The real light that led me to my Catholic home was the doctrine of transubstantiation–the change of the substance of the bread and wine into the substance of the body and blood of Our Lord at the consecration in the Mass. That is the doctrine which has proved a stumbling block and a rock of offence to so many souls. It has been mocked, derided and denounced by so many of the wise men of the world, as unreasonable, unphilosophical, a denial of the evidence of the senses and as altogether preposterous, yet it was that doctrine that landed me in the bosom of the Church. And, where, you will ask, did I, being a Protestant at the time, get that doctrine from? The answer, perhaps, will prove still more of a puzzle. My thanks for the doctrine are due to the Episcopal Book of Common Prayer, the Old and New Testaments and, it is humbly believed and trusted, to the grace of God...

One morning, after receiving Communion–it was no sacrament, but God's mercy, I solemnly believe, sent a special grace with it–a light, like a flash from Heaven, burst upon my poor soul. It was like the sun suddenly beaming through a rift in the dark storm cloud. It was no miracle, but it was a distinctive grace. It could have been nothing else. Instantly the whole doctrine of the Incarnation in all its offices and functions bearing upon man's fall and his redemption and sanctification opened to my perception. The absolute necessity, in the scheme of salvation, for the literal interpretation of our Lord's words in the sixth chapter of S. John seemed irrefutable to me, and justified beyond cavil the doctrine of the Catholic Church as to transubstantiation.

Roads to Rome
William Markoe