SPLIT: The Eucharist in Scripture and Catholic teaching.

[Cal_Fullerton]

Yes, I have attended Protestant churches a few times but it wasn’t something my parents were ‘into’. Both of them felt that all organised religions were corrupt and we do better practicing our faith without being a part of corrupt institutions. At nine, I vaguely remember being bored to tears at a Lutheran service. I didn’t get anything out of it. I went once to another denomination with a friend when I had had a sleepover at her place. They had a communion service with plates of broken up bread passed around and grape juice distributed in little paper pill cups. It didn’t make any impression on me.

Not to worry. God had been tapping me on the shoulder for a few years before I actually answered Him. It took a lot to get my attention. Not even surviving going over a 45 foot cliff in a car at 50mph - with NO injuries - was enough to make me turn to Him.

Back in November, I went to a Lutheran service with my SIL. It felt to me more like a prayer meeting with one person (the pastor) giving us something to think/pray about. My SIL was disappointed that they didn’t have a communion service that day.

Although I grew up in KSA, I was never a Muslim. I would never become a Muslim although their faith example for me was very strong. I admire the strength of their convictions, but not their beliefs because they have been beguiled away from Jesus.

I’ll get to the 2nd half of your comment #424 later.

I’m glad you survived your accident! Apparently, you feel God miraculously protected you. If so, I imagine he used some angels!

I’m sorry that your experiences with Protestant churches weren’t so hot. I attend a charismatic Baptist church. The pastor is slowly becoming more charismatic with time. I think he sees imbalances among charismatics leaders he sees on TV and is somewhat leery of them. And to some extent I sympathize with him although TBN, DayStar, and Angel One have been a great uplift to me through the years.

Is KSA Saudi Arabia? Syria? Do you live in the U.S. now?

Yes, if more of we Christians had the strong convictions that some of the Muslims have, we’d be far more effective in promoting our way—which is of course the only way to God.

Helen & I feel so blessed to be in God. He is so good to us. His faithfulness never fails. :tissues:

 

[pablope]

I think that’s very good, jm. The church was unified then in a way that it (or she) has not been since. I believe the Father and Jesus and the Spirit are grieving over the disunity in his body. That’s one reason I’m trying to learn more about Catholicism and make friends with you guys (and gals).

Do you believe the Eastern church, which, as I understand, split with the Western church back around A.D. 300 or 400, was no longer part of the true church of Christ after they wandered? (I may need correcting on my dates!)

 

[Linda_Marie]

I’ll get to the 2nd half of your comment #424 later.

I’m glad you survived your accident! Apparently, you feel God miraculously protected you. If so, I imagine he used some angels!

I’m sorry that your experiences with Protestant churches weren’t so hot. I attend a charismatic Baptist church. The pastor is slowly becoming more charismatic with time. I think he sees imbalances among charismatics leaders he sees on TV and is somewhat leery of them. And to some extent I sympathize with him although TBN, DayStar, and Angel One have been a great uplift to me through the years.

Is KSA Saudi Arabia? Syria? Do you live in the U.S. now?

Yes, if more of we Christians had the strong convictions that some of the Muslims have, we’d be far more effective in promoting our way—which is of course the only way to God.

Helen & I feel so blessed to be in God. He is so good to us. His faithfulness never fails. :tissues:

KSA is the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. Currently, I live in outback Australia. I’ve lived so many places that when people ask, I say I’m from Earth.

Sometimes, I get really fearful when I think of how much God has intervened in my life. And yes, I’ve made my Guardian Angel work overtime protecting me. It took me years to answer Him. Now I worry that I haven’t done or am not doing what He wants of me.

I didn’t really get to choose my Church. God made it clear to me where He wanted me and made me Catholic before I even knew what the Church Teaches. That spiritual 2x4 was most effective. That and the Eucharist.

The first time I received the Eucharist, I was at my MIL’s house and she had a home Mass. The priest knew I wasn’t Catholic (I think he was unaware that I was also unbaptised). I didn’t know what to do when he came around to me, so I just followed his lead. He offered me Communion, so I received.

That marked a turning point. Jesus, in the Eucharist, changed me. Where before, God and religion had little place in my life, Jesus and the Church became the driving force, the centre of my life. The desire to continue to receive the Lord in the Eucharist became first and foremost.

The high point of the Catholic year is coming up. I invite you to attend your local Catholic Church for Palm Sunday, Holy Thursday, Good Friday and Easter Vigil (on Saturday evening before Easter Sunday). They are longer than the usual liturgy (about 1.5 hrs) so be prepared. Easter Vigil, when I was baptised, went 3 hours. (we had 4 for Baptism and 30 odd for Confirmation plus the entire Mass was sung, it was beautiful)

 

[Cal_Fullerton]

I’m finding the 2nd half of Linda Marie’s comment #424 (the oldest comment I haven’t responded to) fascinating.

There’s so much in it that I don’t have time to respond the way I’d like to right now. I’m going through a busy spell. But hang on, you precious saints, I’m coming back.

 

[Cal_Fullerton]

Actually, we are closer [on *church

] than you think. It is both, the institution founded by Jesus and the people He has gathered to Himself. That you have been baptised ‘In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit’ means that you are part of the Church, whether you think of yourself as Catholic or not.

That’s good!

from the Catechism
*
816 "The sole Church of Christ [is that] which our Savior, after his Resurrection, entrusted to Peter’s pastoral care, commissioning him and the other apostles to extend and rule it. . . . This Church, constituted and organized as a society in the present world, subsists in (subsistit in) the Catholic Church, which is governed by the successor of Peter and by the bishops in communion with him."267

The Second Vatican Council's Decree on Ecumenism explains: "For it is through Christ's Catholic Church alone, which is the universal help toward salvation, that the fullness of the means of salvation can be obtained. It was to the apostolic college alone, of which Peter is the head, that we believe that our Lord entrusted all the blessings of the New Covenant, in order to establish on earth the one Body of Christ into which all those should be fully incorporated who belong in any way to the People of God."268

Wounds to unity

817 In fact, "in this one and only Church of God from its very beginnings there arose certain rifts, which the Apostle strongly censures as damnable. But in subsequent centuries much more serious dissensions appeared and large communities became separated from full communion with the Catholic Church - for which, often enough, men of both sides were to blame."269 The ruptures that wound the unity of Christ’s Body - here we must distinguish heresy, apostasy, and schism270 - do not occur without human sin:

Where there are sins, there are also divisions, schisms, heresies, and disputes. Where there is virtue, however, there also are harmony and unity, from which arise the one heart and one soul of all believers.271

**818 "However, one cannot charge with the sin of the separation those who at present are born into these communities [that resulted from such separation] and in them are brought up in the faith of Christ, and the Catholic Church accepts them with respect and affection as brothers . . . . All who have been justified by faith in Baptism are incorporated into Christ; they therefore have a right to be called Christians, and with good reason are accepted as brothers in the Lord by the children of the Catholic Church."272

819 "Furthermore, many elements of sanctification and of truth"273 are found outside the visible confines of the Catholic Church: "the written Word of God; the life of grace; faith, hope, and charity, with the other interior gifts of the Holy Spirit, as well as visible elements."274 Christ’s Spirit uses these Churches and ecclesial communities as means of salvation, whose power derives from the fullness of grace and truth that Christ has entrusted to the Catholic Church. All these blessings come from Christ and lead to him,275 and are in themselves calls to "Catholic unity."276***

Sadly, there are too many who have been raised in faith, whether Catholic or a denomination, but who reject it, or even just don’t care.

We must keep them in our prayers.

Wow! That’s all fantastic, Linda Marie! So the Catholic Church is offering an olive branch to the denominations. The CC does accept those of us who have been justified by faith, no matter where we fellowship. (Of course, as you said, there are too many who have been raised in faith, whether Catholic or a denomination, but who reject Christ. )

I’m going to save that quotation. I might use it in the future to straighten out uninformed Catholics.

 

[Cal_Fullerton]

The split happened after some horrendously stupid battle that took place in Constantinople during the Crusades - my impression is that Western Christians mistook Eastern Christians for Arab Muslims, and killed them all - and for whatever reason, whether deserved or not, the Bishop of Rome was blamed for the mix-up.

We are also experience very spring-like weather here in Calgary - I’m hoping for an earlier and longer summer.

Calgary, Alberta? Helen & I were there briefly last summer! Your mountains are fun to look at.

You’re apparently referring to a different split than I was thinking of. I’m not sure anymore what I was thinking of. Oh, the problems with stretched out discourses!
Actually, I think Linda Marie’s quote from the Catechism took me to where I was going.

 

[brb3]

The first time I received the Eucharist, I was at my MIL’s house and she had a home Mass. The priest knew I wasn’t Catholic (I think he was unaware that I was also unbaptised). I didn’t know what to do when he came around to me, so I just followed his lead. He offered me Communion, so I received.

That marked a turning point. Jesus, in the Eucharist, changed me. Where before, God and religion had little place in my life, Jesus and the Church became the driving force, the centre of my life. The desire to continue to receive the Lord in the Eucharist became first and foremost.

Very true !! I had similar experience. I was a lapsed Protestant, dating a lapsed Catholic … who nevertheless allowed me to go to her Church. She didn’t know the rules on the Eucharist … and didn’t inform me I was not to receive. Over a several year period, we would occasionally go to her Church … and everytime I received the Eucharist, I was amazed at the spiritual healing it brought me. I sensed supernatural energy within me each time upon my receipt thereof … which enabled me to overcome my prodigal sins. I experienced the Catholic Eucharist’s special power, that the Protestant Lord’s Supper lacked. The Eucharist is what convinced me to study and later join the Catholic Church. Early on in my study of the Catholic Church, I heard someone errantly say on a radio program that it was OK for Christians to receive the Eucharist … so that reinforced to me it was proper for me to receive, before I eventually learned otherwise during RCIA. I was so helped by the Eucharist, that I was convinced it was God’s greatest healing medicine on Earth. Having experienced the Church’s Supernatural Sacrament … John 6 became very easy for me to accept, as the literal REAL PRESENCE teaching of Christ.

I now know the Church teaches it only heals ‘venial’ sins. But, God used the Eucharist to heal me of major mortal sins … and to lead me to His True Church via its miraculous power.

 

[jmcrae]

Calgary, Alberta? Helen & I were there briefly last summer! Your mountains are fun to look at.

You’re apparently referring to a different split than I was thinking of. I’m not sure anymore what I was thinking of. Oh, the problems with stretched out discourses!
Actually, I think Linda Marie’s quote from the Catechism took me to where I was going.

Good!

For me, it’s important to be part of the same organization that Jesus actually established - not because I think other people are going to go to Hell, but because for me, that unbroken line of continuity between Him and me is one more important relationship that I have with Him - it allows me to be related to Him “by blood” and not merely by friendship. (Although a personal relationship with Him in friendship is also very important to me, as well - don’t get me wrong.)

 

[Cal_Fullerton]

How would physical union with one’s Beloved not bring one closer?

I think it’s just incredible that Jesus gives Himself to us to eat and drink at Mass - it amazes me every single time.

OK, jm, so your amazement lifts your faith?
Beyond that, how does Communion help you get closer to Jesus? Is there any other way?
Do you feel his presence in greater measure throughout the rest of the day or week?
Does your participation in Eucharist empower you to do a better job at work? Does it help you love people more?

 

[jmcrae]

OK, jm, so your amazement lifts your faith?
Beyond that, how does Communion help you get closer to Jesus? Is there any other way?

I’m trying to figure out how much closer you think one could be, than physically united with Him. He is inside me, and I am inside Him. We become one being, intermingled.

Do you feel his presence in greater measure throughout the rest of the day or week?

Feelings are not the measure of reality. What I feel is irrelevant - sometimes, I don’t feel anything at all. That’s not the point.

Does your participation in Eucharist empower you to do a better job at work? Does it help you love people more?

To “use” Jesus as a means to a material end is to miss the point completely.

The end and purpose of our relationship with Jesus is union with Jesus. Yes, the side effects are that we are better people - more honest workers, more loving people - because we are no longer self-concerned - we know that in Jesus, nothing can harm us, so we are free to take the risks of love and honesty. But those are not the reasons for our relationship with Jesus. Jesus is our goal - not work or human relationships. And sometimes, in order to emphasize the point, He will take those things away from us temporarily (as He did with Job) to ensure that we remember what we were created for.

I hope that helps you.

 

[Linda_Marie]

As you know, the Our Father (The Lord’s Prayer) which we use is a translation.
Give us this day our daily bread.
There is no equivalent word in English or Latin for the Greek epiousion, which is translated as ‘daily’.

Our “Daily Bread?”
But is the Holy Eucharist of the Eucharistic banquet also the daily bread of the “Our Father”? If the “Our Father” is the perfect prayer, which is most perfectly prayed in the context of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, then does it not make sense that the daily bread that we most need and so ask for is the supersubstantial bread of the Holy Eucharist?
<…>
The Greek word here is* epiousion*, which is a hapax — a word that is only used here and nowhere else in the Greek language — and so presumed to be the Greek equivalent of whatever word Our Lord may have used in Aramaic or Hebrew. Most translate the word as “daily”, and this goes back to the Latin of Saint Jerome, who renders “arton epiousion” as “panis quotidianum”, daily bread, in the Gospel of Luke. However, in the Gospel of Saint Matthew, Jerome translates the same words as “panis supersubstantialem”. In other words, Jerome, who realized that this Greek hapax could not be expressed in Latin with both meanings at once, chose to give it one meaning in Matthew — “daily”; and another in Luke — “supersubstantial”, so as to preserve both senses of the word for Latin speaking Christians, albeit in two distinct biblical locations.(bolding mine)

We have mostly lost this second original meaning — supersubstantial — and so are usually unaware of this lost Eucharistic connotation in our recitation of the Our Father.
<…>
This concept of substance (epiousion) in the Holy Eucharist as applied above by Ambrose in De Sacramentis was very similar to the interpretation of Saint Cyril of Jerusalem — supersubstantial food for the soul. Yet in a later quote from De Sacramentis (below), we will see how Saint Ambrose interprets the concept of substance in a new way, which will be crucial for the development of substantial change in the theology of Real Presence. Remember, too that Ambrose was combating Germanic Arianism in his diocese as he sought to defend the consubstantiality of the Father and the Son against the Arians who denied that Jesus was one in substance (homo-ousion) with the Father. Hence, it would seem only natural that the concept of substance or ousia would be in the forefront of his mind as he wrestled with the terminology of the Real Presence of Christ in the Holy Eucharist.

As Our Lord Jesus Christ is the true Son, not by grace in the manner of men, but as Son of the substance of the Father, so it is true real flesh as He Himself said which we receive, and His true/real blood is imbibed. But perhaps you might say what the disciples said when they heard Him saying: “Unless one eats my flesh and drinks my Blood, he shall not dwell in me nor have eternal life” — perhaps you might say “How is it true? I see the analogy, but I do not see the true/real blood.” First of all, I [Ambrose] told you of the statement of Christ which acts so that it can change and convert the established species of nature (mutare et convertere genera institute naturae). Then when Christ’s statement is not accepted by His disciples but hearing that He gave His flesh to eat and gave His blood to drink they turned away and only Peter said, “You have the words of eternal life and how can I turn from you?’ Therefore, so that others could say this without the horror of experiencing blood but dwell in saving grace, you receive the sacrament in an analogous experience, but truly the grace and power of its nature. * “I am” He declares “the bread of life which comes down from heaven.” But flesh did not come down from heaven, this flesh He acquired on earth out of the Virgin. How then did bread come down from heaven and be living bread? Our Lord Jesus Christ at the same time shares divinity and corporality, and you who partake in this food receive the flesh of His Divine Substance. (Emphasis added.)3*

So we see that in the prayer the Lord taught us, we are not just asking for food for the nourishment of our bodies, we also ask to receive the Eucharist every day, to nourish our souls.

“Father, give us this day our daily bread”

 

[Cal_Fullerton]

The date/year is placed as 1054 [of the West/East split of the church of Jesus Christ].

 

[SWR11]

Wow. That’s all very heavy.
Let’s see if I understand— although the bread and wine continue to taste like bread and wine, after the priest consecrates the bread and wine, their chemical makeup actually changes to match exactly the body and blood of Christ as they were when Jesus was crucified 2,000 years ago. Is that correct?

Also, the person of Jesus, that is, his resurrected nail-scarred body, is also present in the church building.
Is that right?

What I have come to understand about the Eucharist within the Roman Communion is that Christ’s whole body, blood, soul and divinity are in the bread and wine, and the bread and wine become the actual body and blood of Christ. The appearance remains as bread and wine, but the substance has changed. Also, if I am correct, it is the glorified body of Christ that is offered and present during the Eucharist. It is not a doctrine I agree with, and I have not seen it taught or practiced as explicitily within the Ante-Nicene Chruch as do most Roman Catholics. Blessings

 

[Luvtosew]

What I have come to understand about the Eucharist within the Roman Communion is that Christ’s whole body, blood, soul and divinity are in the bread and wine, and the bread and wine become the actual body and blood of Christ. The appearance remains as bread and wine, but the substance has changed. Also, if I am correct, it is the glorified body of Christ that is offered and present during the Eucharist. It is not a doctrine I agree with, and I have not seen it taught or practiced as explicitily within the Ante-Nicene Chruch as do most Roman Catholics. Blessings

I’m still RC but I never held the opinion of tranbs the way I find so many are describing it lately till I came on these sites. I also see its a sacrifice.

I never understand how they say its the body and blood and then offer it as an unbloody sacrifice, so one minute it contains the blood when its consecrated then offered back up the Father as an unbloody sacrifice, doesn’t make sense.

No ones been able to explain that one to me.

 

[jmcrae]

I’m still RC but I never held the opinion of tranbs the way I find so many are describing it lately till I came on these sites. I also see its a sacrifice.

I never understand how they say its the body and blood and then offer it as an unbloody sacrifice, so one minute it contains the blood when its consecrated then offered back up the Father as an unbloody sacrifice, doesn’t make sense.

No ones been able to explain that one to me.

The sacrifice of thanksgiving that is offered by the priest is the bread and the wine (unbloody). This is a really clumsy way of explaining it, but the way I understand it is, roughly speaking, Jesus essentially replaces the bread and the wine on the Altar with Himself - in Eucharistic Prayer #1, which is the one that comes down to us from Apostolic times, the language is very clear that the Angels transfer the essential substances of the bread and wine into Heaven while Jesus is descending on to the Altar and replaces their substances with His own, which is the flesh that was sacrificed for our sins on the Cross, once and for all - which is what we then consume in Holy Communion.

A Catholic priest does not actually sacrifice Jesus on the Altar - Jesus already did that on the Cross. What the Catholic priest sacrifices is the bread and the wine - which then gets “traded” if you will for the body and blood, soul and divinity of Jesus Christ at the moment of the Consecration.

 

[SWR11]

I’m still RC but I never held the opinion of tranbs the way I find so many are describing it lately till I came on these sites. I also see its a sacrifice.

I never understand how they say its the body and blood and then offer it as an unbloody sacrifice, so one minute it contains the blood when its consecrated then offered back up the Father as an unbloody sacrifice, doesn’t make sense.

No ones been able to explain that one to me.

I also see it as a sacrifice, but one of praise and thanksgiving. Like you, I do not understand the bloodless part of the Mass either. Blessings

 

[Luvtosew]

I also see it as a sacrifice, but one of praise and thanksgiving. Like you, I do not understand the bloodless part of the Mass either. Blessings

I agree with you.

 

[Cal_Fullerton]

I listen to Mother Angelica on EWTN sometimes. I wonder, do any of you ever enjoy listening to her?

 

[Cal_Fullerton]

KSA is the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. Currently, I live in outback Australia. I’ve lived so many places that when people ask, I say I’m from Earth.

Wow, Australia! It’s neat to talk to someone from the other side of the globe.

Now I worry that I haven’t done or am not doing what He wants of me.

If you haven’t done what he wanted of you in the past—and who of us always has?—then all we have to do is say “I’m sorry,” and do what he wants us to do right now. Then the past is gone, God has forgiven it, it is all “under the blood,” as we like to say in the charismatic movement. Corrie Ten Boom, who suffered greatly during the Holocaust, said once that our sins are cast into a sea of forgetfulness, and God put up sign saying “NO FISHING”!

If you worry that you are not doing what he wants of you now, it could be the Accuser (the devil) lying to you. Or it might be the conviction of the Holy Spirit, in which case you can ask God what specifically it is that he wants you do to. When he tells you, ask him to give you strength and desire to do it; then do it! Everything will work out for the best in the long run. He knows what he’s doing and he loves you with an undying, unwavering love.

Jesus, in the Eucharist, changed me. Where before, God and religion had little place in my life, Jesus and the Church became the driving force, the centre of my life. The desire to continue to receive the Lord in the Eucharist became first and foremost.

It sounds like the Eucharist is a great blessing to you. I wonder why Catholics seem to stress the Jesus in the Eucharist rather than the Jesus that comes into their hearts through the Eucharist?

 

[Cal_Fullerton]

everytime I received the Eucharist, I was amazed at the spiritual healing it brought me. I sensed supernatural energy within me each time upon my receipt thereof … which enabled me to overcome my prodigal sins. I experienced the Catholic Eucharist’s special power, that the Protestant Lord’s Supper lacked. . . .

Thanks for that testimony, brb3.