THE EUCHARIST FROM BORN FUNDAMENTALIST, BORN AGAIN CATHOLIC
BY DAVID M CURRIE
Catholics say bread and wine turn into the body and blood of Jesus during the Mass which is the same sacrifice as the cross of Jesus.
In an examination of his book, I wrote that as it is enough to show the Catholic clergy has no authority, but has misappropriated it, to convince that its claims about the Mass are suspect and possibly downright false.
CURRIE SAYS, At the last supper had Jesus meant to teach Lutheranism, that
the Eucharist contains the body of Christ but does not become it, he would have
said, "This bread contains my body" or evangelicalism he would have said, "This
bread represents my body" but he said it was his body so that is what it is
(page 35).
THE TRUTH: Too bad Jesus couldn't use symbolism with people trying to read too
much into it. The Bible never gives any hint that Jesus meant this literally.
The Calvinists say, "This is my body," over bread without believing it becomes
the body of Jesus and we don't say they should be saying, "This represents my
body". So when they can do it why not Jesus?
And even if the Catholics are right it doesn’t prove their doctrine of
transubstantiation to be true. Luther seems to have believed at times not that
the substance of the bread turned into Jesus but that Jesus made the bread a
part of him like your fingernail is part of you. This theory is called
incarnationism.
CURRIE SAYS, Jesus' saying we must eat his body and drink his blood took place
near Passover time just about a year before Jesus celebrated the last supper.
This was to indicate that what would happen at the supper would be
transformation of bread and wine into the body and blood of Jesus (page 35).
THE TRUTH: Evidences like that are so weak that they are useless. The crowd were
not at the last supper so there is no value in the books reasoning.
CURRIE SAYS, Jesus saying he was the bread of life was just an analogy. He says
he will give this bread as his flesh for us to eat and that it is the same flesh
that will be nailed to the cross (page 37). If the flesh we are to eat is
figurative so is the flesh for the crucifixion (page 38). Jesus physically died
on the cross so we physically eat his body.
THE TRUTH: The discourse never mentions that Jesus will die or become a
sacrifice. The Roman Catholic faith teaches that it is Jesus' body and blood as
they are now in their supernaturalised and resurrected state that is the
Eucharist. So there is no need for Jesus to be dead or have been dead to feed us
with his body and let us drink his blood.
He says his flesh will be given up for the life of the world which does not
amount to saying he will be crucified or sacrificed.
He told the Jews that they cannot be saved unless they eat his body and drink
his blood. If you take the passage literally then take this literally too. It
was spoken to Jewish people who would mostly never become Christians. It is
likely that none of them would when they all went away because of Jesus’ silly
talk. If you are a missionary you do not tell you hearers to go to communion to
be saved for they cannot do that unless they are believe repent and are baptised
first. You give them the minimum. You certainly do not suggest anything that
will puzzle them like yarns about food and drink becoming God or a man. The way
Jesus spoke shows the passage is not literally true. When Jesus came close to
teaching the Roman doctrine in this passage and retreated it shows only one
thing: he does not want us to believe in it and it is blasphemous.
Eating the body of Jesus is a synonym for believing and drinking his blood is a
synonym for accepting the suffering and love he offered to God to atone to him
for sins.
CURRIE SAYS, The eating of flesh is literal for Jesus used the word chew for eat
(page 38). This word was never used symbolically anywhere.
THE TRUTH: Any word can be used symbolically - that is what symbols mean: using
words that are literal in a non-literal way! So he never used it symbolically
anywhere you say! Jesus never wrote cookery books so what would you expect?
He would have to use the word chew in a literal context elsewhere so that we
would be able to tell he meant it all literally according to the books logic.
But he didn't so what does that say?
CURRIE SAYS, He who eats the bread without discerning the body eats judgment to
himself 1 Cor 11) so this is clearly saying that we must see that the bread is
the body of the Lord (page 39).
THE TRUTH: There were heretics around who didn’t believe Jesus was a man but
thought that he was a vision. Paul could have meant without discerning that
Jesus had a body not that the bread was the body. Paul would have written he who
eats the bread without discerning that it is the body had he believed the bread
turns into Jesus.
Discerning the body could also mean that the substance of the body of the Lord
is fed to the soul of those who take the bread without it being in the bread. It
could mean that the body of the Lord is spiritually fed to the eater of the
bread which means eating the bread is as good as eating the body though the
substance of the body is not eaten or given to the soul.
CURRIE SAYS, Satan worshipers parody the Mass because they know there is
something in it and that Jesus established it as the centre of Christian life
(page 45).
THE TRUTH: The Eucharist is the ritual at the heart of Christianity and
naturally anti-Christians would parody it. Nearly all Satan worshippers believe
that Christianity is superstitious nonsense. The use of real wafers consecrated
at Masses is rare which illustrates the point. Their use is not an essential.
Would Satanists believe that there is power in having the real body of God on
the altar and desecrating it? If they believed it was God they would know that
he would thwart them every time!
Spiritualist mediums do more to convince their flocks that they commune with the
dead than priests ever do that Jesus becomes the communion wafer and yet they
encourage the flock to disbelieve in mediums! It is frightening that people
would believe the priests so easily and it is bigoted how they encourage it. The
mediums have more right to the respect the priest demands. They are more
believable in every way.
CURRIE SAYS, Melchizidek was said to be a priest forever and he offered bread
and wine to God. Jesus was called by God a priest like Melchizidek so he offered
bread and wine to God at the last supper (page 47).
THE TRUTH: Jesus did not offer bread and wine at the last supper - he just used
them. How could you offer God created things? He owns them to start with and has
no need of them. It would be a bizarre and eccentric thing to do. Melchizidek
brought out bread and wine to Abraham for he was priest of God the Bible tells
us. That does not mean he offered them to God.
CURRIE SAYS, Hebrews 10:3 and Leviticus 24:7 use the word remembrance to mean
sacrifice so when Jesus said at the last supper do this in remembrance of me he
meant offer this sacrifice for me (page 47).
THE TRUTH: Hebrews only says there is a reminder of sin in the sacrifices which
does not mean that sacrifice and remembrance are necessarily inseparable.
Remembrance and sacrifice are two separate activities. Jesus lived in different
times from Leviticus and different times use words differently. Worse Leviticus
was written in Hebrew and the gospels were written in Greek and worse again
Jesus had been speaking in Aramaic! So there is no reason to believe the words
for remembrance mean sacrifice as well.
CURRIE SAYS, The sacrifice of the Mass and the food and drink being literally
the body and blood of Jesus Christ were unanimously believed in by the early
Christians (49).
THE TRUTH: We know the early Christians had many divisions and we have barely
any statements that show the Church believed what this book says and yet it says
that the early Church was Roman Catholic in its eucharistic theology.