Tag Archives: God

The Everlasting Life

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Everlasting Life

Harking back for thousands of years to times before the 5th century B.C., even the great Greek historian Herodotus related stories of a fabulous Fountain of Youth, which possessed amazing powers to cure and restore people. It was a reflection of the desire of all mankind to live fully for an indefinite period of time, even forever—everlasting life.  During their elementary school years, many students are introduced to the 16th century explorer, Ponce de  Leon, who unsuccessfully searched for the legendary Fountain of Youth in Florida. Ponce de Leon, as was the case of many explorers before and after him, never discovered the Fountain of Youth. In the modern world of the 21st century, countless numbers of individuals seek youthfulness and long life in magic formulas, mineral concoctions, and anti-aging creams. Mankind will continue to seek an everlasting life as long as man lives… and it will always be disappointed in its search. Yet, mankind may indeed have access to an everlasting life, just not the kind of earthly life it has been seeking.

In fact, mankind has been assured that it will experience everlasting life; God is the guarantor of this assurance.  Yes, God, especially through his Son Jesus Christ, has promised mankind a life that will not end. Jesus confidently assures us, “He who believes in me, though he dies, yet shall he live.” (Jn 11 25)  Pope Benedict XVI noted in his 2nd volume of Jesus of Nazareth, “It is in the encounter with him (Jesus Christ) that we experience the recognition of God that leads to communion and to life….. through with relationship with the one who is life, man to comes alive.” It is not a life as we know it on earth, but rather a divine life, bound with God, a sharing in his divinity. Everlasting life does not begin at our bodily death. Our souls are naturally immortal. Once they are created by God at our conception, they will never end. Our souls have an eternal future. We believe that, provided we die in the state of grace, our souls will share in the very happiness of the God

However, during his lifetime a person can, by the poor choices he makes, lose the grace necessary for life with God. If he dies without seeking God’s forgiveness for his poor choices, then he will experience not Everlasting Life with its joy and happiness, but rather Everlasting Death with its horrors of rejection and misery….forever.

St. Thomas Aquinas succinctly summarized the conditions of Everlasting Life in his Catechism, The Apostles’ Creed, Article Twelve.

“….what is everlasting life. And in this we must know that in everlasting life man is united to God. God Himself is the reward and the end of all our labors: “I am thy protector, and thy reward exceeding great.”[3] This union with God consists, firstly, in a perfect vision: “We see now through a glass in a dark manner; but then face to face.”[4] Secondly, in a most fervent love; for the better one is known, the more perfectly is one loved: “The Lord hath said it, whose fire is in Sion, and His furnace in Jerusalem.”[5] Thirdly, in the highest praise. “We shall see, we shall love, and we shall praise,” as says St. Augustine.[6] “Joy and gladness shall be found therein, thanksgiving and the voice of praise.”[7]

God’s gift of Everlasting Life is freely given to mankind; it is mankind’s choice as whether to accept the gift or to reject it.

As St. Augustine says: “Thou hast made us for Thee, O Lord, and our heart is restless until it rests in Thee.”[

Suggested Reading:

“Introduction to Christianity”, by Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger, published by Ignatius Press, Part Two, Section C, part 3.

“The Catechism of St. Thomas Aquinas”, the section on The Apostles’ Creed can be accessed at www.cin.org/users/james/ebooks/master/aquinas/aindex.htm. The entire catechism is also in print on amazon.com

 

The Resurrection of the Body

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The Resurrection of the Body

While our children were playing together, my wife and I glanced at each other with a smile in our eyes, expressing with one look our joy in the fabulous, joyful individuals we had brought into the world. Without the love we showered on each other, the children would not exist. We had created wonderful new human beings, who now experienced the wonders of life on their own. Without us, these stimulating vibrant individuals would not be enjoying and enhancing the world.

Similarly, just as our children were totally depended on the love between my wife and me for their existence, so also all Christians are depended on Christ’s love for them; a love exhibited during his life and death on earth and on his Resurrection. Christ’s resurrection is the basis for belief in man’s own resurrection. As been said many times by many different people, “The Christian faith stands or falls with the truth of the testimony that Christ is risen from the dead.” The resurrection of Jesus Christ is the foundation for the Christian belief in the resurrection of Christian bodies. All Christians are emphatically tied to the Resurrection of Jesus Christ. As demonstrated in his twelve appearances after his resurrection, Jesus possessed a new, transformed body, unencumbered by time or space; a body type man will assume when man enters heaven, signifying a new relationship between God and man….a heavenly minded relationship.

Man was created by God with both a body and a soul, any resurrection of the body must include both the body and the soul in order to return man to the original state in which God created the first man and woman, Adam and Eve, prior to their Original Sin. The undivided unity of man – body and soul- is a fundamental statement of the fate of man. The salvation of man is viewed as possessing both the body and soul – unseparated man. The Resurrection of dead as expressed in the Apostles’ Creed speaks of the one creation “man’; the person. It is the Christ, as lover of all mankind, whose own resurrection sets the example for man’s resurrection. “All love wants eternity; and God’s love not only wants it but effects it and is it.” (Ratzinger, Introduction to Christianity, pg.350)  The beginning of the resurrected life actually begins when we form a relationship with Christ on earth; a relationship that outlasts death. There is continuity with Christ from an earthly life through death and into heaven.

The issue confronting man is man’s willingness to form a loving, lasting relationship with Jesus Christ. Will man choose Jesus and the gift of an everlasting, loving life or will he choose only himself and face an eternal existence of sorrow and rejection?  This is the fundamental decision facing each person. Choose well!

The subject of the Resurrection of Jesus is so critical to Christian beliefs that it is demands some review and study. There are numerous books and articles which discuss both the Resurrection of Jesus and man’s resurrection. Listed below is a small sample of these writings.

“The life of Christ” by Bishop Fulton J. Sheen, Kindle edition, Chapter 62

“Handbook of Christian Apologetics” by Peter Kreeft and Ronald Tacelli, Kindle edition, Chapter 8. The chapter examines in some detail the arguments for and against the Resurrection of Jesus and man’s resurrection.

“Jesus of Nazareth, From the Entrance to Jerusalem to the Resurrection”, by Pope Benedict XVI, published by Ignatius Press, Chapter Nine.

“Credo”, by Hans Urs Von Balthasar, published by Ignatius Press, Chapter XI.

“Introduction to Christianity”, by Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger, published by Ignatius Press, Part Two, Section C, part 3.

“The Catechism of the Catholic Church”, Part One, Article Eleven, “I Believe in the Resurrection of the Body”