A food capable of making man divine (St. Thomas Aquinas)

   One eats [Christ’s] flesh and drinks his blood in a spiritual way if he is united to him through faith and love, so that one is transformed into him and becomes his member: for this food is not changed into the one who eats it, but it turns the one who takes it into itself, as we see in Augustine, when he says: ‘I am the food of the robust. Grow and you will eat me. Yet you will not change me into yourself, but you will be transformed into me.’ 

   And so this is a food capable of making man divine and inebriating him with divinity. The same is true in reference to the mystical body of Christ, which is only signified (and not contained), if one shares in the unity of the Church. Therefore, one who eats in these ways has eternal life …the unity of the Church is brought about by the Holy Spirit: ‘One body, one Spirit.' 

--St. Thomas Aquinas, 

Commentary on the Gospel of John 

Image source: John August Swanson, Last Supper (2009), with prints available for purchase at: https://johnaugustswanson.com/catalog/last-supper/
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