That is an ancient saying going back to primitive times when people believed that the character of a lion could be conveyed to a human by eating lion, that wisdom could come to one who ingested the meat of an owl. And certainly, in some sense, we are what we intake. Ingesting unhealthy food, drinking too much liquor, taking drugs -- these things can end up defining us, with the substance replacing who we really are.
In our reading from I Corinthians tonight, Saint Paul assures us that the very essence of Christ is con- veyed in the Eucharist, so that we can in time, by God's grace, be transformed into His likeness. Paul also warns us that we commit sacrilege when we receive the Eucharist without acknowledging that the elements are the Body and Blood of the Risen Christ, under the appearances of bread and wine. es He actually goes so far as to say that such sacrilege towards the Sacrament has led to illness and death!
We call it a Mystery -- a reality beyond our scientific understanding, beyond our sensory abilities to defect, yet received by faith and validated by its results in the lives of the faithful. Unlike some others, the Romans and Lutherans, we do not seek to scientifically define exactly when and how the Christ a becomes truly present in the Sacrament. We rather accept and believe it, and live into its reality as the core of our common life.
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