JonNC;8727188]Gabe, speaking only for me, I can only present the words of Christ Himself. If He can be born of the Blessed Virgin, be resurrected from the dead, change water into wine, He can, using whatever means He chooses, make His body and blood present. If I cannot convince the non-believer of the others, why would we think we could convince Him of this?
Just for you Jon, many blessings
I would like to introduce a different approach to the RP by transubstantiation here;
Many of the Early Church Fathers expressed some form of change to the substance of bread and wine. It would appear that none of their teachings was made universal in the Church. If we compared all of their teachings to the change we would find that later years science defeats their change of substance. The only one the universal Church finally uses to define and refute all doubt from both secular thought and religious thought is “transubstantiation”.
We have to remember when these Early Church Fathers write their writings are not binding on the whole Catholic Church. Even though councils would later use “some” of their writings to confirm a Council findings.
Although the Orthodox would hold to the Early Church Fathers confirmation of a change, but their ancient understanding of the change does not suffice the whole of Christendom in every age. The Catholic Church finally gives credence and faith that a change is truly manifested by transubstantiation to every age past, present and future generations.
Read the highlighted words our ECF’s chose in describing a change.
St. John Chrysostom “ astonished at His unspeakable gift, blessing Him, among other things, for the **pouring **it out, but also for the **imparting **thereof to us all”…
“For His Word cannot deceive, but our
senses are easily beguiled. His Word has never failed, but our senses in most things go wrong”…
“For as bread consisting of many grains is made one, so that
the grains nowhere appear; they exist indeed, but their difference is not seen by reason of their conjunction; so we are cojoined both with each other and with Christ;
“He also
comingles Himself with us, and not be faith only, but also in
very deed makes us His body…What then ought not he to exceed in purity that has the benefit of this sacrifice?
St. Ambrose “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”
“Perhaps you will say,
“I see something else, how is it that you assert that I receive the Body of Christ?..Let us prove that this is not what nature made, but
what the blessing consecrated, and the power of blessing is greater than that of nature, because by blessing nature itself is changed”
St. Cyril of Jerusalem “for in **the figure **of bread is given to you His Body, and in the
figure of wine His Blood… thus it is that, according to the blessed Peter, we **become partakers **of the divine nature”…and been fully assured that the
seeming bread is not bread, though
sensible to taste, but the Body of Christ; and that the **seeming **wine is not wine, though the
taste will have it so, but the Blood of Christ;… “after the invocation the Bread **becomes **the Body of Christ”.
St. Gregory of Nyssa “He gives these gifts by virtue of the benediction through which He **trans-elements **the natural quality of these visible things to that immortal thing”.
St. John of Damascus “but that the bread itself and the wine are
changed into God’s body and blood…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… **The bread and wine are not merely figures **of the body and blood of Christ (heaven forbid!) **but the deified **body of the Lord itself;…But if some persons called the bread and wine antetypes of the body and blood of the Lord, as did the divinely inspired Basil, they said so not after the consecration but before the consecration…
cont;
Really, if anything could ever demonstrate the human ability to manufacture “disputes” out of thin air, this one here takes the cake.