How To Explain Eating The Flesh and Blood Of Christ To A 7 Year Old

I received this question via Twitter:

@CauseofourJoy @stumpthepriest A 7 yo is afraid he is ‘eating Jesus’ when he receives Holy Communion. What do we tell him?

I have heard this question before- not just from 7 year olds, but from adults who can’t understand the idea of eating the Flesh and Blood of Jesus Christ without the idea of cannabalism coming to their minds.  In some way, if someone doesn’t understand what is going on, I can understand how that might happen.

First, let’s just briefly talk about a couple of things.  First, let’s go to the Old Testament, and the night of the Passover.  The Egyptions had enslaved the Jews for some time, and after a series of plagues that only served to harden the heart of pharoah, God commanded the people through Moses and Aaron to have the people cook break without leaven (so it would be done quicker) and to prepare an unblemished lamb, putting its blood on the door posts and lintel of the house, and eating the flesh of the lamb.  This lamb’s blood on the door posts and lintel (an image of the cross which is also a vertical and horizontal arrangement of wood) would tell the angel of death to “pass over” the house, and spare the first born sons.  The Egyptians were not so lucky, of course.  The flesh of the lamb and the bread gave them strength for the journey ahead.  They literally ate the flesh of the lamb that saved them.

Fast forward to the Passover Supper the night before Jesus died- they are celebrating a re-presentation of that same night- there is lamb meat on the table, there is unleavened bread and wine (which would have also been at the first Passover).  The same thing happens this time- the blood of the lamb will be put on the new doorway of the cross, and all who believe will be passed over by death.  Jesus even takes the bread and says it is his body and the wine and says it is his blood- the first Mass.  He didn’t say he was speaking figuratively, and in John 6 he is emphatic about them eating his flesh and drinking his blood- he wasn’t being analogous, since he repeated himself about 6 times in that gospel passage.  Paul, in 1 Cor 11 also indicates that the belief of the early Christians is that this was his body and blood.  So, in the same way, we eat the flesh of the lamb that saves us.

It is nicer to say flesh of the lamb here, since we are not equating it with another human being.  The early church (and I would argue the modern church) has been persecuted for the idea that the bread and the wine become the actual Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity of Christ.  Nero used it as one of the excuses for persecuting Christians for the first time when he burned down Rome.

In effect, we are “eating Jesus,” since we believe that the Eucharist is what He said it is.  But in another sense, eating the Eucharist is a sign for us of radical unity.  What better way to unite something with ourselves than to eat it.  It literally becomes part of us.  I like to think about the Eucharist in these terms rather than the literal idea that we are eating his flesh and drinking his blood.  But in reality, that IS what we are doing.

Now, this is hard enough to comprehend for us adults who have some experience with life and have fully formed brains that can understand the nuances of thins kind of theology.  So how do you explain it to a 7 year old?

Again, you have to put it into terms that they understand, and won’t get confused with.  You can explain the nuances as they get older.  So what I usually do for the children is to say that receiving the Eucharist is like being hugged tightly by Jesus.  So tightly that you can’t tell where Jesus stops and I begin.  He loves us an embraces us in the Eucharist so that we feel His love for us, and we become a part of Him.  He is really there, embracing us inside and out, body, mind, and spirit.

I think when I explain it this way, it doesn’t detract from the fact that Jesus is really there, Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity- but at the same time it can explain what the Eucharist does for us while not tripping the mind of a 7 year old who might not be able to grasp what is going on in the Eucharist when we talk about eating flesh and drinking blood.  I have to be frank, the idea of being wholly and “holy” (ha! get it?) by the Eucharist, that is by Jesus Christ Himself that he pulls us into His Heart is comforting for this 34 year old priest, too.

7 year olds are not alone- remember what happened to Jesus when he said it in John 6- the people who he fed, as well as some of his closest followers left him because the didn’t understand what he was saying.  He even asked Peter if he would leave Him- and for once Peter gets it right (I always say he has foot in mouth disease in the Gospels) and he replies: “Lord, where would we go?  You have the words of eternal life.”