Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ Jesus,
The First Holy Communion season is in full swing throughout the Church. This weekend our youth who have been preparing for First Holy Communion will receive our Lord Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament of the Altar for the first time. This is very special for them and for our parishes! Let us remember our own First Communion and pray for our children to always love our Lord, Truly Present in the Holy Eucharist!
This week I share with you a summary of our Faith regarding the Real Presence of our Lord Jesus in the Holy Eucharist and some quotes on the Holy Eucharist.
“The doctrine of the Real Presence asserts that in the Holy Eucharist, Jesus is literally and wholly present - Body and Blood, Soul and Divinity - under the appearances of bread and wine. Evangelicals and Fundamentalists frequently attack this doctrine as ‘unbiblical,’ but the Bible is forthright in declaring it (cf. 1 Cor. 10:16–17, 11:23–29; and, most forcefully, John 6:32–71).
The early Church Fathers interpreted these passages literally. In summarizing the early Fathers’ teachings on Christ’s Real Presence, renowned Protestant historian of the early Church J. N. D. Kelly, writes: ‘Eucharistic teaching, it should be understood at the outset, was in general unquestioningly realist, i.e., the consecrated bread and wine were taken to be, and were treated and designated as, the Savior’s Body and Blood.’” (Early Christian Doctrines, 440)
“From the Church’s early days, the Fathers referred to Christ’s presence in the Eucharist. Kelly writes: ‘Ignatius roundly declares that . . . [t]he bread is the flesh of Jesus, the cup his blood. Clearly he intends this realism to be taken strictly, for he makes it the basis of his argument against the Docetists’ denial of the reality of Christ’s body. . . . Irenaeus teaches that the bread and wine are really the Lord’s body and blood. His witness is, indeed, all the more impressive because he produces it quite incidentally while refuting the Gnostic and Docetic rejection of the Lord’s real humanity.’” (ibid., 197–98)
"Hippolytus speaks of ‘the Body and the Blood’ through which the Church is saved, and Tertullian regularly describes the bread as ‘the Lord’s body.’ The converted pagan, he remarks, ‘feeds on the richness of the Lord’s Body, that is, on the Eucharist.’ The realism of his theology comes to light in the argument, based on the intimate relation of body and soul, that just as in Baptism the body is washed with water so that the soul may be cleansed, so in the Eucharist ‘the flesh feeds upon Christ’s Body and Blood so that the soul may be filled with God.’ Clearly his assumption is that the Savior’s Body and Blood are as real as the Baptismal Water. Cyprian’s attitude is similar. Lapsed Christians who claim Communion without doing penance, he declares, ‘do violence to His Body and Blood, a sin more heinous against the Lord with their hands and mouths than when they denied him.’ Later he expatiates on the terrifying consequences of profaning the Sacrament, and the stories he tells confirm that he took the Real Presence literally." (ibid., 211–12) St. Justin Martyr
"We call this food Eucharist, and no one else is permitted to partake of it, except one who believes our teaching to be true and who has been washed in the washing which is for the remission of sins and for regeneration [i.e., has received Baptism] and is thereby living as Christ enjoined. For not as common bread nor 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 nurtured, is both the Flesh and the Blood of that incarnated Jesus." (First Apology 66 [A.D. 151]) St. Augustine of Hippo
"What you see is the Bread and the Chalice; that is what your own eyes report to you. But what your Faith obliges you to accept is that the Bread is the Body of Christ and the Chalice is the Blood of Christ. This has been said very briefly, which may perhaps be sufficient for Faith; yet Faith does not desire instruction." (ibid., 272) St. Ambrose of Milan
"Perhaps you may be saying, ‘I see something else; how can you assure me that I am receiving the Body of Christ?’ It but remains for us to prove it. And how many are the examples we might use!... Christ is in that Sacrament, because it is the Body of Christ." (The Mysteries 9:50, 58 [A.D. 390]) (taken from www.catholic.com)
Through the intercession of Mary, the Mother of the Eucharist, St. Joseph, St. Michael, and St. Paul, may God bless our parishes, our Archdiocese and all the Faithful throughout the world with heartfelt Faith in the Holy Eucharist!
In Christ through Mary,
Fr. Kasel