Saturday of the Twenty-fourth Week in Ordinary Time
Did you ever wonder why it is that in the Apostles’ Creed that we confess belief in the resurrection of the body? Isn’t it enough to say that there is resurrection? Why is “of the body” so important that it is part of the oldest baptismal formula that we have, used in first-century Rome? There are at least three ways in which this prepositional phrase, “of the body,” makes a huge difference for Christians.
First, bodily resurrection says something about the nature of communal bodies (as in “a body of people”). We exist only in relationship to others. There are always others that brought us into existence, others that comfort and hurt us, others that befriend and bruise us. So too with the Church. We who “pledge allegiance” to Jesus Christ in our Baptism and by saying the creed, are made into His Body, the Body of Christ, the Church. Indeed, if we were baptized as infants other members of the Body even spoke for us at Baptism. Yet, the Church isn’t only bound by space and time. This Body includes those who have died and are now living in Heaven with God. Therefore, the Church is also called the Communion of Saints.
Second, resurrection of the body lends importance to fleshly bodies themselves. Unlike many forms of disembodied spiritually that have as goal the spirit’s transcending the body, Christians believe that salvation comes through not outside of the body. Bodies are important, even eternally important. This belief is grounded in the centrality of the Incarnation—that in the body of Jesus Christ, God became human. Jesus’ body itself is not unimportant; he was not simply God in a human suit, as an early Church heresy held. He is fully divine and fully human. It was that body of Jesus that healed the bodies of the blind and the lame, that body that suffered on the cross, that body that was resurrected on the third day. We might not be able to describe exactly what our resurrected body will look like, as the Corinthians ask Paul in today’s first reading (1 Cor 15:35) but we do know that, like Jesus, our new life will be bodily. Remember, after Jesus’ resurrection, He still bore his five wounds from his crucifixion; he was clearly not disembodied.
Third, “of the body” directs our attention back to the beginning, to creation and, in so doing, proclaims the importance of the here and now. We notice that part of Paul’s explanation of the resurrected body brings him to a discussion of Adam, the first man (1 Cor 15:45ff.). As Adam was formed from the earth, so too are we. We are called to take this seriously—we are people of the earth, we are called to make our bodies “rich soil,” in the words of today’s gospel (Lk 8:15), so that God’s word might blossom in us into eternal life.
This means that Christians take the work of this earth, what we do with our bodies, as very important for our next life.
A short story will elaborate these points a bit further. Some years ago, there was a gang member in Texas who was convicted to a death sentence. While on death row, he had a conversion to Christianity and dedicated his time there to writing books for children aimed at rescuing them from gang life. When the famous then-governor of Texas was asked about commuting this man’s death sentence, he responded that he was happy about the man’s conversion, because now he’ll go to heaven, but justice says that he must die. This type of response is precisely what Christian emphasis on the body works against. Our salvation cannot be separated from our lives on this earth and justice cannot be served by killing. Such a response must be rejected as tearing apart the spirit and the body, tearing apart life here and life hereafter.
- Tim Gabrielli