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Brookline Carmel Bulletin
August 14, 1960
Cogitatio Sancta
(Holy
Meditation)
For
the eager longing of creation awaits the revelation of the sons of God. …for creation itself also will be delivered
from its slavery to corruption into the freedom of the glory of the sons of
God. For we know that all creation
groans and travails in pain until now.
And not only it, but we also who have the first fruits of the Spirit –
we ourselves groan within ourselves waiting for the adoption as sons, the
redemption of our body. (Romans 8:19)
There
are several reasons why we yearn for the day our bodies will be reunited to our
souls in glory. First, our bodies and
our souls were made for each other; they were not created to exist independently,
but to form together one single entity (for substance, as philosophers
say). Second, our bodies are part of
the material world, and with the rest of material creation, long for release
from the law of corruption and decay.
Third, we see that Jesus, Our Father and Mary, Our Mother are both in
Heaven in their glorified bodies, and we want to be there with them.
But
besides being eager to enjoy the glorification of our body, we also find
ourselves wishing that we didn’t have to die.
We are perpetually in search of a ‘fountain of youth’. Although by our very nature we are liable to
death – since our material bodies are subject to physical laws, and thus are
quite capable of sustaining damage that puts an end to vital processes – we
know that at one time God intended to preserve us from ever receiving such an
injury, and that He had also suspended the law of deterioration (aging) that
the physical world is subject to. That
we are now obliged sometime to die is due to original sin, for the wages of sin
is death.
The
Feast of the Assumption of Our Blessed Lady, however, reminds us that the wages
of virtue is resurrection of the body in glory. It is the just reward meted out to the bodies of the blessed. Holiness and virtue are the factors which
reintegrate human nature, restoring it, as says Our Holy Father Saint John of
the Cross, to the state of original justice which Adam and Eve enjoyed before
the fall (without, however, restoring the special prerogatives of immunity from
death). It is fitting, therefore, that
the body shares in the glory of the soul.
We
cannot over emphasize the dependence of the soul upon the body. The body depends upon the soul for its life,
but likewise, the soul depends upon the body for its ‘life’. Were it not for the body, a soul would never
come into contact with reality, nor would the soul be able to communicate with
its surroundings and exert an influence upon the worlds of matter and
spirit. Whatever is in our minds has
come to it through the senses of the body.
Not only the concepts that come already formed through hearing, but
those, which the mind itself fashions out of its sense impressions. The soul, in turn, makes known its own ideas
and concepts to others and also gives evidence of its conformity (or non-conformity)
to reality through the instrumentality of the body. Particularly, knowledge of God must come to the soul through the
body (fides ex auditu – faith is from hearing), and the soul needs the
cooperation of the body in order to love and serve God in full measure. The soul, then when it enjoys the Beatific
Vision, will, after the day of general judgment, impart to the body a
commensurate degree of its essential glory. It gives God to the body in so far
as the body is able to receive Him (His attributes). Thus theologians speak of the gifts of clarity (a shining
splendor), impassibility (immunity from pain and physical harm), agility (move
with the speed of thought), and subtlety (it will have many of the properties
of a spirit), which a glorified body will possess.
But
it is true, too, that the body can lead the soul astray. Because of the division in human nature due
to original sin, the sense appetites of the body are not subject (when we
awaken to the use of reason) to the intellect and will. They follow their own separate course, pursuing
pleasure. If the soul does not labor
to tame the sense appetites, and make them subject to the control of its higher
nature, then it becomes the slave of the senses, the slave of sin, and reaps
its reward, everlasting death. On
the other hand if broken and trained, the sense appetites can be made to pursue
what will contribute to the perfection of our soul. Then the soul finds it does what is right quasi-automatically, making
the exercise of virtue easy and delightful. (Worth struggling for, eh, wot!)
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