Common Objections to the Eucharist and How to Answer

Common Objections to the Eucharist and How to Answer

Objection: How can the Eucharist be the Body and Blood of Christ? It still looks and tastes like bread and wine? 

HOW TO ANSWER 

• Transubstantiation: the substance changes, but the accidents remain the same. 

• Substance: A substance is a thing you can point to and say, “That’s a ____.” (For example, a chair.) 

• Accidents: the characteristics of a substance: size, color, material, etc. 

In the Eucharist, the bread and wine change into a different substance, the Body and Blood of Christ. But all the accidents of bread and wine stay exactly the same – the look, the size, and the taste. 

St. Ambrose: “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.” (Catechism of the Catholic Church 1375)

Objection: Jesus was speaking symbolically about the Eucharist. 

HOW TO ANSWER 

Part 1: What the first Christians taught 

St. Paul, New Testament 

 “The cup of blessing which we bless, is it not a participation in the blood of Christ? The bread which we break, is it not a participation in the body of Christ?” (1 Corinthians 10:16).

 “For I received from the Lord what I also delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus on the night he was betrayed, took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it and said, “This is my body which is for you. Do this in remembrance of me.” In the same way also the chalice, after supper, saying, “This chalice is the new covenant in my blood. Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me.”... Whoever, therefore, eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty of profaning the body and blood of the Lord.” (1 Corinthians 11:23- 25, 27)

 St. Ignatius of Antioch, Early Christian bishop 

“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.” (Letter to the Smyrnaeans) 

Part 2: The words of Jesus 

“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 you; he who eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day… He who eats my flesh and drinks my blood abides in me, and I in him.” (John 6:53) 

Non-Catholic objection: Jesus said “It is the Spirit that gives life, the flesh is of no avail.” (John 6:63) But Jesus said, “the flesh” – not “my flesh.”

In Scripture, the words “the flesh” refer to sinful human nature – for example, “The spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak.” (Matthew 26:41) – “While we were living in the flesh, our sinful passions, aroused by the law, were at work in our members to bear fruit for death.” (Romans 7:5)

 “For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit set their minds on the things of the Spirit.” (Romans 8:5)

 “Live by the Spirit, I say, and do not gratify the desires of the flesh. (Galatians 5:16) Jesus asks, “Do you take offense at this?” (John 6:61) instead of “Why are you taking this literally?” 

“After this many of the disciples drew back and no longer walked with him. Jesus said to the Twelve, ‘Will you also go away?” (John 6:61, 66-67)

Objection: If the Eucharist is really Jesus’ body and blood, and you eat and drink it, isn’t that cannibalism? 

HOW TO ANSWER 

No, because his presence is sacramental. A sacrament is a sign that causes what it signifies. “The sacraments are efficacious signs of grace, instituted by Christ and entrusted to the Church, by which divine life is dispensed to us.” (Catechism of the Catholic Church 1131)

 “I am the living bread which came down from heaven; if any one eats of this bread, he will live for ever; and the bread which I shall give for the life of the world is my flesh.” (John 6:51) 

• Cannibalism involves killing. In the Eucharist, Jesus isn’t killed. He’s made present. 

• Cannibalism involves destroying the victim. In the Eucharist, Jesus isn’t destroyed. We’re united to Him by receiving the Eucharist. 

• Cannibalism is bloody. The Eucharist is unbloody. We receive Christ in his whole self, body and blood, in an unbloody manner.

Objection: Catholics re-crucify Jesus again at Mass. 

HOW TO ANSWER 

“The sacrifice of Christ and the sacrifice of the Eucharist are one single sacrifice.” (Catechism of the Catholic Church 1367) 

In the Mass, we “remember” what Jesus did on the Cross, but in a way that makes it present. 

“The Eucharist is the memorial of Christ’s Passover, the making present and the sacramental offering of his unique sacrifice, in the liturgy of the Church which is his Body. In all the Eucharistic Prayers we find after the words of institution a prayer called the anamnesis or memorial.” (Catechism of the Catholic Church 1362) 

“In the sense of Sacred Scripture the memorial is not merely the recollection of past events but the proclamation of the mighty works wrought by God for men. In the liturgical celebration of these events, they become in a certain way present and real.” (Catechism of the Catholic Church 1363) 

The Eucharist is the same sacrifice as the sacrifice of Christ. 

“Because it is the memorial of Christ’s Passover, the Eucharist is also a sacrifice. The sacrificial character of the Eucharist is manifested in the very words of institution: “This is my body which is given for you” and “This cup which is poured out for you is the New Covenant in my blood.” In the Eucharist Christ gives us the very body which he gave up for us on the cross, the very blood which he “poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins.” (Catechism of the Catholic Church 1365)

   - From The Station of the Cross

Pax et bonum