text: No I won't keep that in mind, Pandora, without full context. I can think of multiple understanding of the Eucharist in our historical past that I would expect you to reject as heterodox. Proclamation of the "reality" of  Christ in the Eucharist has multiple expressions of meaning depending on one's philosophical understanding of reality. Transubstantiation presupposes Aristotelianism, and that is not part of revelation in anyone's accounting.
  
  But more to the point, historical wisdom about our Catholic past is not confined to orthodox Christians, however one defines orthodoxy. Bart Erdman, for instance, is a biblical scholar who has long given up the Chirstian faith, but he is still a helpful read if one wants to enter more deeply into the mentality of those who first read the NT.