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Comment by CodeAndCuffs | Hacker News Reader

Ironically, I think every single one of these is in the bible. ...Maybe not cannibalism.

2 Kings 6 24And it came to pass after this, that Benhadad king of Syria gathered all his host, and went up, and besieged Samaria. 25And there was a great famine in Samaria: and, behold, they besieged it, until an ass's head was sold for fourscore pieces of silver, and the fourth part of a cab of dove's dung for five pieces of silver. 26And as the king of Israel was passing by upon the wall, there cried a woman unto him, saying, Help, my lord, O king. 27And he said, If the LORD do not help thee, whence shall I help thee? out of the barnfloor, or out of the winepress? 28And the king said unto her, What aileth thee? And she answered, This woman said unto me, Give thy son, that we may eat him to day, and we will eat my son to morrow. 29So we boiled my son, and did eat him: and I said unto her on the next day, Give thy son, that we may eat him: and she hath hid her son. 30And it came to pass, when the king heard the words of the woman, that he rent his clothes; and he passed by upon the wall, and the people looked, and, behold, he had sackcloth within upon his flesh. 31Then he said, God do so and more also to me, if the head of Elisha the son of Shaphat shall stand on him this day.

Cannibalism is symbolically re-enacted by practicing Christians every Sunday, when they literally eat the body of Christ at the end of mass.

Figuratively eat, unless you are a Catholic, who believe they literally eat the body of Christ (transubstantiation).

I'm a Protestant, but that explanation of transubstantiation may be the popular understanding but is not the actual official doctrine of the Catholic Church. I'm not versed enough to explain it except by way of terrible analogy to software development - everyone knows what Agile is, but no one really knows what Agile is, and once you start to read the Agile Manifesto and think deeply, you realize that.

I'm a Protestant, but that explanation of transubstantiation may be the popular understanding but is not the actual official doctrine of the Catholic Church.

I was raised a Catholic, I believe doctrine changed at some time, maybe Vatican II? I remember being told as a child (a long time ago :) not to eat some time before communion.

Maybe that's obsolete now.

The Catholic Church (and the bible they started from) effectively say everything and its opposite, depending on which argument is convenient at any particular time. They've been debating (and training to debate) these subjects for more than a thousand years. The only official doctrine, in practice, is that they are Right at all times, no matter what the topic might be.

I wouldn't really characterize the Catholic Church's official doctrines that way or that flexibly, but again, I am a Protestant with a number of overall disagreements with them and less personal experience with them, and it is easy for me to read your post as someone with much more personal experience. And since HN isn't really the best place for extended religious discussions, if you are interested for any reason, my email is always open.

See below, from https://thejesuitpost.org/2023/04/catholic-101-transubstanti... This seems clear enough to me, and can be summed up by saying that Catholics believe that they are literally eating the body of Christ.

... “transubstantiation” refers to a change in which the substance of a thing—what it really is—changes, while its physical characteristics do not. Of course, this sort of change only occurs in the Eucharist, which, though it appears to remain bread and wine throughout the Mass, nevertheless truly becomes the flesh and blood of Jesus.

I took your using the word literally to mean you were saying that the physical characteristics changed, which is apparently not what you were saying.

I think this is a difference in language expectations, because when and where I grew up, some Protestants thought that Catholics believed either that the physical characteristics of the Eucharist changed during the blessing or consumption of the Eucharist, which your link seems to demonstrate to me that you are not agreeing with.

> unless you are a Catholic

The Lutherans would like a word.

It’s figurative in most sects I believe. Catholics take it literally

Isn't one of the sacraments a little bit cannibalistic?

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