Why do we take Jesus' words literally in the Eucharist and not elsewhere?

[Jennifer132]

But if we’re wrong, they would be correct. We would be worshipping a piece of bread as God Almighty, a textbook example of idolatry in its classic sense. They, on the other hand, do not claim to worship the Bible as God, so on that point, they’re in the clear.

So really, the ones with most at stake is us; we are either in the presence of God in the most intimate sense, or we are committing idolatry of the most diabolical kind. There is no middle ground.

I, for one, will take Jesus at his own word.

This was my initial concern too when I first started looking into Catholicism, but you aren’t worshipping the bread, you are worshipping Jesus in the Eucharist. Even if he isn’t there, and Catholics are wrong, you are still worshipping Jesus, not the bread.

 

[Micosil]

We take them literally because among Christians, it is only Protestants that don’t take it literally. Catholics, Eastern Orthodox, Assyrians, Copts, Antiochian, Ethiopian, … all of these take Jesus literally and celebrate the Eucharist and have the Real Presence in their respective Masses/Divine Liturgies. This has been the case ever since Christianity has been around. The Coptic Orthodox Church of Alexandria has been around since 42 AD when St. Mark founded it; the Syriac Orthodox Church of Antioch has been around since 37 AD when St. Peter founded it. These are ancient, first-century churches that started in the mere decade after Christ’s Passion, Resurrection and Ascension.

It is only the Protestant Reformers that did away with it.

 

[jimcav]

1. This is an interesting one that I haven’t heard any other convert mention, though I’d love to hear from anyone else who saw this: As a Protestant, even though I felt that Catholics were wrong about many things, I did believe that they had the power to perform exorcisms. When I started reading about how a Catholic exorcism is performed, as well as accounts written by exorcists, I noticed that the possessed person would react quite violently to a consecrated host. They could also do things like differentiate between a consecrated and unconsecrated host. If the Real Presence were not true, it wouldn’t cause a reaction like this from a demon. It’s the same reason that throwing regular tap water on them doesn’t cause a reaction like throwing holy water on them. To me, it lent credence to the Catholic case that the consecrated host is, in fact, the body of Christ. (I realize this last point may not be a great one to use in an apologetic way to Protestants, but I just thought I’d share it since it helped me).

Great point and one that I wouldn’t have thought of.

I’m going to look further into this, as it might be a good apologetic point if one believes in exorcisms.

There are also quite a few miracles attributable to the Eucharist too…

 

[johnnyc176]

As I was trying to prepare a defense about the Real Presence to a Protestant, I came across a stumbling block. Of course Catholics say that the real “proof” of the Real Presence is in John 6:32-71, I was troubled by a protestant who said that Jesus did not literally mean by the phrase,

I would ask this protestant by what authority does he/she get to interpret Scripture for us?

 

[Lucretius]

I think that is key right there! Why would the people have left if it was a metaphor? Or why didn’t Jesus call them back. Obviously He was being literal right there. and serious.

The passage even implies that the crowd thought He was being figurative, but after repeating Himself a couple times they realized He was being literal, and freaked out.

Christi pax,

Lucretius

 

[Lion_IRC]

…The protestant argument is made more solid because Jesus often called himself many things, eg. “I am the vine, you are the branches.”

So how is it that we as Catholics can be so certain that in the case of the Eucharist, he did actually mean for us to take him literally and in other situations we know he only meant the statement symbolically?

Yes! That so amazing.

Jesus DID refer to Himself as the vine, the door, the light…etc.

But did Jesus ask us to eat doors? Did He ask us to eat vine branches?
Did He ask us to eat candle sticks or oil lamps?

No. It was the bread.

Ask your skeptical friend to look at this verse and determine which part is merely symbolic;

“For where two or three are gathered in my name, there am I among them.”

 

[petra22]

Speaking as a Protestant considering conversion, the Eucharist was and still is one of the most convincing arguments that is drawing me to Catholicism. What stands out to me is that in other symbolic passages, Jesus tends to extrapolate his meaning pretty clearly. For example:

“I am the vine; you are the branches. If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing.”

So we know he isn’t literally the vine and we the branches, but he’s using it to say that apart from him we are useless.

And:

Then Jesus spoke again to the people, he said, “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.”

Here he specifies that the “light” that he gives us is life (eternal life). So he is explaining that he isn’t a literal light.

And:

In the John 10 passage on Jesus being the gate and the shepherd, the Bible actually says it was a figure of speech (John 10:6).

If you look at the John 6 passage, when Jesus declared that we must eat his flesh and drink his blood, people struggled with his words. And many left him. He could’ve easily said, “hey, don’t go. I’m speaking metaphorically here”. But he didn’t. Instead he kept repeating himself, using stronger and more vivid language. Combine that with, when at the Last Supper he said, “Take and eat. This is my body” with no further extrapolation, and I think you have good reason to believe he was being literal.

I like this.

 

[Todd977]

If the common bread and wine of the Lord’s Supper once consecrated are merely symbols of Jesus Christ and not Jesus Christ himself, then they seem to me to be rather inferior to the symbols of Jesus Christ found in the Old Testament, such as the miraculous manna from heaven (John 6), the miraculous water from the rock (1 Cor 10:4),and the meaty pascal lamb (1 Cor 5:7). Because the New Covenant is a better covenant with better promises (see Heb 8:6), if the New Covenant did have symbols one would expect those symbols would be better than the symbols of the Old Covenant not inferior.

St Paul says that some Christians actually died because they ate the bread or drank the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner. (See 1 Cor 11:27-31) To me this seems a just punishment if the bread and wine once consecrated are Jesus Christ himself because they would truly be guilty of profaning the body and blood of the Lord. However, death seems an unjust punishment if they are merely symbols of Jesus Christ and those who ate or drank them in an unworthy manner were only guilty of symbolically profaning the body and blood of the Lord.

 

[TimothyH]

Jesus and the Jewish Roots of the Eucharist by Dr. Brant Pitre

books.google.com/books/content?id=t4EaqOT4nKUC&printsec=frontcover&img=1&zoom=1&edge=curl&imgtk=AFLRE706xZCoCo32NGrJVEA6ekniJz8mRiGWg_mjxWx66t8Cydik_8AarZyfq3pDHV8rR5KGyVEbJfvzWXzh1x6ErtK2LegRJWcKlMB7jojIcs2rZhX9WLwOc3e34yXKZ1dHU2CGBBTG

Also on Youtube at youtube.com/watch?v=P45BHDRA7pU

-Tim-

 

[DeusExMachina]

We take them literally because among Christians, it is only Protestants that don’t take it literally. Catholics, Eastern Orthodox, Assyrians, Copts, Antiochian, Ethiopian, … all of these take Jesus literally and celebrate the Eucharist and have the Real Presence in their respective Masses/Divine Liturgies. This has been the case ever since Christianity has been around. The Coptic Orthodox Church of Alexandria has been around since 42 AD when St. Mark founded it; the Syriac Orthodox Church of Antioch has been around since 37 AD when St. Peter founded it. These are ancient, first-century churches that started in the mere decade after Christ’s Passion, Resurrection and Ascension.

It is only the Protestant Reformers that did away with it.

And not all Protestants either. Lutherans believe in a literal real presence, as do Methodists (?). Luther even wrote an essay defending Eucharistic adoration called Against the fanatics

 

[Micosil]

And not all Protestants either. Lutherans believe in a literal real presence, as do Methodists (?). Luther even wrote an essay defending Eucharistic adoration called Against the fanatics

I think Lutherans* have a different understanding of the phenomenon; I believe they call it Consubstantiation, where both the essence of the bread and the substance of Christ are present. In the understanding of all of these Apostolic churches, there is only one substance, that of Christ.

And yes, Luther was more Catholic than many would like to admit. He was a priest, after all. He was known to defend Marian doctrines even after the Reformation was underway.​

• Needless to say, if any Lutheran thinks I am incorrect on this, feel free to point it out.

 

[DeusExMachina]

I think Lutherans* have a different understanding of the phenomenon; I believe they call it Consubstantiation, where both the essence of the bread and the substance of Christ are present. In the understanding of all of these Apostolic churches, there is only one substance, that of Christ.

And yes, Luther was more Catholic than many would like to admit. He was a priest, after all. He was known to defend Marian doctrines even after the Reformation was underway.​

• Needless to say, if any Lutheran thinks I am incorrect on this, feel free to point it out.

I think a better understanding is that the body/blood of Christ is present “with, in and under” the bread/wine, so that for sacramental purposes they are the same; this is more or less what Luther articulated

 

[Sy_Noe]

And back that up with St. Paul’s passage that sacrilege against the bread and cup is sacrilege against the body and blood of the Lord.

What prevents Paul’s discussion about receiving unworthily to simply mean if Christ’s sacrifice of His body on the cross for our salvation is not discerned, then one receives unworthily?

 

[Markie_Boy]

Great point - there are several things that could make someone unworthy - no just what they think the bread and wine to be. Coming to the altar while having not forgiven others or with unconfessed sin, and a long list of items.

But if you take John 6 literally - you have to eat His flesh and drink His blood - not “or”. Remember, if we are to take it literally, that is what is written - not that his full presence is in both elements, so you only need one - that is a church philosophy.

 

[Micosil]

I think a better understanding is that the body/blood of Christ is present “with, in and under” the bread/wine, so that for sacramental purposes they are the same; this is more or less what Luther articulated

The “under” part is fine, as in the Catholic (and Orthodox) understanding of the Eucharist, Christ truly is present under the species of bread and wine. I think what is philosophically problematic is, if both the essence of the bread/wine and the substance of Christ are present, how can one object have two substances or essences?

What prevents Paul’s discussion about receiving unworthily to simply mean if Christ’s sacrifice of His body on the cross for our salvation is not discerned, then one receives unworthily?

The most rational way to see what was intended is to see what the earliest Christians took this to mean; St. Ignatius of Antioch, third bishop of Antioch, consecrated by St. Peter and a disciple of St. John the Apostle, had this to say in Letter to the Smyrnaeans, Ch 6:

Take note of those who hold heterodox opinions on the grace of Jesus Christ which has come to us, and see how contrary their opinions are to the mind of God… They 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 the Father, in his goodness, raised up again. They who deny the gift of God are perishing in their disputes.

Someone with such an Apostolic pedigree would simply not be mistaken. He knew atleast two of the Apostles, and it stands to reason that he may have also come into contact with St. Paul as Antioch was also related to him.

Some 40 years later, St. Justin Martyr wrote similarly in First Apology 66:1–20:

Not as common bread or 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 of which our blood and flesh is nourished, . . . is both the flesh and the blood of that incarnated Jesus

Following this ancient, historical understanding, all of the Apostolic churches take Jesus literally, from the Roman Church all the way to Mesopotamia and the Assyrian and Ancient Churches of the East, to the Ethiopian Church.

 

[mattp0625]

As I was trying to prepare a defense about the Real Presence to a Protestant, I came across a stumbling block. Of course Catholics say that the real “proof” of the Real Presence is in John 6:32-71, I was troubled by a protestant who said that Jesus did not literally mean by the phrase,

“Truly, truly, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood, you have no life in yourselves. 54 He who eats My flesh and drinks My blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day. 55 For My flesh is true food, and My blood is true drink. 56 He who eats My flesh and drinks My blood abides in Me, and I in him. 57 As the living Father sent Me, and I live because of the Father, so he who eats Me, he also will live because of Me. 58 This is the bread which came down out of heaven; not as the fathers ate and died; he who eats this bread will live forever.”

that the Communion Host would become Jesus, Himself, but rather it merely symbolizes Him. It seems the real hang up about the Eucharist is not so much that we have this communion service, but that we as Catholics are idol worshiping because Jesus did not intend for us to think that the host was literally change into Jesus.

The protestant argument is made more solid because Jesus often called himself many things, eg. “I am the vine, you are the branches.”

So how is it that we as Catholics can be so certain that in the case of the Eucharist, he did actually mean for us to take him literally and in other situations we know he only meant the statement symbolically?

It’s about contextual interpretation versus fundamentalist interpretation.

The RCC contextually interprets the bible, taking into account all of scripture to arrive at conclusions.

A fundamentalist starts with a goal and works backwards. Here, the goal would be to deny the need for a priesthood, magisterium, apostolic succession, and sacraments.

This put Luther, the founder of the reformation, in a tough spot. He wanted to deny the authority of the church, yet still have Eucharist. So, he came up with consubstantiation of the Eucharist - e.g. God is already part of everything, so we don’t need the priest. This even later evolved into the Eucharist as a mere symbol.

Saint Ignatius of Antioch clearly defined the Eucharist and magisterium in the first century, so sacred tradition is also behind the RCC. This is why tradition is such a bad word for Protestants.

The disciples were first called Christians at Antioch (Acts 11).

 

[Sy_Noe]

The most rational way to see what was intended is to see what the earliest Christians took this to mean; St. Ignatius of Antioch, third bishop of Antioch, consecrated by St. Peter and a disciple of St. John the Apostle, had this to say in Letter to the Smyrnaeans, Ch 6:

Someone with such an Apostolic pedigree would simply not be mistaken. He knew atleast two of the Apostles, and it stands to reason that he may have also come into contact with St. Paul as Antioch was also related to him.

Some 40 years later, St. Justin Martyr wrote similarly in First Apology 66:1–20:

Following this ancient, historical understanding, all of the Apostolic churches take Jesus literally, from the Roman Church all the way to Mesopotamia and the Assyrian and Ancient Churches of the East, to the Ethiopian Church.

I understand. I just don’t know how soon humans might have been mistaken. I’m not even sure the original 12 Apostles were not puzzled at times by Jesus. So for me it takes faith.

 

[Sy_Noe]

Great point - there are several things that could make someone unworthy - no just what they think the bread and wine to be. Coming to the altar while having not forgiven others or with unconfessed sin, and a long list of items.

But if you take John 6 literally - you have to eat His flesh and drink His blood - not “or”. Remember, if we are to take it literally, that is what is written - not that his full presence is in both elements, so you only need one - that is a church philosophy.

Though I admit it’s one I’ve not given much consideration to, you make an interesting point.

 

[Church_Militant]

Maybe this blog article of mine will help. After all…it’s not just John 6.

The Eucharist IS Scriptural

 

[Micosil]

I understand. I just don’t know how soon humans might have been mistaken. I’m not even sure the original 12 Apostles were not puzzled at times by Jesus. So for me it takes faith.

They were, and as the Gospels indicate, they frequently misunderstood Him. He would either correct them or say something to the effect of “Oh, you, who don’t understand. ”. But in the case of the Eucharist, he only insisted again and again on the literal meaning.