[Dwan W.]

Why is it that most Christians see cannibalism as primitive and taboo when Christianity’s most major rite is symbolic of cannibalism (communion being based on the eating of flesh and drinking of blood)?

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Name : Dwan W., Gender : M, Sexual Orientation : Straight, Race : Black/African American, Age : 27, City : Tallahassee, State : FL, Country : United States, Education level : Over 4 Years of College, 

[Dan27306]

The flesh aspect is in remembrance of His body that was broken for us (whipped, beaten, brutalized, finally crucified) and the blood aspect is in remembrance of the blood He shed on our behalf. Certain denominations teach that when the elements are taken in they transfigure into Christ’s actual flesh and blood, but most people take that as far too literal an interpretation (and one that overlooks what else the Word says). Communion is commemoration, not a rite of cannibalism.

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Name : Dan27306, Gender : M, Race : Hispanic/Latino (may be any race), Religion : Pentecostal, Age : 21, City : Los Angeles area, State : CA, Country : United States, Education level : 2 Years of College, Social class : Lower middle class, 

[Augustine23386]

Christians who believe that Christ is present in the Eucharist (Roman Catholics, Orthodox, Anglicans and Lutherans, though these groups disagree over exactly what this means) are following the most literal interpretation possible of the words of Christ: ‘Unless you eat the flesh and drink the blood of the Son of Man, you will not have life in you.’ Basically we’re following orders. Keep in mind, also, that eating human flesh and drinking human blood were even more repulsive to Jews of that era than it would be to us, were such a thing possible. It took blind, naked faith, total trust, for the Apostles to stay with Jesus even though He said this, just as it takes total faith and trust for Eucharistic Christians to believe today that bread and wine truly become the Son of God. I don’t understand it but I believe it. God in Christ becomes part of me, and I become part of God in Christ, when I receive Him in Holy Communion.

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Name : Augustine23386, Gender : M, Race : White/Caucasian, Religion : Catholic, Age : 39, City : Columbia, State : SC, Country : United States, Education level : Over 4 Years of College, Social class : Middle class, 

[L-Wilson26166]

The question is, no matter how smybolic this is, why is this seen as primative or taboo when another culture literally does this? I think there is a little bit of hypocrisy in this.

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Name : L-Wilson26166, City : Tallahassee, State : FL, Country : United States, 

[Kevin26320]

The sacrifice on the cross was a replacement for former sacrifices that took place in Judaism. Judaism had been moving away from the idea of sacrificing animals in the centuries leading up to Jesus; most sacrificing was limited to rituals for feeding the priest caste, who couldn’t raise their own food. The significance of the rememberance of communion established that Jesus had been sacrificed to God for man, and therefore animals no longer needed to be sacrificed to God at all; Jesus had trumped them. It wasn’t a reinforcement of sacrifice, but a rejection of all other forms of sacrifice but the symbolic sacrifice of communion. Whether the flesh and blood is symbolic or actually BECOMES the flesh and blood of Christ during communion is an important theological question; Roman Catholicism teaches that the bread and wine transmutates and becomes the flesh and blood of Christ. Martin Luther proposed that the bread and wine was bread and wine AND the flesh and blood of Christ at the same time, a concept known by the term consubstantiation. Most other Protestant religions merely see the bread and wine as being symbolic, no change takes place. The rejection of sacrifice also allowed the early Church, which was viewed as a small Jewish splinter group, to distance itself from Orthodox Judaism and establish its own identity as a separate religion.

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Name : Kevin26320, Gender : M, City : Austin, State : TX, Country : United States, Social class : Middle class, 

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