Ancient Quotes Support the Catholic Teaching on the Eucharist
The Eucharist is central to the faith life of the Christian believer and has been so since the very beginning. There is no subject we have more information about than this. Jesus is the Lamb of God, come to take away the sins of the world. The thing was, the Old Testament prefigured this when a perfect, spotless lamb was roasted and eaten by the Jews. This prefiguring is perfect because Jesus commands his followers that "unless you eat of the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood, you have no life in you." It doesn't get much clearer than that. If this wasn't meant literally, then in the episode in John 6, Jesus would have explained His teaching by some other means because the Jews quarrelled with one another, "How can this man give us his flesh to eat?" This is significant because if this is something we need to partake in for life, how can one live outside this when the sacrament is so readily available to those who are at Mass? And what about those who are not even Catholic? In a practical sense, one cannot live the fulness of the Christian faith without "eating the flesh...and drinking His blood."
Scripture
Acts 2:42
John 6:25-71
Malachi 1:1-11
1 Corinthians 10:1-33
1 Corinthians 11:17-34
Tradition (Writings of those who came before us)
St. Hilary 350 A.D.
St. Clement 96 A.D.
St. Ignatius of Antioch 106 A.D.
Didache (Teaching of the Apostles) 75 A.D.
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