Abstract

The article points to the Eucharistic theology of Irenaeus of Lyon’s Adversus Haereses (2nd century) as an expression of the lex credendi appropriate to the new formulation of the lex orandi in the oratio super oblata of the Missa «pro custodia creationis». The understanding of the Eucharist in the process that goes from creation to the eschaton through the mystery of Christ; the perspective of ontological continuity with which this process is conceived; the valorization of materiality as me­diation (Eucharistic bread and wine) and destination (the fleshly body of believers) of the salvation offered by Christ: these are the notes of the bishop of Lyon’s thought that form a Eucharistic doctrine appropriate to what the new euchological formula requires. These notes require a criti­cal hermeneutic of the Thomistic doctrine of transubstantiation and its dogmatic reception, which the new formula hardly supports.