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At the risk of annoying my friends, this is something that we are close to each other’s stance on. All foods ARE clean, and the admonition against blood has to do with ritual idol worship that was common at the time and was warned against in the same way that eating foods sacrificed to idols was warned against.

We have our differences of course, such as the exact nature of the Body and Blood of Christ and whether the nature of the bread and wine remains present alongside or is done away with entirely.

How does a Lutheran understand the statement that the life is in the blood? The admonitions given in the first books of Moses say to not eat the blood 'for the life is in the blood'. That goes further than merely admonition against eating food sacrificed to idols, eh?

And an additional note: if you can get the Life of God in you by eating the confection, why insist that the ritual be repeated so often? My understanding of the Life of God is that it is eternal, not teporary.

(MHG) The Word of God, that God is SPIRIT, not some confection your cult priests can feed to you at a pagan altar after some mumbo jumbo magic incantation supposedly brings Jesus from the Throne room to your altars, as if your priest commands GOD! Your cult is the most pagan evidence of the spirit of antichrtist and you are lost to it!

Thats a bit excessive, don't you think?

And I have not employed John 6 at all... yet
- or the early Church Fathers who wrote about the Eucharist.
Below I will draw a comparison to see if your Catholic-Pagan-cult theory has validity.

All foods ARE clean, and the admonition against blood has to do with ritual idol worship that was common at the time and was warned against in the same way that eating foods sacrificed to idols was warned against.

OK- I get all that. Now square it up.
Ironically, todays first Mass reading is exactly that, Acts 15.
A warning to the gentiles (always read Pagan worshipper when you see gentile - though there were Atheists around as well, even then) As decided by the Council- with all in agreement.:

It is my judgment, therefore, that we ought to stop troubling the Gentiles who turn to God, but tell them by letter to avoid pollution from idols, unlawful marriage, the meat of strangled animals, and blood.

the decree Paul and Barnabas will carry actually is this:

29 You are to abstain from food sacrificed to idols, from blood, from the meat of strangled animals and from sexual immorality.
You will do well to avoid these things.
Farewell

OK. The point I am belaboring here is that St. Paul was very well attuned to the Pagan influences he was converting - and knew their ways needed to be replaced with Christian ones. It was important enough for him to travel all the way to Jerusalem to be part of this first Church Council.
4-5 years later, writing to the Corinthians.. he's dealing with similar behavioral issues.
Paul, chastising, reminds those crazy Corinthians that the Lord's Supper is not for party time.
He then recites for them - which IS one of the Traditions he handed down to them -
The Last Supper words of Christ- THAT CHRIST GAVE TO St.Paul:

23 For I have received of the Lord that which also I delivered
unto you, that the Lord Jesus,
the same night in which he was betrayed, took bread.

24 And giving thanks,
(NOT MUMBO JUMBO Incantation- but Giving Thanks to God)
broke, and said: Take ye, and eat:
this is my body, which shall be delivered for you:
this do for the commemoration of me.

25 In like manner also the chalice, after he had supped, saying: This chalice is the new testament in my blood: this do ye, as often as you shall drink, for the commemoration of me.

26 For as often as you shall eat this bread, and drink the chalice, you shall shew the death of the Lord, until he come.

Then he explains the condemnation the casue from their unworthy actions in approaching the Lord's supper.

So much so .. he says - if your just hungry- Eat at Home !!!

34 If any man be hungry, let him eat at home; that you come not together unto judgment.

So if you have been following along- knowing what you do about Paul's presence at the Council - his dislike for practicing Pagan customs, his dislike for not revering the Lord's Supper to the point they condemn themselves... through all this-

SO I HAVE TO ASK... just one question - just one...
Do you really think St. Paul thought of the Eucharist as just a pagan ritual-that is deserving of the derision from you, that has been practiced in the Catholic Church through its entire existence?