A parishioner shared this great anecdote with me: The great Flannery O’Connor, at a New York dinner party, responded thus when one of the other guests opined that the Eucharist was a symbol empty of religious truth:  “If it’s a symbol, to hell with that.”  She later said:  “That was all the defense I was capable of but I realize now that this is all I will ever be able to say about it, outside of a story, except that it is the center of existence for me; all the rest of life is expendable.”