The theme of this reading is the differences between a secular view of the ritual of the Christian communion and the Christian explanation. The secular view presents the idea that by partaking in communion, a Christian is doing a cannabillistic act. Since Christians refer to the bread and juice as the body and the blood of Christ, they take the reference as a literal translation. The actual Christian preactice, as explained by Hippolytus refers to The Last Supper when Christ broke bread and offered wine and called them his body and his blood.
The idea that, from a secular point of view, the eucharist could be seen as cannabilism is something that I had never considered before. Because of that, that whole idea stood out to me. Coming from a Christian perspective, the fact that anyone would think of the eucharist as cannabilism strikes me as slightly abusurd. But by trying to see it as someone who is not a part of the Christian faith and hears communion being called "the body and the blood," I guess I could partialy see where someone would get that idea.
This reading presents the idea of how an outsider could easily mistake a figurative comparison as a literal translation. This idea may be new to most Christians because they only see the eucharist through the lens of their faith. Becuase of this, many Christians might be shocked by the realization that a non-Christian might view communion as people taking part in eating the body of an individual and by drinking that individual's blood.
A modern parallel to this article could be non-Islamic people mistaking all people of the Islamic faith as being violent indivuals. Non-Islamic people make this assumption based on the few Islamic extremists that do use violence to express their view of their faith. In reality however, not all Islamists are violent just as Christians are not cannibals.
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