I’m guilty of the murder of Jesus; my sin put Him on that Cross. However, I wouldn’t call it murder. Jesus willing accepted the punishment as unjust as it was. He did it out of love.
Yes our Lord laid his life down willingly, but he didn’t force anyone to whip and torture him either. Humans have a free will and they could have set him free, so yes it was murder.
Where did Jesus say He should be taken literally on this issue? Those disciples that left Jesus thought is was literal, no doubt. That doesn’t mean Jesus meant it literally. .
Right here:
John 6, 54 Then Jesus said to them: *Amen, amen *I say unto you: Except you eat the flesh of the Son of man, and drink his blood, you shall not have life in you.
Note: “Amen, Amen” means “truthfully, truthfully”
And here Again:
55 He that eateth my flesh, and drinketh my blood, hath everlasting life: and I will raise him up in the last day.
And here again:
56 For my flesh is meat
indeed: and my blood is drink *indeed. *
“Indeed” means “I’m not kidding folks.”
And here again
57 He that eateth my flesh, and drinketh my blood, abideth in me, and I in him.
And here once more again:
58 As the living Father hath sent me, and I live by the Father; so he that eateth me, the same also shall live by me.
When we read how those who were around him reacted when he said this horrible thing. Then we see that they too understood his meaning, and were shocked! I spent several years in different Protestant evangelical Churches and no one could ever convince me that Jesus didn’t say what he said in John 6. Metaphor is all that the Protestant can come up with and it just doesn’t wash with what Jesus said over and over… The Catholic Church is the only one that gives a logical and truthful interpretation of this.
Where did Paul say we should understand the words of Jesus literally? I remember Paul quoting Jesus. .
I just quoted it before. Here it is again.
1st Cor 10, 16 The chalice of benediction, which we bless, is it not the communion of the blood of Christ? And the bread, which we break, is it not the partaking of the body of the Lord? 17 For we, being many, are one bread, one body, all that partake of one bread
…. He asks the Corinthians: ”Is it not the chalice the communion of the blood of Christ? And The bread… “Is it not the partaking of the body of our Lord?”
No hint of a metaphor here either.
I agree the hand thing wasn’t meant to be literal but to illustrate how sinful sin is. An eye or hand can’t cause us to sin anyway, they only obey our hearts.
I don’t have any evidence that the first apostles (and/or the disciples that stayed with Jesus) took Jesus literally (the Last Supper/bread and wine into the Body and Blood of Jesus).
Well the Church certainly does both in and out of the scriptures. We know that the early Church taught the real presence and the sacramental nature of communion and has never faltered since.