Why I am a Catholic Part 1:

The Eucharist - Jesus's "Body, blood, Soul and Divinity"

 The great writer and Christian apologetic GK Chesterton (convert to the Catholic faith) once said "The difficulty of explaining "why I am a Catholic" is that there are ten thousand reasons all amounting to one reason: that Catholicism is true." I will not cover here all the beliefs and doctrine of the Catholic faith, that would take forever. But I will tackle four of the biggest issues, The Eucharist (is it symbolic or is it Christ's actual flesh and blood), the protestant belief of Sola-Scriptura (that the bible alone is our sole authority), Salvation and the Catholic Church's teaching on Mary.

After studying and researching what the Catholic Church truly teaches I have come to see that Archbishop Fulton Sheen was completely correct when he said "There are not one hundred people in the United States who hate the Catholic Church, but there are millions who hate what they wrongly perceive the Catholic Church to be."  I saw a blog titled “Almost not Catholic” and laughed to myself because I came very close to buying into some of the anti-catholic beliefs and propaganda and was myself “almost not Catholic.” Even more so, after reading in depth about why the Church teaches what it teaches I have realized that Sheen was also speaking truly when he said "The Catholic Church is like a lion in a cage. You don't need to defend it, you simply need to open the door." 

With all this being said I would like to be very clear hear, I am not trying to attack or be negative towards any Christian denominations, I am simply stating why it is that I have come to believe in the Catholic faith. I have a great respect for my brothers and sisters in Christ that are not a part of the Catholic Church. I just think there are a lot of misconstrued views of Catholicism and many people don't understand why we believe what we believe. I will use scripture, the writings of the first Christians, and quotes from converts to the Catholic faith to make my case. It is my prayer that this will at least allow those who are not Catholic to come to a better understanding and respect for the Catholic faith. 

  I would like to discuss the Eucharist or Communion. Does the bread and wine actually become Jesus Christ's "Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity" as the Catholic Church believes or is it his spiritual presence as Lutherans believe, or is it whatever the person receiving it believes it to be as some Churches teach, or is it purely symbolic as many other Churches believe? This is the problem of Sola Scriptura (The Bible Alone, but I'll talk about this next week) which interpretation is correct. One example of the confusion that followed the reformation is evidenced in Christopher Rasperger’s work published in 1577 titled: 200 Interpretations of the Words: This is My Body. So which definition is the truth? Is there an objective truth? Before I go any further stop reading and open your bible and read John chapter 6 verse 22-70. Seriously stop reading and read those verses. Did you read them? Good. Ok now I know what you're probably thinking, "come on, Jesus spoke in parables and metaphors a lot and this is simply another one. After all Jesus did say "I am the vine," (John 15:5), "I am the door," (John 10:7,9), "I am the good shepherd,"(John 10:11,12), I am the light of the world (John 8:12.) thus when he said "I am the bread of life" (John 6: 35) he was just speaking metaphorically or symbolically." 

This is often an argument presented by Protestants that Jesus wasn't speaking literally. However this argument does not work and here is why. In none of those other cases did the people he was preaching to actually believe he was speaking literally and question how he could actually be a vine or a door or a Sheppard. However in John chapter 6 the Jews listening clearly understood that this time he was not speaking in metaphors and thus asked him "how can this man give us his flesh to eat?"  (John 6:52). Notice in John Chapter 3, when Nicodemus is misunderstanding Jesus teaching on being Born again. He ask "How can I reenter my mothers womb?" In this verse Jesus clarify's his teaching and says "I tell you the truth, no one can enter the kingdom of God unless he is born of water and the Spirit. Flesh gives birth to flesh, but the Spirit gives birth to spirit." Notice in John Chapter 6, Jesus does not clear it up here and say "guys this is just another metaphor or a symbol, you don't actually have to eat my flesh." No Jesus repeats himself even more seriously. "So Jesus said to them, “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.”   This is NOT the language of a symbol or metaphor. In John 6:50-53 we encounter various forms of the Greek verb phago, “eating.” However, after the Jews begin to express incredulity at the idea of eating Christ’s flesh, the language begins to intensify. In verse 54, John begins to use trogo instead of phago. Trogo is a decidedly more graphic term, meaning “to chew on” or to “gnaw on.” 

Or as Archbishop Sheen put it: “Christ words were too literal, and he cleared up too many false interpretations, for any of His hearers to claim that the Eucharist {OR Body and Blood he would give} was a mere symbol, or that it’s effects depended upon the subjective dispositions of the receiver. It was our Lords method whenever someone misunderstood what He said to correct that [wrong] understanding, as He did when Nicodemus thought “born-again” meant reentering his mothers womb. But whenever someone correctly understood what he said, but found fault with it, He repeated what he said. And in this discourse, our Lord repeated five times what he said about His Body and Blood. The full meaning of these words did not become evident until the night before He died. In His last will and testament, he left that which on dying no other man had been able to leave, namely, His Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity, for the entire world.”

 Again another chance arrives for Jesus to clear this up, "Therefore many of His disciples, when they heard this said, “This is a difficult statement; who can listen to it?” (Question: Is this a difficult statement if Jesus is speaking symbolically? No) 61 But Jesus, conscious that His disciples grumbled at this, said to them, “Does this shock you? 62 What then if you see the Son of Man ascending to where He was before? 63 It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh profits nothing; the words that I have spoken to you are spirit and are life...66.

         "Jesus did not say, “My flesh is of no avail.” He said, “The flesh is of no avail.” There is a rather large difference between the two. No one, it is safe to say, would have believed he meant my flesh avails nothing because he just spent a good portion of this same discourse telling us that his flesh would be “given for the life of the world” (Jn 6:51, cf. 50-58). So to what was he referring?The flesh is a New Testament term often used to describe human nature apart from God’s grace. For example, Christ said to the apostles in the Garden of Gethsemane, “Watch and pray that you may not enter into temptation; the spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak” (Mk 14:38)." (Catholic Answers)

    As Catholic Apologetic Tim Hollingsworth put it; "In spite of Christ's warning, some of his disciples chose to walk away. Christ's warning is no less clear today. "The flesh is of no avail!" Your eyes will see bread. Your tongue will taste wine. Your nose will smell the alcohol. Your intellect cannot grasp what I am about to fully reveal on the night before I am to die for your sins, when I take bread in my sacred hands and break it so that you may always have me present and accessible. Your faculties of reason cannot understand the miracle - the turning of bread and wine into my flesh and blood - that will be performed in every nation, from the rising of the sun to its setting, at the hands of my priests until I come again in glory" (Hollingsworth, 2011). 

            Now here again protestants argue that "the words I have spoken are spirit and life" means that Jesus was speaking symbolically. "Jesus very clearly states that his words (about the Eucharist) are "Spirit and life." The English word spirit comes from the Latin word spiritus which literally means "breath."The word "Spirit" appears in 58 books, 288 chapters, 509 verses and a total of 556 times in the New American Bible.Nowhere in scripture is the word "Spirit" used as a synonym for the word "Symbolic." As John Martignoni of the Bible Christians Society says, we don't pray to the Father, Son and Holy Symbolic" (Hollingsworth, 2011).

            "As a result of this, many disciples returned to their former way of life and no longer accompanied him" Had these disciples mistaken the meaning of Jesus' words, Jesus would surely have known and corrected them. He didn't. In no other place in scripture do people actually leave Jesus due to some doctrinal teaching. And these weren't just followers who simply were listening to him preach and said alright I am going home. These were his disciples who had left everything and given up everything to follow Him. And now because of this one teaching they decided I am no longer going to follow Him. They had clearly understood his meaning--Jesus' flesh was to be really eaten; His blood to be really drunk.

             That is why when Jesus turns to the original twelve disciples and says "Do you also want to leave?"(what a statement, like saying "hey guys...if you can't accept this you can leave too..because its true.") Peter doesn't respond, "No I get it Jesus, Transubstantiation; the physical elements remain but the substance is changed....makes perfect sense." Peter doesn't pretend to understand the Sacred mystery but he believes none the less and responds with "Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life."

 Another argument that Protestants often make is that in the book of Leviticus God forbids people to drink blood. Leviticus 17:14 says, “Since the life of every living body is its blood, I have told the Israelites: You shall not partake of the blood of any meat. Since the life of every living body is its blood, anyone who partakes of it shall be cut off.”  They say God would be contradicting himself by requiring us to drink His blood. In the Old Testament God makes it clear that we are not to drink blood because it is “the life of every living body.”  So for the exact same reason people were forbidden to drink it in the Old Testament we are now required to drink His Blood in the New Testament, Jesus wants His life inside us! How awesome is that! Christ says in John 6 "So Jesus said to them, “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.”  

And he took bread, gave thanks and broke it, and gave it to them, saying, "This is my body given for you; do this in remembrance of me." the same way, after the supper he took the cup, saying, "This cup is the new covenant in my blood, which is poured out for you. - Luke 22: 19-20

Then they told what had happened on the road, and how he was known to them in the breaking of the bread. - Luke 24:35

 ^(Jesus explained the whole scripture to the disciples but they failed to identify Jesus. Jesus walked with them but they still failed to recognize him. Their eyes were closed even though they heard the word of God and its interpretation from Jesus himself. Jesus walked with them but they were still foolish and ignorant about the person of Jesus. Until He was made “known to them in the breaking of the bread.” The word Known that is used there is the Hebrew word Yada. It’s a personal and intimate knowledge, not to just to know about something or to know a fact but to intimately and personally know something or someone. In the Eucharist we have Yada with Christ.)

Is not the cup of blessing which we bless a sharing in the blood of Christ? Is not the bread which we break a sharing in the body of Christ? - 1 Corinthians 10:16

Behold, I stand at the door, and knock, if anyone hears My voice, and opens the door, I will come into him, and will eat with him, and he with Me. - Revelations 3:20

  

            Further more the early Church fathers supported this belief in the real presence. Here are just a few examples (there are MANY more). This was such a strongly held belief that the first Christians were actually accused of and persecuted for being cannibals because they truly believed the Eucharist was indeed Jesus Christ's Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity. St. Ignatius was actually taught by the apostle John and was martyred for his faith in Christ. (Also note the dates when these were written)

"Let that Eucharist be held valid which is offered by the bishop or by the one to whom the bishop has committed this charge. Wherever the bishop appears, there let the people be; as wherever Jesus Christ is, there is the Catholic Church."

- St. Ignatius, Epistle to the Romans, 7, 110 A.D.

"Consider how contrary to the mind of God are the heterodox in regard to the grace of God which has come to us. They have no regard for charity, none for the widow, the orphan, the oppressed, none for the man in prison, the hungry or the thirsty. They abstain from the Eucharist and from prayer, because they do not admit that the Eucharist is the flesh of our Savior Jesus Christ, the flesh which suffered for our sins and which the Father, in His graciousness, raised from the dead." - St Ignatius, Letter to the Smyrnaeans", paragraph 6. circa 80-110 A.D.

"I have no taste for corruptible food nor for the pleasures of this life. I desire the bread of God, which is the flesh of Jesus Christ, who was of the seed of David; and for drink I desire his blood, which is love incorruptible" - St. Ignatius (Letter to the Romans 7:3 [A.D. 110]).

"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" St. Justin the Martyr (First Apology 66 [A.D. 151]).

“He has declared the cup, a part of creation, to be His own Blood, from which He causes our blood to flow; and the bread, a part of creation, He has established as His own Body, from which He gives increase to our bodies.” - St. Irenaeus 180 A.D.

"The stem of the vine takes root in the earth and eventually bears fruit, and 'the grain of wheat falls into the earth' (Jn. 12:24), dissolves, rises again, multiplied by the all-containing Spirit of God, and finally after skilled processing, is put to human use. These two then receive the Word of God and become the Eucharist, which is the Body and Blood of Christ."

-St. Irenaeus circa 180 A.D.

"Since Christ Himself has said, "This is My Body" who shall dare to doubt that It is His Body." - St. Cyril of Jerusalem (300 A.D.)"

"Be convinced that this is not what nature has formed, but what the blessing has consecrated. The power of the blessing prevails over that of nature, because by the blessing nature itself is changed. . . . Could not Christ's word, which can make from nothing what did not exist, change existing things into what they were not before? It is no less a feat to give things their original nature than to change their nature." - St. Ambrose (391 A.D.)

"It is not the power of man which makes what is put before us the Body and Blood of Christ, but the power of Christ Himself who was crucified for us. The priest standing there in the place of Christ says these words but their power and grace are from God. 'This is My Body,' he says, and these words transform what lies before him."

-  St. John Chrysostom, "Homilies on the Treachery of Judas" 1,6; d. 407 A.D.:

"I promised you [new Christians], who have now been baptized, a sermon in which I would explain the sacrament of the Lord’s Table. . . . That bread which you see on the altar, having been sanctified by the word of God, is the body of Christ. That chalice, or rather, what is in that chalice, having been sanctified by the word of God, is the blood of Christ"  - St. Augustine (Sermons 227 [A.D. 411])

Martin Luther Himself said this about the Real Presence of Jesus Christ. 

        "Who, but the devil, has granted such license of wresting the words of the holy Scripture? Who ever read in the Scriptures, that 'my body' is the same as 'the sign of my body'? or, that 'is' is the same as 'it signifies'? What language in the world ever spoke so? It is only then the devil, that imposes upon us by these fanatical men. Not one of the Fathers of the Church, though so numerous, ever spoke as the Sacramentarians: not one of them ever said, It is only bread and wine; or, the body and blood of Christ is not there present. Surely, it is not credible, nor possible, since they often speak, and repeat their sentiments, that they should never (if they thought so) not so much as once, say, or let slip these words: It is bread only; or the body of Christ is not there, especially it being of great importance, that men should not be deceived. Certainly, in so many Fathers, and in so many writings, the negative might at least be found in one of them, had they thought the body and blood of Christ were not really present: but they are all of them unanimous.”

~Luther’s Collected Works, Wittenburg Edition, no. 7 p, 391

            A protestant historian of the early Church J.N.D. Kelly (Anglican) 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." I cannot get over the unanimous testimony of the early Christians.  A convert to the Catholic faith once said; "To be deep in church history is to cease to be protestant."Cardinal Henry Newman after studying the writings and beliefs of the first Christians realized that he could no longer remain Protestant. The early Christians, as a body, believed that the holy mysteries upon the altar did become the flesh and blood of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.  And so do I. The way I see it, Christ loves us too much to say "This is how much I love you, here is a symbol of my love." No, "this is how much I love you, I give you my very self."


I'll close with a line from the Catechism: 

1336. "The first announcement of the Eucharist divided the disciples, just as the announcement of the Passion scandalized them: 'This is a hard saying; who can listen to it?' [Jn 6:60 .] The Eucharist and the Cross are stumbling blocks. It is the same mystery and it never ceases to be an occasion of division.  'Will you also go away?': [Jn 6:67 .] the Lord's question echoes through the ages, as a loving invitation to discover that only he has 'the words of eternal life' [In 6:68.] and that to receive in faith the gift of his Eucharist is to receive the Lord himself."

If this wasn’t convincing, Scott Hahn’s article; “The Fourth Cup” below is really good! Scott Hahn was a former Presbyterian minister and ardent anti-Catholic who after studying the Church teachings converted to Catholicism. (his testimony can be found in the book, Rome Sweet Home) 

The Fourth Cup - Scott Hahn

Citation:

Tim Hollingworth's blog that I cited a twice:

http://timhollingworth.blogspot.com/2011/01/spirit-and-life-symbolic-communion-or.html