The Real Presence pt. 1: In Defense of the Eucharist

(probably my favorite Mass painting ever)

Hey there, internet!
In this edition of Dat Blog, I am going to discuss a topic that's near and dear to my Catholic heart: the Eucharist.

The Eucharist is Jesus' body and blood veiled by the form of bread and wine (partially because if it actually looked, tasted, smelled, and felt like flesh and blood, most everybody would be terrified of it). At the Climax of the Catholic Mass, Jesus, through the priest, changes the consecrated bread and wine into His aforementioned precious body and blood. For more information on what the Eucharist is, click here.

Now, this is a subject that is by nature very hard to understand, and I'm going to try to explain some things about it and just say a lot of things about it for you. First, in this "part one," let's look at some reasons for believing that the Eucharist is what Jesus and the Catholic Church say it is. Here is my defense for the real presence of Jesus in the Eucharist:


EXHIBIT A: The Gospel of John, Chapter 6 verses 26 through 70.

In this episode of St. John's gospel, Jesus has a crowd of thousands gathered with Him and He's preaching and teaching. Read the passage then come back.

In this discourse, Jesus says multiple times that He is the bread of life. The first time He says that is in verse 35:

"Jesus said to them, 'I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me will never hunger, and whoever believes in me will never thirst.' "

 He keeps on going back to that point and says it more explicitly and clearly each time. The second time he makes the claim is in verses 48-51:

"I am the bread of life. Your ancestors ate the manna in the desert, but they died; this is the bread that comes down from heaven so that one may eat it and not die. I am the living bread that came down from heaven; whoever eats this bread will live forever; and the bread that I will give is my flesh for the life of the world.”

He's using language that seems to indicate that he means business.
Verse 52:

"The Jews quarreled among themselves, saying, “How can this man give us His flesh to eat?”

Jesus could easily have explained himself as having been speaking symbolically, because the Jews would have been seriously grossed out by this, given the Jewish laws regarding blood and dead bodies. 

But he doesn't. In 53-58 he really drives the point home that he's being serious.


"Jesus said to them, “Amen, amen, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you do not have life within you.
54. Whoever eats* my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him on the last day.
55. For my flesh is true food, and my blood is true drink.
56. Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood remains in me and I in him.
57. Just as the living Father sent me and I have life because of the Father, so also the one who feeds on me will have life because of me.b
58. This is the bread that came down from heaven. Unlike your ancestors who ate and still died, whoever eats this bread will live forever.”

*The greek word used for "eats" here isn't that of a human just eating a meal, but of an animal "gnawing" or "chewing." This kind of explicit language wouldn't have been used if this was just a long, drawn out symbolic talk. 

If Jesus is understood to be speaking symbolically throughout this passage, then what is one to make of verse 55? "For my flesh is true food and my blood is true drink." Jesus doesn't take an analogy this far anywhere else. 


Now let's take a look at how Jesus' disciples react to all this.Verse 60:

"Then many of his disciples who were listening said, 'This saying is hard; who can accept it?'"

and then later in John 6:66 (note the numbering), after Jesus says some words about how they did not and could not understand, not explaining himself as having been speaking only symbolically, "many of his disciples returned to their former way of life and no longer accompanied him." Jesus could have called them back and explained Himself, saying "come on, guys, it was only a symbol, calm down." But no, he let them go because they had heard the truth as it is and rejected it. Verses 67 through 69:

"Jesus then said to the Twelve, 'Do you also want to leave?'
68. Simon Peter answered him, 'Master, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life. 69. We have come to believe and are convinced that you are the Holy One of God.'"

He still doesn't take anything back or explain any symbolism. He clearly said what he meant, and the apostles, even though they could not understand, remained faithful, just as we should always remain faithful when we encounter things from God that we don't understand. 

This discourse is reinforced as evidence for the real presence of Jesus in the Eucharist by the accounts of the last supper, in which Jesus said that "this is my body," not "this represents my body in some obscure way, so have crackers and grape juice at church sometimes." Further, in 1 Corintians 10:16 and and 11:23-30, St. Paul talks about the Lord's Supper in a way that doesn't suggest that it's symbolic. Note, especially, 11:27: 

"Therefore whoever eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord unworthily will have to answer for the body and blood of the Lord."

This is more than a nice meal to commemorate Jesus and bring our happy family together.



EXHIBIT B: Foreshadowing



Let's look at the Passover for a minute. God had specific instructions for dealing with the sacrificial lamb. Exodus 12:3-8:

"3. Tell the whole community of Israel: On the tenth of this month every family must procure for itself a lamb, one apiece for each household.

4. If a household is too small for a lamb, it along with its nearest neighbor will procure one, and apportion the lamb’s cost in proportion to the number of persons, according to what each household consumes.

5. Your lamb must be a year-old male and without blemish. You may take it from either the sheep or the goats.

6. You will keep it until the fourteenth day of this month, and then, with the whole community of Israel assembled, it will be slaughtered during the evening twilight.

7. They will take some of its blood and apply it to the two doorposts and the lintel of the houses in which they eat it.

8. They will consume its meat that same night, eating it roasted with unleavened bread and bitter herbs." 

Jesus is the new, living sacrificial lamb. 

After the lamb was slaughtered and the blood had done its job, the sacrifice was to be eaten. The sacrifice itself was to be eaten. God didn't instruct the Jews to eat Matzah as a representation of the lamb's meat.

In a similar way Jesus was slaughtered and His precious blood did its job, and Catholics consume Him at mass in a kind of new passover meal.

(Also, if you want to really stretch the foreshadowing here, it might be observed that Jesus instituted the Eucharist at the last supper on the same night he was betrayed and began his passion, just as the lamb was consumed the night it was sacrificed. Again, that's stretching it and sure doesn't prove anything, just thought I'd throw that in there.)








Now, briefly, let's take a look at some things about Jesus' birth. Jesus was born in Bethlehem, which means "house of bread." He was placed in a manger, which is a feeding trough for sheep. You get the idea. Jesus is the bread, and He is food for His flock.



EXHIBIT C: EARLY CHURCH WRITINGS

Saint Ignatius of Antioch was the Bishop of Antioch who lived in the first and second centuries. It's believed that he was a disciple of St. John the evangelist himself. In his epistle to Smyrnaeans in 110 AD, he wrote the following:

"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 that Father, in his goodness, raised up again. They who deny the gift of God are perishing in their disputes."

This isn't scripture, but it is historical support for the validity of the Eucharist. Here we have an authoritative figure in the church just around 80 years after the death of Christ speaking about the real presence. Also in 110 AD in an epistle to the Romans, he wrote the following:


"I desire the Bread of God, the heavenly Bread, the Bread of Life, which is the flesh of Jesus Christ, the Son of God, who became afterwards of the seed of David and Abraham; I wish the drink of God, namely His blood, which is incorruptible love and eternal life."

The early church leaders did not see the Lords Supper as a symbolic memorial. They acknowledged that this was the real deal, just like Jesus said it was. I suggest reading more writings of the early church leaders for more information on where the Church stood on doctrine in the early years of Christianity. Here is a page with several quotes regarding this which you can take or leave once you've realized their legitimacy. 



I do hope this has been informative and enlightening so far. If you have questions, comments, or concerns, stick them below in the comment section. Stay tuned for the next installments on the real presence, in which I will answer frequently asked questions, supply you with links to great Eucharist-related resources, talk about the implications of consuming and being united with the God of the Universe, and possibly go on even more because there's a lot to talk about with this subject. Have a nice day!



God bless,

Peter

Dat Blogger