20100426 Question: Blood of Christ

2: In Leviticus it says not to drink blood for church rituals and yet Catholics have Jesus's Body and Blood every mass. Why is it consumed if the Bible says it is wrong?

2. That's a really insightful question. I will answer it three ways: 1) The Hebrews believed that the life of the animal was in its blood, so it would lower the human that drank it ("so far as you drink of it, so far shall it separate you from the people" Lev. 17:10), but the life of God (typically referred to as "grace") is specifically what we desire to gain by worthily partaking of Communion (joining together with Jesus the Christ). 2) The Lord's Supper was a transformation of the Passover feast (Exodus 12), where in lieu of a yearling lamb, Jesus offered himself as the Lamb of God (John 1:29) that the Lord Himself shall provide (Gen. 22:8). The Passover necessarily entails the eating of unleavened bread and the drinking of wine, which Jesus says are His Body and His Blood and commands us to take and eat and drink. Given the approbation given later on to consuming what was previously considered unclean (Acts 10:9-16) we can accept the apparent contradiction to have been resolved by the command of the Lord at the Last Supper. 3) There is a difference between Communion and cannibalism. Cannibalism is eating the physical body or blood of someone, wherein each portion consumed reduces the physical quantity remaining. In Communion, we are partaking metaphysically of the Christ's body and blood, that is, it is not a portion of His physical body or blood, but rather, the bread and wine are substantially changed to also be His Body and Blood expressly for the Communion of the people of God.