Even when Jesus' words are simple and clear, they are too deep and encompassing to be understood by those who refuse to open up to the possibilities.
At this meeting with his disciples, he took the most basic elements of everyday life and said that every time these were consumed to do it in his remembrance. He said it was he that was being taken in and converted to our self, our life. He meant that, as being one with the "Father", he was in all and everything, too. Remembering that was what was important.
Religion reduced his words to benign, regulated, formulaic nonsense that separated people from the message rather than transmitting it. The hocus-pocus of bread and wine turning into meat and blood is not only asking people to believe the unbelievable, it is a perversion of what was intended. The importance is much more humble and, at the same time, much more embracing and extensive. Every time one takes sustenance into oneself, one is ingesting Jesus, the nourishment from the "Father", directly.
Of course, that takes intercessors out of the picture, and that doesn't work for those who wish to control and manipulate.