Description
In this in-depth study, Fr. O’Connor lets the breadth and richness of the Church’s Tradition speak for itself. He presents and comments on substantial excerpts from the major sources of the Church’s Tradition extending all the way back to apostolic times. Focusing on the doctrine of the Real Presence, he follows the earliest witnesses through the challenge in the Middle Ages of Berengarius to the Protestant Reformation and modern disputes.
Both historically and theologically, the author treats the Real Presence, Transubstantiation, the Eucharist as pledge and foretaste of heaven, as sacrifice, as the Sacrament of Sacraments. He also shows the relationship between the Eucharist and the Church and the Eucharist and Our Lady. The great theologians and Fathers of the Church that O’Connor draws upon include St. Ignatius of Antioch, St. Justin Martyr, St. Irenaeus, St. Jerome, St. Augustine, St. John Chrysostom, St. Ambrose, St. Thomas Aquinas, Duns Scotus, Paul VI, and John Paul II.
“This book is nothing less than a comprehensive study of the Church’s meditation on the Mystery of the Eucharist from the first centuries to our own times. The Hidden Manna is a superb work.”
Ignatius Press, 1988. Softcover, 376 pp.
