Richard Dawkins: Catholic Belief in the Eucharist Is ‘Madness’
11 Apr 2021
Professional atheist Richard Dawkins went after Catholics on Sunday, insisting belief in the Eucharist as Christ’s body and blood is “madness.”
“Roman Catholics are required to believe that communion wine actually is literally the blood of Christ, and the wafer literally is his body,” Dawkins wrote on Twitter.
“Not symbolically but literally. Not a metaphor but literally,” he added. “That way madness lies. At very least it’s a pernicious abuse of language.”
Dawkins, the author of
The God Delusion, seemed to take comfort in saying that most Catholics “don’t believe the official dogma,” namely “… the entire substance of the bread and the entire substance of the wine are converted respectively into the Body and Blood of Christ in such a way that ‘only the appearances of bread and wine remain’.”