When did you first believe in the Real Presence?

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I first believed in my first Holy Communion classes when I was in first grade. They told us a story about someone that was stoned to death while they were protecting the Eucharist from desecration and it made me realize how important the Real Presence really is.
 
Yeah, that was St. Tarcisius. They like to tell that story to children because Tarcisius was supposedly only about 12 years old when he was killed.
 
Pup, I am in agreement with you that most of the Protestants outside Lutherans and Anglicans do not believe in the Real Presence in the physical bread and wine.

I’ve found that a lot of Protestants get very affronted if you bring that up though (or various other things about Protestants).
 
After conversations with protestants on another forum, my take on protestants and communion is that individually, in spite of denominational affiliation, they pretty much all professed some belief in the Real Presence. I mean, it sounds so cool, who wouldn’t want to believe it?

Actions, however, betray they’re words, and until protestants drop down on their knees and worship the Holy Eucharist it’s hard for me to believe they truly believe in the Real Presence.
 
I’ve had a couple of Catholic friends attend protestant services and return saying the same thing, “The people were nice, there was just something missing…”
 
tad said:
After conversations with protestants on another forum, my take on protestants and communion is that individually, in spite of denominational affiliation, they pretty much all professed some belief in the Real Presence.
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I don’t know that they quite know what it means, though. It’s been my experience that the interpretation isn’t even close to the same. They believe in a more spiritual “real presence” over a literal one.
 
A lot of the Protestants who aren’t Lutheran or Anglican believe Christ is present when they gather to pray or when they call on him. A spiritual presence rather than physically in the Eucharist. They think of genuflecting towards the tabernacle or monstrance as being idolatry or just plain weird like we’re “worshipping a cracker”.
 
I’ve tried to remember his name for years but all I could remember was the story. Thank you! 😁
 
I agree with you. But you are talking about the official position of Protestant Churches I think if you actually talked with Protestants like I have, since I used to be a protestant myself, you would get a very different story not all Baptists will agree with their churches stance, same with a Presbyterian or a United Church of Christ member. Just because a Protestant is attending a certain denomination doesn’t necessarily mean they will believe everything that that denomination holds to. Also most of the Protestants I know have a believe in the Real Presence (consubstantiation specifically). Like I said in my previous statement. Consubstantiation is a way of looking at how Jesus is really present in the Eucharist. Obviously its the wrong way to view it… but it is a way nonetheless.
 
I concur with the words of Flannery O’Connor: “Well, if it’s a symbol, to hell with it.”
 
thomasaquinas2015 said:
Just because a Protestant is attending a certain denomination doesn’t necessarily mean they will believe everything that that denomination holds to.
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If you don’t believe the doctrinal teachings of a particular church, why would you want to keep attending it?

I can see having a difference on moral teachings, similar to the debates in the Catholic church over women priests, gays etc.

But belief about whether Jesus is present in the Holy Eucharist seems pretty central to a faith from a “beliefs” point of view.
 
I am sure I learned about the Real Presence at a very young age from my devout mother. I never remember a time not believing it. I do know that as a child I called the sanctuary light the “pilot light” (for you youngsters, ovens used to have a gas jet that you had to physically light with a match, called a pilot light) and I still think it is a great image.
Protestant churches seem just like empty buildings without the Real Presence.
 
I intellectually accepted the doctrine, but my real belief came after Baptism. I simply knew everything was true after that point in a way I couldn’t have before. And this makes sense theologically, since God infuses faith, hope, and charity into a soul during Baptism.

By the same token, I sometimes commit mortal sin and, for whatever reason, always feel the lights come back on after a good Confession. I know from experience that I can sometimes have a very shaky intellectual belief in certain doctrines while being in a state of sin, but then instantly have no problem the minute I return to Confession. Frankly, I recently went some months of being away from the Church, and got to the point where I couldn’t even think about anything Catholic. But a good Confession put everything back into place.

So yes: I believe it’s true that none of these things can actually be assented to until God gives us faith, and without faith, we merely have an intellectual opinion.
 
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Cradle Catholic.
Everything was the real presence 😛
Then - first communion -
Altar boy - confirmation mass -
Never had a reason to doubt it either.
My life’s been blessed, that way, at least - lol
 
At least by the time it was explained to me in 2nd Grade in preparation for first communion. But I think I believed in it before that because of my mom’s example.
 
That moment,even when already a catholic ,when you suddenly have a clear understanding and belief in the Real Presence is called a conversion isn’t it?
 
I remember attending one Mass when I was about 10 when I really had an encounter with Jesus. During the consecration I just felt God’s love and presence so strongly and I couldn’t stop thinking about it all day. I didn’t really know about the real presence; but this encounter was so deep that when I learned about the Church’s teaching, it was not difficult to accept.
 
Tis_Bearself said:
If you don’t believe the doctrinal teachings of a particular church, why would you want to keep attending it?
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That is a very good question. I honestly do not have a good answer for you. Having come from a Protestant background I will say this though. For the Protestant believer in Jesus, they think it is mostly impossible to have the Fullness of Truth in any Church that includes the Catholic Church as well. So they stick to the Church that is as closely alines to their own beliefs. But again they may disagree with some of the beliefs as well. In order to understand a Protestant, you have to talk to them individually not as a denomination. This goes true with Catholics, especially today. There are many Catholics who disagree with the Catholic Church on various issues privately. I myself do not.

“But belief about whether Jesus is present in the Holy Eucharist seems pretty central to a faith from a “beliefs” point of view.”

Yes I agree. However let me give you a case in point. My dad who attends an Assemblies of God Church/Community: He holds to Consubstantiation. However here is what the Assemblies of God has on their website underneath Holy Communion:

“The Lord’s Supper, consisting of the elements --bread and the fruit of the vine-- is the symbol expressing our sharing the divine nature of our Lord Jesus Christ (2 Peter 1:4 [KJV/NIV]), a memorial of his suffering and death (1 Corinthians 11:26 [KJV/NIV]), and a prophecy of His second coming (1 Corinthians 11:26 [KJV/NIV]), and is enjoined on all believers “till He come!””

The problem with this is that it is super vague. That is I believe on purpose. Consider for example their usage of symbol does not the Catholic Church teach that the Eucharist is a symbol as well as being the Literal presence of Christ on Earth? Again do we not also believe that the Eucharist is a memorial of his suffering and death? Do we also not believe that the Eucharist points us forward to when Jesus will come back again?

Depending on how they are using the word symbol I would say I agree with the Assemblies of God teaching on Holy Communion. Although they would not call the Eucharist/Holy Communion a Sacrament but rather an Ordinance by this they mean, it has been commanded by the Lord Jesus Christ for us to do, which again we would agree. However do they believe that it is a means of Grace? They don’t say. Thus it leaves open for the individual to believe what he/she wants to believe in the Assemblies of God.

Another thing my dad disagrees with the Assemblies of God about is this: “The baptism of believers in the Holy Spirit is witnessed by the initial physical sign of speaking with other tongues as the Spirit of God gives them utterance.” What this means is that if you haven’t spoken in Tongues you haven’t received the Baptism of the Holy Spirit. My dad disagrees, So do I.
 
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thomasaquinas2015 said:
I agree with you. But you are talking about the official position of Protestant Churches I think if you actually talked with Protestants like I have, since I used to be a protestant myself, you would get a very different story not all Baptists will agree with their churches stance, same with a Presbyterian or a United Church of Christ member. Just because a Protestant is attending a certain denomination doesn’t necessarily mean they will believe everything that that denomination holds to. Also most of the Protestants I know have a believe in the Real Presence (consubstantiation specifically). Like I said in my previous statement. Consubstantiation is a way of looking at how Jesus is really present in the Eucharist. Obviously its the wrong way to view it… but it is a way nonetheless.
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I am a convert.

I was a Protestant. I was a Protestant for just over 44 years, though my father was Roman Catholic.

I belonged to the Methodist Church where I was confirmed at 16, but went to the Baptist church with my grandparents from about age 4 to around age 11. I attended a women’s Presbyterian college.

Protestants do not and never have believed in the Real Presence with the exception of the Episcopalians and the Lutherans.

Consubstantiation (spiritual presence of Christ in the Host) is not the Real Presence as we know it in the Catholic Church, which is the very different transubstantiation (host becomes the body and the wine becomes the blood of Christ). They aren’t the same at all.
 
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Thanks for your post. I agree that the statements put forth by a lot of Protestant churches seem to me to be vague and open to a lot of interpretation by the individual person attending the church.

However, I have to disagree with one thing you said:
thomasaquinas2015 said:
Consider for example their usage of symbol does not the Catholic Church teach that the Eucharist is a symbol as well as being the Literal presence of Christ on Earth?
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I went to the Catholic Catechism page with all the teachings on the Eucharist here

http://www.vatican.va/archive/ccc_css/archive/catechism/p2s2c1a3.htm

and searched for the word “symbol”. It came up exactly once on that page, saying that the Christian ALTAR (not Eucharist) is the “symbol of Christ himself, present in the midst of the assembly of the faithful”.

I can’t imagine the Catholic Church would use the word “symbol” in its official teachings to refer to the Eucharist because that would be extremely open to misinterpretation of the Eucharist as being just a symbolic representation of Jesus’ presence instead of His real, physical presence. So no, the Catholic Church does not teach that the Eucharist is a “symbol”.

Sacraments, including the Eucharist, are considered visible “signs” of God’s grace, and the Catechism page does refer to the “signs” of bread and wine. But a sign is not the same thing as a “symbol”. A sign is indicating something (here, God’s grace); a symbol is usually just a representation of something, not the thing itself. The Eucharist is the real Jesus, in other words, the thing itself.
 
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