“They can no longer die, for they are like angels”
Is the body good and the soul bad? Is our life a battle: body vs. soul? Why does what we do “in the body” during our life effect what happens to our soul after we die? What happens and will happen to our soul when we die? What does the soul do for the body and what does the body do for the soul? The soul animates the body, without the soul, the body is dead. The soul enables us to think and to act, our reason and our free will. It is the body that physically manifests our thoughts and our will. Our soul enables us to live, subsist and move. “Each individual soul will be reunited with the selfsame body with which it was united on earth. While all the dead will rise, only the just will have their bodies glorified”[i] Our bodies are good and we should want our bodies back. The bodies of the unjust will not be glorified, while the bodies of the just will rise again and will be glorified. What a blessing to have a glorified body, a perfect body, with no suffering or death, which are both effects of original sin. The relationship between the body and soul is not a protagonist vs. antagonist relationship; it is a partnership. Through both our body and soul we “work out our salvation”[ii] by grace, through faith and acted out in charity[iii]. The body and soul struggle together and thus gain victory together and receive the same reward. “Our bodies will rise from the dead in order to share with our souls in the eternal reward we merited during our stay on earth. Our final resurrection will also complete the victory of Christ over death that He began on Easter Sunday. With Him we shall be able to say, ‘Death is swallowed up in victory. Death, where is your victory? Death, where is your sting?’ (I Corinthians 15:54-55)”[iv]
MUSIC – “Christ Is Risen - Matt Maher - as performed by LifeChurch.tv”
Pay close attention to the spoken word portion of the song that comes around marker 2:50. Death does not just happen at the end of our life but we are in the midst of the culture of death, tempted and effected by the thief who comes only to steal, kill, and destroy. We can only overcome death through Jesus Christ. Only through Jesus Christ can we have life to the full and say, “O Death where is your sting, where is your victory.”
2 Corinthians 5:6-10 - “So we are always courageous, although we know that while we are at home in the body we are away from the Lord, for we walk by faith, not by sight. Yet we are courageous, and we would rather leave the body and go home to the Lord. Therefore, we aspire to please him, whether we are at home or away. For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each one may receive recompense, according to what he did in the body, whether good or evil.”
Why is there the desire to sometimes “leave the body and go home to the Lord”? What is it about our body that sometimes makes life difficult both physically and spiritually? The three enemies we face our whole life is the devil, the world and the flesh. “The term ‘flesh’ refers to humanity in its state of weakness and mortality. The resurrection of the flesh is the literal formulation in the Apostles Creed for the resurrection of the body.”[v] The “flesh” is not just the body but “humanity in its state of weakness”, this is also called concupiscence. “In consequence of original sin human nature, without being totally corrupted, is wounded in its natural powers. It is subjected to ignorance, to suffering, and to the dominion of death and is inclined toward sin. This inclination is called concupiscence.”[vi] We are wounded in both body and soul. Our body is subject to suffering and death, our soul, which is our intellect and will, is subject to ignorance. Tertullian says that the flesh is the hinge of salvation. “We believe in God the Creator of the flesh; we believe in the Word made flesh in order to redeem flesh; and we believe in the resurrection of flesh which is the fulfillment of both creation and the redemption of the flesh.”[vii] Catholics like flesh, God created it, God became it, and God redeems it. Yes, the flesh (concupiscence) is our enemy, an enemy we must be aware of, but we must see flesh in the positive. We must allow our flesh to be redeemed daily.
The fact that the body will be resurrected and the flesh redeemed tells us that neither the body nor the flesh is a permanent enemy, but rather, that our body is fallen and is able to be redeemed. The fact is that “the flesh, our own corrupt inclinations and passions, which are the most dangerous of all our enemies”[viii] will tend toward corruption unless it is redeemed. Saint Francis of Assisi nicknamed his body “ass” because the body is like a stubborn donkey that does what it wants and must be disciplined. Our battle is to daily allow God to redeem us body and soul and with the Grace to direct our inclination and our passion to the honor and glory of God. This is why Saint Paul says, “So whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do everything for the glory of God.”[ix]
The flesh is not like our other enemies - the devil and the world. The devil is damned and will not be redeemed, the devil has no hope, but rather is determined only to “steal, kill and destroy”[x] The world is not a part of us, the falsehoods and vanities of the world are temptations from without. Jesus says we are in the world but not of the world. The flesh (our humanity in its state of weakness) is not an enemy from without, but rather from within, and therefore we are at battle with our own corrupt inclinations and passions. Our inclinations and passions are by our sinful nature, disordered. A life of Grace is the process of ordering and directing our inclinations and passions toward God instead of toward our self and away from God. Through the grace of God we can refuse to rebel as the fallen angels and as our parents Adam and Eve did in the garden. Within the heart and mind of each Christian the rebellion against God can end. The resurrection is victory, the proof, that order and redemption of our body is a reality. We are not a soul, trapped in a body, but rather a body and soul together longing for redemption. Our body and soul, as the communion antiphon states, needs to “be lead to peaceful waters” and to “rest in green pastures”. “Faith in the resurrection of Jesus says that there is a future for every human being; the cry for unending life which is a part of the person is indeed answered. God exists: that is the real message of Easter. Anyone who even begins to grasp what this means also knows what it means to be redeemed.”[xi]
What was Jesus’s resurrected body able to do? “Jesus’s resurrected Body can no longer suffer or die. Jesus physical body entered the upper room in Jerusalem through closed doors; He ascended into Heaven in body at the command of His will; and he is the most beautiful object of bodily vision now beheld by the angels and saints.”[xii] The resurrected physical body of Jesus is present in only two places: Heaven and in the Most Blessed Sacrament. What a privilege and joy that the God we serve and worship is real, so real that He has a body with a heart that beats for us. His physical body awaits us in heaven, but also awaits us in the nearest tabernacle. We can literally, go to our Lord, in the presence of His physically body and pray, “May the Heart of Jesus, in the Most Blessed Sacrament, be praised, adored, and loved with grateful affection, at every moment, in all the tabernacles of the world, even to the end of time.”[xiii] It is Jesus who waits for us in every tabernacle, many times that tabernacle, is only miles, only minutes from us. “When you approach the tabernacle remember that he has been waiting for you for twenty centuries.”[xiv]
CHANT – “Adoremus in Aeternum - Gregorian Chant (Catholic Hymns)”
Lyrics in English: "We will adore for eternity the most holy Sacrament. Praise the Lord, all ye nations: praise Him all ye peoples. Because his mercy is confirmed upon us: and the truth of the Lord remains forever. Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Ghost: As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end. Amen. We will adore for eternity the most holy Sacrament. Praise the Lord, all ye nations: praise Him all ye peoples." As mentioned in this lesson Jesus Christ is physically present in two places in the universe, in heaven and in the Blessed Sacrament. This chant says that we will adore for eternity the most holy Sacrament. Is this true? We now adore the Blessed Sacrament on earth in the liturgy and in every tabernacle in the world, but we will adore the Blessed Sacrament in heaven for all eternity? The following are the words of a priest from the archdiocese of Cardiff. “I won’t need to adore the Blessed Sacrament when I get to heaven, but I am looking forward to enjoying Jesus face-to-face for the rest of eternity. There is continuity between the one I now adore in the form of the Eucharistic Presence and the one I will adore face-to-face, so think I can say to him while he is the Blessed Sacrament that I will love him forever. If a fiancé said “I will love my girlfriend for ever”, who would dare say to him: “You are wrong, because you will no longer love your girlfriend when she becomes your wife!”[xv]
What happens to the master will also happen to the servant. When we say, “I believe in the resurrection of the Body” what we are professing is that what happened to our master will also happen to us. We are a part of the Mystical Body of Christ. “The term, ‘body,’ when referring to the Church, derives its meaning from the analogy used by St. Paul, where he speaks of Christians: ‘You are the Body of Christ, member for member’ (1 Corinthians 12:27), and of Christ: ‘the Head of His Body, the Church’ (Colossians 1:18).”[xvi]
What happened to the Head of the Body of Christ? The head suffered, died and resurrected but the members have not. The members of Body are still suffering, have yet to die and await with hope and confidence a bodily resurrection, so that the members may attain, what the head has attained. If we are the Body of Christ, we must know that all that happened to the head of the Body of Christ will also happen to the members of the Body of Christ. We cannot have the resurrection without having the passion and death. If the head of the Body was mocked, spit on, bruised and crucified, so to should the members expect to experience what the head experienced? The head (Jesus) speaks lovingly to the members (Church) when he says, “If the world hates you, know that it has hated me before it hated you.”[xvii] We have hope, not despair, because we proclaim at each Mass the mystery of our Faith, “We proclaim your death, O Lord, and profess your Resurrection until you come again.”[xviii] In this proclamation, we are proclaiming our own death but also our own resurrection, when Christ comes again.
Are we to be the same persons after our resurrection? Yes, although we are greatly changed for the better in our glorified state, we shall remain essentially the same after the resurrection. We retain our own personal identity.[xix] What are some examples in life in which a person is the same person but completely changed by an event or circumstance in life? One example is when someone has a baby for the first time. They are the exact same person, but are greatly changed by God for having been given this great responsibility to raise a child.
What are the qualities of the risen body? The qualities of the risen body are, immunity from death and pain, freedom from restraint by matter, obedience to spirit with relation to movement and space, and extraordinary beauty of the soul manifested in the body.[xx]
Our risen body will be perfect. In the middle ages the discussion was brought up as to what age the resurrected body would be. Saint Thomas Aquinas and others held the theory that the resurrected body would be the earthly body at its prime, perhaps the age of 19 to 21. There is also the belief that babies who are aborted, those who are miscarried, and infants who die at a young age, will receive the body they would have had. Those who die at an old age will receive the body they had, when their body was at its prime. In a world in which bodily image is everything, you would think a resurrected body would be welcomed.
St. Cyril of Jerusalem said, “Man is the divine masterpiece, made in the image and likeness of his Creator, gifted with an immortal soul by divine gift.” In a society which believes and follows humanism and materialism (man and matter is the measure of all things), we focus on man as body, not as body and soul united. List or name as many magazines, billboards, advertisements, TV stations focused on the body. List or name as many magazines, billboards, advertisements, TV stations focused on the soul. Our society is fixated on the body, but ignores the soul.
VIDEO – Mr. Olympia 1975
There are contests between bodybuilding, modeling, and plenty of other competitions that look to the body.
Our body is on loan; it is given to us by God and will return to God. “The body is the Lords! Your body is your own. The media has a bad plan to drag u down to the zipper zone!”[xxi] In the midst of food, sex, tattoos, glamour and all other material goods which adorn and satisfy our body, we can forget the words of Saint Paul, who says, “Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, which you have from God?”[xxii] From the time of one the first apostles, Paul to Pope John Paul II the importance of controlling the body and keeping the body holy has been stressed. “Purity, as the virtue, that is, the capacity of ‘controlling one’s body in holiness and honour’ (1 Thess 4:4), together with the gift of piety, as the fruit of the dwelling of the Holy Spirit in the ‘temple’ of the body, bring about in the body such a fullness of dignity in interpersonal relations that God himself is thereby glorified. Purity is the glory of the human body before God. It is God’s glory in the human body, through which masculinity and femininity are manifested.”[xxiii]
What gives the most glory of the human body? Do we honestly think tattoos, clothes, accessories, muscles, agility, and intelligence give the most glory to the human body? While some of those things are good, above all purity is the glory of the human body before God.
How do we stain our body? How do we remove the stain(s)? If we have become impure we can go to reconciliation and clean our body, take a spiritual shower. “Respect your body since it is your good fortune to be a temple of the Holy Spirit. Do not stain your body… and if perchance you have stained it, purify it right away through penance. Clean it while you still have time.”[xxiv]
[i] Fr. John Hardon, S.J., Modern Catholic Dictionary; page 466
[ii] Philippians 2:12
[iii] Ephesians 2:8-10
[iv] Fr. John Hardon, S.J., Basic Catholic Catechism Course; page 40
[v] Compendium of the Catechism of the Catholic Church; section 202
[vi] Compendium of the Catechism of the Catholic Church; section 77
[vii] Compendium of the Catechism of the Catholic Church; section 202
[viii] The Penny Catechism
[ix] 1 Corinthians 10:31
[x] John 10:10
[xi] Pope Benedict XVI
[xii] Fr. John Hardon, S.J., Basic Catholic Catechism Course; page 41
[xiii] Taken from the St. Clare of Assisi Transitus and Night Prayer
[xiv] Saint Jose Maria Escriva
[xv] 19 September 2013 by Jeff Ostrowski – Views from the Choir Loft Blog
[xvi] Fr. John Hardon, S.J., Modern Catholic Dictionary; page 366
[xvii] John 15:18
[xviii] The Order of the Mass I
[xix] Fr. John Hardon, S.J., Basic Catholic Catechism Course; page 41
[xx] Fr. John Hardon, S.J., Basic Catholic Catechism Course; page 41
[xxi] Fr. Stan Fortuna, CFR
[xxii] 1 Corinthians 6:19
[xxiii] Pope John Paul II, Address of March 18, 1981
[xxiv] St. Cyril of Jerusalem, Catechesis, IV, 25