"Unless you eat of the flesh of the Son of Man..."

"How can this man give us his flesh to eat?" wondered the audience for Jesus' long discourse on the "Bread of Life" in John 6. A better question might have been, "Why?" Why such crude and confusing language?  Indeed, it confused its original audience, and the church ever since has put great energy into explaining what the words really mean. Some of the explanations (such as the R.C. Doctrine of Transubstantiation) are cleverly devised, and might succeed in making the gospel language less offensive, at least to devotees of Aristotelian metaphysics.

But maybe it is supposed to be confusing.
Maybe its supposed to be offensive and gross.
Maybe it is supposed to be like the cross: hideous and repulsive, yet translated paradoxically into a symbol of hope.
Maybe it is supposed to be like the whole notion of "God incarnate", the notion of "God-ness" inhabiting human flesh with all its inconveniences, orifices, and vents.
Maybe its supposed to be an invitation into a reality inaccessible to ordinary language, a place under the radar, behind the scenes, and over the top, where eucharistic babble over crackers and wine continues to draw men and women to Christian altars, even after 2000 years of confusion.

Even if we balk at the idea of eating the flesh of the Son of Man, God is less fastidious when it comes to eating us. It seems apparent to me that God "...eats us, swallows us whole as we pose as hunters, crouched in our flimsy deer-blinds, clutching our useless weapons and peering intently into the all consuming wildness all around us."