[Pearls Ep. 124: Friday follow-upi
In this week’s Pearls episode we are entering into the mystery of Corpus Christi – the body and blood of Christ. Yesterday we looked at the body of Christ. Today we move to his most precious blood, again with thoughts from Fr. John Hardon:
First Fr Hardon quotes St. Peter – “You know that you were redeemed from the vain manner of life handed down from your fathers, not with perishable things as silver or gold but with the Precious Blood of Christ as the Lamb without blemish and without spot.” Fr. Hardon continues, “Why does Peter identify the Blood of the Lamb of God as “Precious?” Well, it is surely Precious because it is the Blood of no human being. It is the Blood of the living God who took on human nature, capable of shedding His Blood. Why was the Blood of Christ Precious? Because it is the Blood of God who took on human nature in order to be able to suffer and to bleed and, let us add, in order to bleed to death. Why Precious? Because it is the Blood of the living God.”
So much blood throughout history – both the history of the Bible and ribbon of history that continues to unfold ever since. And yet, it can only be solved with more blood? By a savior who had to “bleed to death?” Why so gruesome?
Wasn’t there some other way?
Any other way?
It’s reasonable to ask that question. And it’s a very worthy subject of meditation – “couldn’t God have found another way?“
There are endless depths to plumb on the role of blood and sacrifice in Creation. The stunningly complex role of blood in the design of human beings; Cain’s murder of Abel and the blood that cried out from the ground; the early test of Abraham to sacrifice his son; the blood sacrifices of the Mosaic law; and then Christ’s incarnation and sacrifice – the intermingling of flesh-and-blood and sacrifice and divinity is inextricable in salvation history, and somehow bound up in all of that was the necessity for the offering of Christ’s blood.
But there is one way in which we know for certain no alternative to a blood sacrifice was possible.
How do we know? Because someone else asked that the same question. In a garden. Just before bleeding to death. And so, we reverence the precious blood of that sacrifice every Sunday.
Ending on a different note – we will see on Monday how the blood of Christ “inebriates” us – giving us life and vitality. Stay tuned…
Blessings on your journey with Christ –
Steve and Karen Smith
Interior Life