In today’s gospel the Lord ends his teaching regarding the resurrection of the body saying: “He [the God of Moses] is not God of the dead, but of the living, for to him, all are alive”. This truth, that for God all those who have already left this world are alive reminds me of a cute story I heard from a priest in Colombia many years ago.

This priest lived in a convent with several other priests. They would regularly visit the children of a nearby orphanage. It happened that one of the priests died and the children learned about it. Soon after, this other priest went to the orphanage and was asked by a little boy: “Are you the priest who died?” The funny understanding of death this child had exemplifies the understanding of death God almighty also has. For God, death is only for an instant and we become the living of the coming age as the Lord puts it.

In order to have a correct understanding of the resurrection of the body, we need to be clear about the inseparable unity of body and soul. The human soul is not a thing separated from the body. Saint Thomas Aquinas taught that the soul is the unifying and organizing energy by which our human body becomes properly human. Body and soul make an inseparable unity. This is the way the Lord sees people in the gospels. For example, to the paralytic man the Lord first says, “Your sins are forgiven”. Only after the Lord cures him from his physical illness.

The inseparable unity of the human person implies the resurrection of the body. God does not want us only to have a partial experience of heaven, the experience of the soul. From this inseparable unity of the human person we expect that the whole human person, body and soul, will enjoy the fullness of the vision of God in heaven.

The human body is the instrument by which we learn in this world. Our knowledge comes through the senses such as hearing and sight. In this world our knowledge of God also comes through the senses: for example, the disciples saw and heard the Word of God made flesh. So, it makes sense that in order for us to continue learning the mystery of God in heaven we also need our bodies. This understanding also allows us to imagine that heaven would somehow have a resemblance of our present physical world. As we have space, sound and color in this world, which help us learn, so we dream of similar elements in heaven, Saint Thomas Aquinas taught, where our body and soul may feel at home.

The belief in the resurrection of the body is a source of hope for us Christians. The resurrected body will be in continuity with our earthly body. It will also be different. The difference will be in the almost perfect harmony with the soul. Again, Saint Thomas Aquinas said that the heavenly body will be entirely responsive to the soul, like an instrument in the hands of a skilled player. The famous Bishop Robert Barron commented that many musicians mention that when they are profoundly immersed in the music, they feel a great unity between them and their instruments. So great is this feeling of unity, musicians say, that the instrument “plays them”.  This reality of our heavenly body is a source of so much hope for us. The reason is that in this world we experience the disharmony between our body and our soul because of our sinful condition. It often seems as if our body remains stubbornly out of tune or unresponsive to the player, our soul. That will not be the case in heaven, thanks be to God.

The Lord says: “Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him on the last day”. If he had not added “and I will raise him on the las day”, we may be thinking that eternal life was only for our soul. A glorious body like his Risen Body is what the Lord promises to those who believe in him and worthily receive him in the holy sacrament of the Eucharist. Let us humbly ask the Lord to give his grace to truly believe in the resurrection and to live in a manner that agrees with our belief.