on. When the bread and wine are transubstantiated, God again becomes flesh and Christ again dies upon the altar. This wonder can be performed only by priests empowered through ordination. . . His first insistence was that the sacrament of the mass must be not magical but mystical. . . He, too, had no mind to subject it to human frailty and would not concede that York-5 he had done so by positing the necessity of faith, since faith is itself a gift from God, but this faith is given by God when, where, and to whom he will and even without the sacrament is efficacious; whereas the reverse is not true, that the sacrament is of efficacy without faith. 'I may be wrong on indulgences,' declared Luther, 'but as to the need for faith diminished the role of the priests who may place awafer in the mouth but cannot engender faith in the heart" (Bainton 107). For Luther, the Holy Eucharist of Lord's supper was really a symbolic act rather than an actual instance of transubstantiation in which the bread and wine actually become the body and blood of Christ. That was a magical aspect to this sacrament which Luther could not accept. According to the Roman Church, the bread and wine may have the appearance of such, but their inner substances have literally become the flesh and blood of Christ. All of this is a literal acceptance of the words of Jesus at the Last Supper: "And as they were eating, Jesus took the bread, and blessed it, and brake it, and gave it to the disciples, and said, Take, eat; this is my body. And he took the cup, and gave thanks, and gave it to them, saying, Drink ye all of it; For this is my blood of the new testament, which is shed for many for the remission of sins" (Matthew 26: 26-28). Luther's view of the communion sacrament was strictly symbolic as is the view of Protestants to this day. However, this idea was heresy so far as the Roman Catholic Church was concerned. The sacramental power of its York-6 priests was no longer ne...
