THE SPIRITUALITY OF THE RISEN BODY.
Having seen the personal beauty and splendor in which the just will
rise on the last day, we shall now examine some other attributes of
the glorified body. St. Paul tells us: "It is sown an animal body, it
shall rise a spiritual body."*
* 1 Cor. xv. 44.
Rising a spiritual body does not mean that the bodies of the just
shall be changed into spirits. Our bodies, which are material by
nature, must remain so forever. They must rise in conformity to the
glorious body of Jesus Christ, "who will reform the body of our
lowness made like to the body of His glory." And what kind of a body
had Jesus Christ, when he arose triumphant over death and hell? It
was certainly His own material body of real flesh and blood, and not
a spirit. When he appeared to his apostles, as St. Luke tells us,
"they, being troubled and affrighted, supposed that they saw a
spirit. And He said to them, Why are you troubled, and why do these
thoughts arise in your hearts? See my hands and feet, that it is I
myself; handle and see; for a spirit hath not flesh and bones as you
see me have."* Assuredly, here is a true body of flesh and blood and
bone, and not a spiritual one--in the sense that matter does or can
become a spirit. It is the very same body in which He suffered such
terrible tortures and agonies during his bitter passion.
* Luke xxiv.
So shall we rise on the last day, in our own material body of flesh
and blood, with every organ and member glorified and made conformable
to the body of Jesus Christ. According to the teachings of St.
Thomas, our bodies shall rise of the same nature as they now are. For
glory does not change or destroy nature, but perfects it.* Evidently,
then, rising a spiritual body does not mean that our bodies are to be
changed into spirits. What then does it mean? It means that, while
retaining their essential material nature, they will be clothed with
properties which naturally belong only to spirits, and not to bodies.
These we shall now examine.
* Ponere enim corpus transire in spiritum est omnino impossibile. Non
enim transeunt invicem nisi quæ in materia communicant. Spiritualium
autem et corporalium non potest esse communicatio in materia, cum
substantiæ spirituales sint omnino immaterialia. Impossibile est
igitur quod corpus humanum transeat in substantiam spiritualem....
Similiter etiam impossibile est quod corpus hominis resurgentis sit
quasi aëreum et ventis simile.--S. Thom., Cont. gent., lib. 4, c. 84.
1. In the first place, rising a spiritual body implies that the
glorified body will no longer need food, drink, and sleep, to sustain
life and strength, as it now does. The risen body will, therefore, in
this respect, become like a spirit, which needs neither food nor
drink. Eating is a necessity of the present life, and makes our
bodies animal. This necessity will no longer exist after the
resurrection. When we reflect upon this, it seems to us that nearly
one half of human life, and of its energies, are expended upon this
one thing of eating, providing, and preparing food. Fields must be
sown, and crops must be raised; grain must be ground; cattle must be
cared for almost as children; ships must cross and recross the ocean;
and all this to prepare food and raiment for our vile bodies. What a
slavery this is! The soul, that noble image of the living God,
instead of giving her time to the developing of her faculties and the
contemplating of God and His works, must provide and prepare food for
the body. Rising a spiritual body will forever emancipate us from
this slavery.
But although it is true that there shall be no more eating and
drinking in heaven, as we now understand these two actions, you must
not infer from this that the sense of taste shall not be gratified in
the blessed. It most certainly will be, as well as every other sense
of the human body, though not by the corruptible food of the present
life. When the butterfly was a caterpillar, it devoured green leaves
with pleasure and avidity. They were its very life. But now that it
is changed into a beautiful butterfly, it lives on the honey and
exquisite perfume of flowers. If you offer it those same leaves that
it loved so much while a caterpillar, it scorns them, and refuses
even to touch them; for they are now unable, in its transformed
state, to give it any pleasure. So shall it be with us after the
resurrection. Our tastes shall be so refined that we shall scorn the
low animal pleasures which are fit only for our present corruptible
bodies. What a difference there is between the coarse green leaf
which is the food of the caterpillar, and the exquisite honey of the
blushing rose, which is the food of the butterfly! There is a still
greater difference between the creatures that now gratify our senses,
and those that are reserved in heaven to gratify our glorified senses
after the resurrection.
But there is still another slavery besides that of eating and
drinking, from which we shall be delivered by rising a spiritual
body. It is the slavery of sleep, which takes up nearly one-third of
our lives. We all know by experience, that it takes only a few hours
of heavy physical labor or assiduous mental application to exhaust
all our mental energies and bodily strength. And, whether we like it
or not, we must sleep six or seven hours, in order to regain our lost
strength, and to be ourselves again. How many saints have grieved
over this necessity of our nature! Often have they desired to spend
the nights in the contemplation of God; but in spite of their
endeavors, they were overpowered by sleep. The spirit, indeed, was
willing, but the flesh was weak.
This imperative necessity of our animal bodies will be totally
removed by rising a spiritual body. Spirits have no need of sleep;
their energies are never exhausted by the manifold acts which they
constantly perform. They live in the continual enjoyment of that
supernatural strength wherewith they were clothed the moment the
Vision of God flashed upon them. It is this wonderful strength which
will be poured out, as it were, over our bodies, at the resurrection.
For, as St. Paul says of our body: "It is sown in weakness, it shall
rise in power."* Hence, however intense may be the application of our
mental faculties or of our physical powers in heaven, we shall ever
remain strangers to the well-known feelings of fatigue and
prostration. All our energies shall ever remain fresh and unimpaired,
and their continual exercise shall be the never-failing source of the
most exquisite enjoyment.
* 1 Cor. xv. 43.
2. In the second place, rising a spiritual body implies vastly more
than the mere emancipation from the necessities of nature. It means,
besides, that the body will then be totally subject to the spirit,
and consequently that concupiscence and other inordinate passions,
which now war against the spirit, shall no longer exist. This is one
of the most consoling of promises to persons who are endeavoring to
lead a holy life. Their present corruptible body, in which "the law
of sin" resides, is an enemy that is ever warring against the spirit.
Often have they cried out with St. Paul: "Unhappy man that I am! who
will deliver me from the body of this death? The grace of God, by
Jesus Christ our Lord."*
* Rom. vii. 24.
Yes, the fulness of grace has come at last, and the body of sin and
death is no more. It is now changed into a spiritual body, which is
not only totally subject to the spirit, but even aids and perfects
it, in all its intellectual operations, as well as in its moral
affections. The spiritual body is, therefore, no lounger a burden and
a temptation; it is become like a spirit, which cannot be enslaved to
inordinate animal passions or instincts.
What a blessedness is here promised to us! No more involuntary
cravings after forbidden pleasures; no more of those involuntary
thoughts and inclinations which are so humiliating to pure souls; no
more danger of being turned away from God by the beauty of creatures;
no more wandering of the mind from His presence. In a word, the
spiritual body is totally subject to the spirit, and "the law of
sin," which received its birth at the fall of our first parents, is
totally destroyed.
3. Rising a spiritual body means, in the third place, that the matter
of which the body is now composed will become so refined and
delicately organized, as, in some sense, to approach the nature of a
spirit, while retaining its essential material nature. Our body will
therefore lose its material grossness, roughness of texture, and
weight, and will be clothed with the attributes of agility and
subtlety.
Agility implies the power of transporting ourselves from place to
place with the rapidity of thought. In this world we can, in the
twinkling of an eye, send our thoughts on the wings of electricity
across a whole continent, or the vast expanse of the ocean; after the
resurrection, we shall possess that power in our very bodies, because
they shall rise spiritual bodies, entirely under the control of the
soul.
Subtilty means that our risen bodies will be endowed with the power
of penetrating all things, even the hardest substances, as easily as
the sun's rays penetrate a clear crystal. This is the power which our
blessed Lord possessed and exercised, when He arose from the dead,
without removing the stone that covered the mouth of the sepulchre.
He simply passed through it with his glorified body. Again, after
eight days, when the Apostles were gathered together, "Jesus cometh,
the doors being shut, and stood in the midst, and said: Peace be to
you."* This is a supernatural gift with which we shall be clothed,
because we must rise conformable to the glorious body of Jesus
Christ.
* John xx. 26.
These, then, are some of the attributes of a spiritual body. They are
evidently the natural properties of spirits. But God will clothe the
bodies of his children with them, as a reward for their love of Him
and the holy lives they have led in this world.