.....sacrament of the Eucharist epitomizes the concept of transubstantiation, in which the spirit and presence of Christ is revealed to believers in the recognizable and tangible form. God's transcendence becomes God's immanence, thereby initiating a process of spiritual transformation. As Cooke (1994) points out, the Eucharist sacrament must also take place within a community, allowing each individual to perceive Christ through other believers. The importance of community is embedded within the ritual of the Eucharist because it is an act of sacred communion -- implying community, gathering, and communication. Therefore, the concept of the Eucharist is rooted in the act of sharing, on one level Jesus sharing His body with the people and on another level the community sharing the Word with each other. Moreover, the Eucharist represents "the message of human life redeemed and transformed by the power of God working through the death and resurrection of Jesus the Christ," (Cook, 1994, p. 96). Consuming the ritual sacrament allows the believer to internalize Christ in a potent way.As a mystical ritual, the Eucharist can be interpreted and understood from multiple perspectives. The elements of Eucharistic Communing that Cooke (1994) identifies includes the gathering...
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