The Real Presence

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In scripture about the Real Presence it says that Jesus is literally and fully in the body, kind, soul, divinity in the Eucharist through the bread and wine. This doctrine is often attacked by Evangelical and Fundamentalists because they feel that it is unbiblical.

The early Church Father interpreted these reading literally. A summary stated by J. N. D. Kelly about Christ’s real presence said,  "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.”

From the beginning of the Church the Church Fathers discussed and taught about Christ's presence in the Holy Eucharist. Kelly wrote also wrote, "Ignatius roundly declares that . . . [t]he bread is the flesh of Jesus, the cup his blood. Clearly he intends this realism to be taken strictly, for he makes it the basis of his argument against the Docetists’ denial of the reality of Christ’s body. . . . Irenaeus teaches that the bread and wine are really the Lord’s body and blood. His witness is, indeed, all the more impressive because he produces it quite incidentally while refuting the Gnostic and Docetic rejection of the Lord’s real humanity."

He then states, "Hippolytus speaks of ‘the body and the blood’ through which the Church is saved, and Tertullian regularly describes the bread as ‘the Lord’s body.’ The converted pagan, he remarks, ‘feeds on the richness of the Lord’s body, that is, on the Eucharist.’ The realism of his theology comes to light in the argument, based on the intimate relation of body and soul, that just as in baptism the body is washed with water so that the soul may be cleansed, so in the Eucharist ‘the flesh feeds upon Christ’s body and blood so that the soul may be filled with God.’ Clearly his assumption is that the Savior’s body and blood are as real as the baptismal water. Cyprian’s attitude is similar. Lapsed Christians who claim communion without doing penance, he declares, ‘do violence to his body and blood, a sin more heinous against the Lord with their hands and mouths than when they denied him.’ Later he expatiates on the terrifying consequences of profaning the sacrament, and the stories he tells confirm that he took the Real Presence literally"

Also big people and events that defined The Real Presence were Ignatius of Antioch, Justin Martyr, Irenaeus, Clement of Alexandria, Tertullian, Hippolytus, Origen, Cyprian of Carthage, Council of Nicaea I, Aphraahat the Persian Sage, Cyril of Jerusalem, Ambrose of Milan, Theodore of Mopsuestia, Augustine, Council of Ephesus.