the “human form” of Jesus, or is it rather that it refers to the divine body and lifeblood of our Lord?

 

[djeter]

It seems to me that there is an obstacle that must be overcome, somehow, and that obstacle is the principle of subjectivism in the mind, for so long as that is what people believe it makes no difference what you tell them, as their response will be something like, “You have your right to your opinion and I have my right to mine.”

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Just the other day I encountered this very attitude. I don’t know how effective my reply was but it went something like this: It is one thing to discuss politics or baseball. You are more than welcome to your opinions on ObamaCare or the pride of being a Red Sawks fan.

However when we cross over and discuss Jesus Christ or what I tell you is Church Teaching I think you can only ask me to cite authority for what I say. And I do in this case: scripture and the Catechism.

You need to do the same for this is what people of faith or fellow Catholics do. When you tell me that Jesus is “not God,” that he is “the Son” and God is the “Father,” you are ignoring the Church Teachings on the nature of the Holy Trinity. You do not “have an opinion” or “point of view” on this. You are wrong, plain and simple.

What you think doesn’t count when you are wrong – much the same way that you thought the runner was safe – the umpire said he was out and the call was unchallenged by anyone one the field. What you think is not a “point of view” in that case either.

He didn’t have a Catechism so I lent him mine, telling him to bring it back when he found something that countered the entries on the Trinitarian God.

This is the first time I found myself in a heated discussion about my faith (actually more about his faith, an ex-Catholic).

Could I have had a better reply?

dj

 

[irishpatrick]

A question about the Real Presence. By transsubstantiation the bread and wine becomes the body and blood of Jesus. I think if you try to picture that, as would be the natural thing for many people to do, it is understandably hard to accept. But Jesus is divine, the physical body was a vessel. Is there any reason the body and blood have to be the “human form” of Jesus, or is it rather that it refers to the divine body and lifeblood of our Lord?

The Eucharist is the Real Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity, of Jesus Christ. It is not a question of what “has to be,” it is a question of “what is.” Jesus chose to give Himself to us in His entirety through the Eucharist.

Have you read the Gospel of John, chapter six? In that chapter, Jesus makes it incredibly clear that the bread and wine become His Real Body and Blood. It is a chapter that many people, who do not believe in the Real Presence, have the most difficult time explaining. Jesus did not simply mention these truths in that chapter, He said it over-and-over. And, when most of his followers left because they found the Lord’s teachings too difficult, Jesus did not call out to them and tell them that he was speaking metaphorically…Jesus let them leave, and He even turned to the Apostles and asked them if they would leave too.

 

[millstreet]

I get that, but what is His REAL body and blood? Is it the human form? Or is His REAL body and blood spiritual in nature? I.e., is the body the vessel carrying the divine being, or is the body the substance of the divine being - considering Jesus is here with us today, but clearly is not in the form of a human.

 

[irishpatrick]

I get that, but what is His REAL body and blood? Is it the human form? Or is His REAL body and blood spiritual in nature? I.e., is the body the vessel carrying the divine being, or is the body the substance of the divine being - considering Jesus is here with us today, but clearly is not in the form of a human.

Fully human and fully divine. Jesus is both God and man.

 

[R_C]

if you try to picture that, it is understandably hard to accept. Is there any reason the body and blood have to be the “human form” of Jesus, or is it rather that it refers to the divine body and lifeblood of our Lord? what is His REAL body and blood? Is it the human form? Or is His REAL body and blood spiritual in nature?

<<I am the living bread that came down from heaven. Whoever eats this bread will live forever. This bread is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world. Very truly I tell you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you. Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise them up at the last day. For my flesh is real food and my blood is real drink. Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood remains in me, and I in them.>>

When Christ said this, many of his disciples abandoned him. The twelve alone remained. Someone told Christ: “This teaching is hard! Who can accept it?” And Christ told them: “Do you want to leave me, too?”

To try to change the meaning of Holy Communion to mean anything less than what it is, is an abandonement of Christ. Thus St. Paul very strongly warns the church at Corinth:

<< I received from the Lord that which I also delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus in the night in which He was betrayed took bread and when he had given thanks, he broke it and said, “This is my body, which is for you; do this in remembrance of me.” and when he had given thanks, he broke it and said, “This is my body, which is for you; do this in remembrance of me.” …] those who eat and drink without discerning the body of Christ eat and drink judgment on themselves.>>

His REAL body and blood is just that. The only difference is that you cannot SEE the body and blood - for obvious and wise reasons! But the “substance” is the real, human body and blood. In each of the species is found Christ whole, Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity. The wine is not the Blood “alone” and the bread is not the body “alone”.

See how the Early Church Fathers discussed and explained the matter.

St. Ignatius of Antioch (~100 AD): <<I take no pleasure in corruptible food or in the delights of this life. I want the bread of God, which is the flesh of Jesus Christ, who is the seed of David; and for drink I want his Blood which is incorruptible love. They [those with heterodox opinions] abstain from the Eucharist and from prayer because they do not confess that the Eucharist is the flesh of our Savior Jesus Christ, flesh which suffered for our sins and which that Father, in his goodness, raised up again. >>

St. Justin Martyr (100-165 AD): << not as common bread nor common drink do we receive these; but since Jesus Christ our Savior was made incarnate by the word of God and had both flesh and blood for our salvation, so too, as we have been taught, the food which has been made into the Eucharist by the Eucharistic prayer set down by him, and by the change (transmutation) of which our blood and flesh is nurtured, is both the flesh and the blood of that incarnated Jesus.>>

St. Irenaeus (~ 200 AD): <<the mixed cup [wine and water] and the baked bread receives the Word of God and becomes the Eucharist, the body of Christ, and from these the substance of our flesh is increased and supported…nourished by the body and blood of the Lord, and is in fact a member of him>>

St Hilary of Poitiers (300-368 AD): << He Himself declares: ‘For my flesh is food indeed, and my blood is drink indeed. He who eats my flesh and drinks my blood abides in me and I in him’14. It is no longer permitted us to raise doubts about the true nature of the body and the blood, for, according to the statement of the Lord Himself as well as our faith, this is indeed flesh and blood.>>

St. Cyril of Jerusalem (313-386 AD): <<The bread and the wine of the Eucharist before the holy invocation of the adorable Trinity were simple bread and wine, but the invocation having been made, the bread becomes the body of Christ and the wine the blood of Christ. He once in Cana of Galilee, turned the water into wine, akin to blood, and is it incredible that He should have turned wine into blood? Since then He Himself declared and said of the bread, ‘This is My Body,’ who shall dare to doubt any longer? And since He has Himself affirmed and said, ‘This is My Blood,’ who shall ever hesitate, saying, that it is not His Blood? Do not, therefore, regard the bread and wine as simply that; for they are, according to the Master’s declaration, the body and blood of Christ. Even though the senses suggest to you the other, let faith make you firm. Do not judge in this matter by taste, but be fully assured by the faith, not doubting that you have been deemed worthy of the body and blood of Christ. . . .fully convinced that the apparent bread is not bread, even though it is sensible to the taste, but the body of Christ, and that the apparent wine is not wine, even though the taste would have it so>>

St. Ambrose (340-397 AD): <<Now we, as often as we receive the Sacramental Elements, which by the mysterious efficacy of holy prayer are transformed into the Flesh and the Blood, ‘do show the Lord’s Death.’ Perhaps you may be saying, ‘I see something else; how can you assure me that I am receiving the body of Christ?’ It but remains for us to prove it. And how many are the examples we might use! Let us prove that this is not what nature has shaped it to be, but what the blessing has consecrated; for the power of the blessing is greater than that of nature, because by the blessing even nature itself is changed. . . Christ is in that sacrament, because it is the body of Christ.>>

Theodore of Mopsuestia (350-428 AD): <<He did not say, ‘This is the symbol of My Body, and this, of My Blood,’ but, what is set before us, but that it is transformed by means of the Eucharistic action into Flesh and Blood.>>

 

[R_C]

St. Gregory of Nyssa (335-395 AD): <<Rightly then do we believe that the bread consecrated by the word of God has been changed [Gr., metapoieisthai] into the Body of God the Word. The change that elevated to divine power the bread that had been transformed into that Body causes something similar now. In that case, the grace of the Word sanctified that Body whose material being came from bread and was, in a certain sense, bread itself. In this case, the bread “is sanctified by God’s word and by prayer”7, as the Apostle says, not becoming the Body of the Word through our eating but by being transformed [Gr., metapoiumenos] immediately into the body by means of the word, as the Word himself said, ‘This is my Body.’ …He shares himself with every believer through the Flesh whose material being [Gr., sustais] comes from bread and wine . . . in order to bring it about that, by communion with the Immortal, man may share in incorruption. He gives these things through the power of the blessing by which he transelements [Gr., metastoikeiosas] the nature of the visible things [to that of the Immortal]. He [Jesus] disseminates Himself in every believer through that flesh, whose substance comes from bread and wine, blending Himself with the bodies of believers, to secure that, by this union with the immortal, man, too, may be a sharer in incorruption. The bread again is at first common bread; but when the mystery sanctifies it, it is called and actually becomes the Body of Christ.>>

St Augustine (354-430 AD): <<He walked here in the same flesh, and gave us the same flesh to be eaten unto salvation. Christ was carried in his own hands when, referring to his own body, he said, ‘This is my body.’ For he carried that body in his hands. What you see is the bread and the chalice; that is what your own eyes report to you. But what your faith obliges you to accept is that the bread is the body of Christ and the chalice is the blood of Christ. >>

St. John Chrysostom (347-407 AD): << ‘Why do I say communion?’ he says; ‘for we are that very Body.’ What is the Bread? The Body of Christ! What do they become who are partakers therein? The Body of Christ! When you see [the Body of Christ] lying on the altar, say to yourself, ‘Because of this Body I am no longer earth and ash, no longer a prisoner, but free. This body, scourged and crucified, has not been fetched by death . . . . This is that Body which was blood-stained, which was pierced by a lance, and from which gushed forth those saving fountains, one of blood and the other of water for the world. This is the Body which He gave us, both to hold in reserve [for worship] and to eat, which was appropriate to intense love; for those whom we kiss with abandon we often even bite with our teeth. Let us therefore in all respects put our faith in God and contradict Him in nothing, even if what is said seems to be contrary to our reasonings and to what we see. Let His word be of superior authority to reason and sight. This too be our practice in respect of the Mysteries, not looking upon what is laid before us, but taking heed also of His words. For words cannot deceive; but our senses are easily cheated. His word has never failed; our senses err most of the time.
When the word says, ‘This is my Body,’ be convinced of it and believe it, and look at it with the eyes of the mind. For Christ did not give us something tangible, but even in His tangible things all is intellectual. If you were incorporeal He would have given you those incorporeal gifts naked; but since the soul is intertwined with the body, He hands over to you in tangible things, that which is perceived intellectually. How many now say, ‘I wish I could see His shape [Gr. ton tupon], His appearance, His garments, His scandals.’ Only look! You see Him! You touch Him. You eat Him. He had given to those who desire Him, not only to see Him and fix their teeth in His flesh, and to embrace Him and satisfy all their love.

St. John of Damascus (676-749 AD): <<The bread and the wine are not merely figures of the body and blood of Christ (God forbid!) but the deified body of the Lord itself: for the Lord has said, ‘This is My body,’ not, this is a figure of My body: and ‘My blood,’ not, a figure of My blood. The body which is born of the holy Virgin is in truth body united with divinity, not that the body which was received up into the heavens descends, but that the bread itself and the wine are changed into God’s body and blood. But if you enquire how this happens, it is enough for you to learn that it was through the Holy Spirit, just as the Lord took on Himself flesh that subsisted in Him and was born of the holy Mother of God through the Spirit. And we know nothing further save that the Word of God is true and energises and is omnipotent, but the manner of this cannot be searched out. But one can put it well thus, that just as in nature the bread by the eating and the wine and the water by the drinking are changed into the body and blood of the eater and drinker, and do not become a different body from the former one, so the bread of the table and the wine and water are supernaturally changed by the invocation and presence of the Holy Spirit into the body and blood of Christ, and are not two but one and the same.>>

The Council of Trent further condemned in the first Canon of the Thirteenth Session that it is an error to deny that “in the sacrament of the most holy Eucharist, are contained truly, really, and substantially, the body and blood together with the soul and divinity of our Lord Jesus Christ, and consequently the whole Christ” and to say instead that"He is only therein as in a sign, or in figure, or virtue" - this error still carries the Church’s heaviest condemnation, so that we must be careful in grasping the proper understanding of the Most Blessed Sacrament and never turn it into a sign, or figure, or virtue, or consider that in either species there is anything less than the whole Christ.

 

[Pancras]

Just the other day I encountered this very attitude. I don’t know how effective my reply was but it went something like this: It is one thing to discuss politics or baseball. You are more than welcome to your opinions on ObamaCare or the pride of being a Red Sawks fan.

However when we cross over and discuss Jesus Christ or what I tell you is Church Teaching I think you can only ask me to cite authority for what I say. And I do in this case: scripture and the Catechism.

You need to do the same for this is what people of faith or fellow Catholics do. When you tell me that Jesus is “not God,” that he is “the Son” and God is the “Father,” you are ignoring the Church Teachings on the nature of the Holy Trinity. You do not “have an opinion” or “point of view” on this. You are wrong, plain and simple.

What you think doesn’t count when you are wrong – much the same way that you thought the runner was safe – the umpire said he was out and the call was unchallenged by anyone one the field. What you think is not a “point of view” in that case either.

He didn’t have a Catechism so I lent him mine, telling him to bring it back when he found something that countered the entries on the Trinitarian God.

This is the first time I found myself in a heated discussion about my faith (actually more about his faith, an ex-Catholic).

Could I have had a better reply?

dj

So this person to whom you lent your catechism was an ex-Catholic? If he did not believe in The Blessed Trinity he would be an ex-Christian! Tell me if I’m wrong, but I don’t think there are any Christians who deny the Trinity. I’ve heard protestant preachers say most effusively that if you want to be called Christian you must believe in the Blessed Trinity.

But today, we have come to a time when it is becoming not uncommon to encounter someone who thinks that Jesus never existed, that He was just a popular legend. Have you noticed that in your travels, talking to people? I have. Now, I suppose it’s possible that somehow God has put me face-to-face with the one person in town who thinks this way, but I have no cause to suspect that is the case.

As for your reply, djeter, I think you did well. It’s important to not be too overbearing or forceful when your listener is prone to take offense too easily. Your reference to the umpire on the field is interesting too, because it seems to me that if not for the game of baseball being a longstanding tradition, of 100 years or more in America, if we were to attempt to put together such a system of rules and judgment by appointed authority (umpires) today, it would likely be impossible. There would be too many cries of opposition saying that this is an unjust game for it violates the personal consciences of everyone in the fan stands. There is a movement afoot to deny the existence of authority.

I have known erstwhle Catholics, that is, they have fallen away from the faith, whose primary obstacle has been just this, that they do not believe in the authority of the Church. When I have tried to gently reassure them regarding Church authority, they have become most vehemently dug-in, and begin to raise all manner of insult against what I say, and failing to upset me that way (for it seemed their primary goal was to get me upset with them) they would resort to personal insults and false accusation, calumny and ad hominem. It is quite a penance to hold your ground and to refuse to be taken in by their relentless banter of spite and derision.
.

 

[Pancras]

Originally Posted by millstreet View Post
I get that, but what is His REAL body and blood? Is it the human form? Or is His REAL body and blood spiritual in nature? I.e., is the body the vessel carrying the divine being, or is the body the substance of the divine being - considering Jesus is here with us today, but clearly is not in the form of a human.

Jesus is in the form of a human through the person of the priest, whose vocation is to represent Him, and to stand at Mass in persona Christi, in the person of Christ. When blessing religious articles, when absolving sins, when baptizing &c., the priest is for us Our Lord present among us, but in the Mass, the Blessed Sacrament becomes the real presence of Our Lord in all ways, that is really and truly, in the ways that the priest cannot be. The Sacrament supplies what is missing in the priest and the priest supplies what is missing in the Sacrament, therefore the priest together with the Sacrament is the whole of Our Lord’s real presence until the end of time.

We have the Church fathers and doctors, quoted in 2 posts above by R_C, saying that the Real Presence of Our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament is the Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity of Jesus Christ, Who is the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity.

So you can’t say is it “one or the other,” as you have here, “Is it the human form? Or is His REAL body and blood spiritual in nature?” For it is both the human form AND the spiritual nature. His real Body and Blood is both human AND spiritual, both material AND supernatural, both physically human AND divinely God. What our senses fail to fathom is supplied to us by the person of the priest who gives us the Blessed Sacrament. That is why this is such a sacred practice that rightly and traditionally belongs only to the priest, or, short of that, to a deacon who is on his way to becoming a priest. Only in recent years has there been a revival of the “permanent deacon” who has no plans to be ordained a priest in the future.

By His incarnation as man, God became human by taking on a mortal body in the immaculate womb of the Blessed Virgin Mary. God in eternity became man in time, for the purpose of our redemption.

God didn’t HAVE to do this.
God didn’t HAVE to suffer.
God didn’t HAVE to be crucified.
God didn’t HAVE to endure the tortures of public execution.
He did it out of His indescribably love for us, and we can see His love when we cast our gaze on a crucifix.
.

 

[irishpatrick]

Jesus is in the form of a human through the person of the priest, whose vocation is to represent Him, and to stand at Mass in persona Christi, in the person of Christ. When blessing religious articles, when absolving sins, when baptizing &c., the priest is for us Our Lord present among us, but in the Mass, the Blessed Sacrament becomes the real presence of Our Lord in all ways, that is really and truly, in the ways that the priest cannot be. The Sacrament supplies what is missing in the priest and the priest supplies what is missing in the Sacrament, therefore the priest together with the Sacrament is the whole of Our Lord’s real presence until the end of time.

We have the Church fathers and doctors, quoted in 2 posts above by R_C, saying that the Real Presence of Our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament is the Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity of Jesus Christ, Who is the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity.

So you can’t say is it “one or the other,” as you have here, “Is it the human form? Or is His REAL body and blood spiritual in nature?” For it is both the human form AND the spiritual nature. His real Body and Blood is both human AND spiritual, both material AND supernatural, both physically human AND divinely God. What our senses fail to fathom is supplied to us by the person of the priest who gives us the Blessed Sacrament. That is why this is such a sacred practice that rightly and traditionally belongs only to the priest, or, short of that, to a deacon who is on his way to becoming a priest. Only in recent years has there been a revival of the “permanent deacon” who has no plans to be ordained a priest in the future.

By His incarnation as man, God became human by taking on a mortal body in the immaculate womb of the Blessed Virgin Mary. God in eternity became man in time, for the purpose of our redemption.

God didn’t HAVE to do this.
God didn’t HAVE to suffer.
God didn’t HAVE to be crucified.
God didn’t HAVE to endure the tortures of public execution.
He did it out of His indescribably love for us, and we can see His love when we cast our gaze on a crucifix.
.

I am not sure if this was correctly directed to me; however, we are in full agreement and I said almost the exact same things you have here.