Ignatius of Antioch on the Real Presence:
"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" (Letter to the Smyrnaeans 6:2-7:1 [A.D. 110]).
". . . and are now ready to obey your bishop and clergy with undivided
minds and to share in the one common breaking of bread – the medicine of immortality, and the sovereign remedy by which we escape death and live in Jesus Christ for evermore" (Letter to the Ephesians 20 [A.D. 110]).
Notice here the date at which Ignatius said this. 110, only 80 years after Christ lived. Ignatius even states it as if it had been a very common and old belief, and in fact it is. All early Christians believe, as the Bible teaches it, in the Real Presence of Jesus Christ in the Eucharist. Communion as a pure symbol is the child of the reformation. Its ironic that Protestants during the Reformation claimed to want to get back to the basics of Christianity, wanted to worship Christ how the earliest Christians did. Yet they go to the Bible, something no Christian had until the 4th Century, and deny the Real Presence, something which every early Christian confessed. So which church is more similar to the early Christians? The Catholic Church of course, but this is because it is the same church.
Pax Tecum
"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" (Letter to the Smyrnaeans 6:2-7:1 [A.D. 110]).
". . . and are now ready to obey your bishop and clergy with undivided
minds and to share in the one common breaking of bread – the medicine of immortality, and the sovereign remedy by which we escape death and live in Jesus Christ for evermore" (Letter to the Ephesians 20 [A.D. 110]).
Notice here the date at which Ignatius said this. 110, only 80 years after Christ lived. Ignatius even states it as if it had been a very common and old belief, and in fact it is. All early Christians believe, as the Bible teaches it, in the Real Presence of Jesus Christ in the Eucharist. Communion as a pure symbol is the child of the reformation. Its ironic that Protestants during the Reformation claimed to want to get back to the basics of Christianity, wanted to worship Christ how the earliest Christians did. Yet they go to the Bible, something no Christian had until the 4th Century, and deny the Real Presence, something which every early Christian confessed. So which church is more similar to the early Christians? The Catholic Church of course, but this is because it is the same church.
Pax Tecum
posted by katholicos | 12:30 PM
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