As the Coronavirus continues to wreak havoc on our nation's most vulnerable, donations for blood transfusions are in high demand. Particularly in Madison, which now has the most cases of any Big Ten school, medical professionals are asking healthy people to do what they can to help their community.
It’s not just individuals doing their part though. Organized religion has a long legacy of helping sick and vulnerable people during times of crisis, and that's exactly what St. Paul’s Catholic Church is doing. They have generously donated all of the communion wine they have in storage to be used for blood transfusions. We sat down with Father Fitzgerald to find out more about this interesting move.
“Father, with all due respect, why donate wine to a hospital when they desperately need blood?”
The priest looked at me like he was confused for a moment before responding.
“Catholic doctrine is quite clear on the issue of transubstantiation, once the wine is blessed, it becomes the blood of Christ himself. I see no reason why it wouldn’t work in a blood transfusion.”
“Ok,” I said, “let's assume for a second that I don’t have any objections to pumping sick people full of alcohol. How do we even know what blood type Jesus has?”
“Well this isn’t an area the church has delved into that much,” said Fitzgerlad, “but I would argue that because Christ’s message is universal, and can be received by all those who accept it, his blood would be O negative, the universal donor.”
“Well, it certainly seems like you’ve given this a lot of thought. Thank you for your time, father.”
About five hours after we finished up our interview, we got word from the university hospital that eleven patients had already died of alcohol poisoning following blood transfusions.
Well, the blood of Christ may not have treated their COVID, but it looks like they’ll be meeting their lord and savior a lot sooner than expected!