Nice to see that the voices have given you insight at a greater level of understanding and much quicker than us. A distinct advantage, I suppose. Yes it is...As an example, you'll notice that not a single Catholic on this thread has been able to expound on the verse I posted...I guess that's because your church avoids that little bit of scripture like the plague...No one can respond because they haven't been told what to think/believe... The verse says Jesus Christ is in you (as a Christian)...The 'real presense'... Why would I need to get the real presense of Jesus for 20 minutes a week by drinking some wine and eating some bread when the bible says I have the real presense 24/7/365??? I realize that may be offensive to some of you folks but I didn't write it...God had Paul the apostle write it... Your church can twist it and turn it anyway they want but at some point, someone's going to say, "Hold on here...These Protestants can back up what they say with scripture"... Our Church has invested two millennia in furthering our understanding of God. Really??? God says don't build statues of ANYONE...But your church convinced you that God didn't mean it??? Look at it this way...If I lose my bible, I have memorized enough of God's word in my heart/mind to know I am saved... Job 22:22 Receive, I pray thee, the law from his mouth, and lay up his words in thine heart. So what if you lose your rosary??? What if your church burns to the ground??? What if you lose your missal and all of your priests quit with no one to consecrate your wine and bread??? What if the pope dies and he's not replaced??? Where's your religion then???
Sorry, which verse? I'm afraid I've lost track of which ones apply to which mistaken philosophy.
It is entirely Biblical to eat His Body and drink His Blood. In fact, it is unBiblical not to do so:
John 6:48-64
48 I am the bread of life.
49 Your ancestors ate the manna in the desert, but they died;
50 this is the bread that comes down from heaven so that one may eat it and not die.
51 I am the living bread that came down from heaven; whoever eats this bread will live forever; and the bread that I will give is my flesh for the life of the world."
52 The Jews quarreled among themselves, saying, "How can this man give us (his) flesh to eat?"
53 Jesus said to them, "Amen, amen, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you do not have life within you.
54 Whoever eats 19 my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him on the last day.
55 For my flesh is true food, and my blood is true drink.
56 Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood remains in me and I in him.
57 Just as the living Father sent me and I have life because of the Father, so also the one who feeds on me will have life because of me.
58 This is the bread that came down from heaven. Unlike your ancestors who ate and still died, whoever eats this bread will live forever."
59 These things he said while teaching in the synagogue in Capernaum.
60 20 Then many of his disciples who were listening said, "This saying is hard; who can accept it?"
61 Since Jesus knew that his disciples were murmuring about this, he said to them, "Does this shock you?
62 What if you were to see the Son of Man ascending to where he was before?
63 It is the spirit that gives life, while the flesh 22 is of no avail. The words I have spoken to you are spirit and life.
64 But there are some of you who do not believe."
It really is hard. You must believe: whoever believes will have eternal life. But you must do more than believe. He must act. And act by His rules, not yours. If you do not eat His Body and drink His Blood, then you shall not live.
You cannot merely be saved by memorizing Scripture. The scribes and the Pharisees did that. That is why I call non-Catholicism so poor and lacking.
If you do not eat His Body and drink His Blood, then you shall not live. I'm intrigued with two questions.
If the ritual of bread and wine is not symbolic, why then did not Jesus not cut off a piece of His flesh and drain some of His blood to give to His disciples? He was right there with them.
And, regarding extrascriptual, "oral tradition" of the Catholic church. We all agree in the four Gospels as written, as the Word, as divinely inspired, as true.
Then would it be reasonable to assume that any extrascriptual policies and dogma must not depart or conflict with the guidance, principles and specific instructions of Jesus from the Gospels as written testifying to His words?
