Communion: Four Ways Christians Understand It

On the night he was betrayed, Jesus took bread, gave thanks, broke it and said 'this is my body, given for you'. Christians have eaten this meal ever since, calling it communion, the Lord's Supper, the Eucharist or the Mass.

The substance of bread and wine becomes Christ's body and blood while the appearances remain. Defined at the Fourth Lateran Council in 1215. The Mass makes present the one sacrifice of Christ; it does not repeat it.

Christ's body and blood are truly present in, with and under bread and wine, which remain bread and wine. Luther held firmly to 'is' while refusing to explain the mechanism.

Calvin taught that Christ's glorified body is in heaven and the Spirit lifts believers to feed on him by faith. Real communion with Christ, genuinely received, without a change in the elements.

Following Zwingli, the bread and cup are symbols of remembrance and proclamation. The Orthodox add a fifth path: a true change confessed as holy mystery and deliberately left undefined.

That Jesus commanded it, that it proclaims his death until he returns, that it unites the church, and that it calls for self-examination and reconciliation first. The disagreement is about how he is present — never about whether the meal matters.