EUCHARISTIC MIRACLES: WHEN FAITH MEETS SCIENCE:
THE THEOLOGY OF JESUS'S BLOOD TYPE
I am often told that Religion has no place in science. Oddly enough, science has not only formed my faith; science has sealed my Faith.
Most Christians have heard of the Shroud of Turin, the ancient relic that bears the image of a crucified male. Blood typing has been done on the Shroud, and it was determined that the crucified male, who many believe to be Jesus of Nazareth, has AB blood.
A lesser know relic is the Sudarium of Oviedo, the cloth, that tradition teaches, covered the face of Jesus before He was wrapped in a burial shroud and laid in the tomb. The blood on this cloth is also from a male and also Type AB.
There has also been several miracles where a consecrated Host miraculously became true flesh and began to bleed true blood.
One such miracle occurred in the 8th century.
A priest in Lanciano, Italy was doubting the real presence in the Eucharist while offering Mass, when suddenly the Eucharist miraculously turned into human flesh and blood.
Similarly, 500 years after the miracle of Lanciano, another priest, in Orvieto, Italy, who was also doubting the real presence of Jesus, similarly experienced a Eucharistic miracle where the host started bleeding all over his corporal (a cloth used in the liturgy).
You can still see the cloth on display in the Cathedral of Orvieto and the non-decomposing flesh and blood in the Church of San Francesco today.
MIRACLE OF BUENOS AIRES
More recently, in 1996, another Eucharistic miracle occurred in Buenos Aires, Argentina when a consecrated Host was found on the ground and placed in a glass of water to dissolve, as is custom.
Days later, the Eucharist hadn’t dissolved at all — it had, however, turned into bloody Flesh.
The Cardinal and then-Bishop Jorge Bergoglio (now Pope Francis) had a photograph taken of the bloody Host, then stored the Host in a tabernacle to decompose.
Three years later, that same bloody Flesh remained!
That’s when Dr. Ricardo Castañón, a Bolivian neurophysiologist, was called in to have samples from the Host examined in a laboratory environment.
Doctor Castañón took it to the San Francisco Forensic Institute without telling anyone there what it was or where it came from. After testing, he was told the samples constituted heart muscle, specifically from the myocardium of the left ventricle.
Further, the tests showed the blood was human, with human DNA, and of the AB type — the same as found on the Shroud of Turin and the Sudarium of Oviedo. Upon further investigation, he also discovered the Host from the miracle of Lanciano was Blood Type AB, as well!
Coincidence? Maybe?
But consider this: Blood Types were not discovered until 1900. The discovery of Blood Type AB came along seven years later, in 1907. Maybe because it’s so rare? Only four-percent of the World population has Blood Type AB.
Well, here’s where it gets interesting…
WHERE SCIENCE AND THEOLOGY MERGE
The Eucharist is the sacrament of communion with one another in the one body of Christ, writes Rev. Dr. Stany Antony OMI. This, he continued, was the full meaning of eucharistic koinonia in the early Church.
Scriptures appears to be in agreement.
St. Paul tells us in 1 Cor 10:16-17 that we just don’t participate in the Eucharist, we are in communion in the blood of Christ. “…nonne communicatio sanguinis?” as it is written in the Latin Vulgate; κοινωνία or koinonia in Greek.
Early Church Father and Orator, St. John Chrysostom (c. 349 – 407) commenting on Paul’s words, — almost 1500 years before the discovery of blood types — said this:
The bread which we break, is it not a communion of the Body of Christ? Wherefore said he not, the participation? Because he intended to express something more and to point out how close was the union: in that we communicate not only by participating and partaking, but also by being united. For as that body is united to Christ, so also are we united to Him by this bread. (Homily 24 on First Corinthians: 4)
In 1485, more than 400 years before the classification of blood based on the presence and absence of antibodies, St. Thomas Aquinas wrote, “…the Eucharist is the sacrament of the unity of the Church, which results from the fact that many are one in Christ”.
In 1566, almost 300 years before science established the ABO Blood Group System, the Church had this to say about the Eucharist:
“For what bread and wine are to the body, the Eucharist is to the health and delight of the soul, but in a higher and better way. This Sacrament is not, like bread and wine, changed into our substance; but we are, in some wise, changed into its nature, so that we may well apply here the words of St. Augustine: I am the food of the frown. Grow and thou shalt eat Me; nor shalt thou change Me into thee, as thy bodily food, but thou shalt be changed into Me.”
In other words, “by this sacrament we unite ourselves to Christ, who makes us sharers in his Body and Blood to form a single body.” (Cathecism 1331).
Or simply put, “He that eateth my flesh, and drinketh my blood, abideth in me and I in you” (John 6:56)
So, what’s this have to do with Blood Typing?
You see, I, like many, once believed that Jesus’ Body and Blood just enters our body during Holy Communion. However, if that was the true theology of the Eucharist, Jesus’ divine Blood Type could be not AB.
Why ?
Because theologically if Jesus’ Blood just enters us, He would be simply donating His sacred blood to all.
Science has shown that only Universal Donors can give blood to all without any harm to the recipient; only people with Blood Type O. However, with Blood Type O, one could not receive blood from any other type, but their own.
The Church has always taught that during Holy Communion we unite with The Body of Christ.
Simply put, Jesus receives us all, body and soul, and unites us all, body and soul, in Him — and by all bodies, I mean all blood types.
Christ is therefore the Universal Acceptor, theologically and biologically. Anyone who took High School Biology knows blood type of the universal acceptor.
That blood type is … AB Blood.
If the Shroud of Turin is a fake, how would the forgers get Jesus’ Blood Type theologically correct — centuries before science knew blood type existed?
Further, if these Eucharistic miracles were also all staged, how would all these Blood Types not just match, but also coincide theologically and biologically?
Coincidence ?
Maybe, but the odds would favor coincidence to favor the most popular Blood Type.
Approximately, 47% of Italians have Blood Type O, while less than 4% share AB. In Argentina, where the most recent miracle took place, half the population is Blood Type O. [note]
When you include Rh factors, the statistic of chance is almost eliminated.
Rh factor was discovered after the discovery of Blood Types — 40 years after! Only five percent of the world population is AB-positive … the same Blood Type in the Eucharistic miracles in Buenos Aires and Lanciano — miracles which occurred 1,300 years apart.
The science is clear — and because it’s clear, my Faith is sealed.
