ESCHATOLOGY

The Glorified Body

The Promise of Christ's Resurrection

by Charles M. Mangan

The commemoration of the Son of God's glorious victory over sin and death - joyfully celebrated by the Church especially on Easter Sunday and throughout the entire, jubilant Easter Season - inevitably turns our minds to our own destiny. "If we have died with Christ," the Apostle to the Gentiles proclaims, "we believe that we are also to live with Him" (Romans 6:8). By our conformity to Jesus in His redemptive death, then we shall be

A perennial question which arises, particularly during the fifty days of Easter, is framed thus: If we are to be like Christ in life as in death, what will our resurrected, glorified bodies be like?

This query has received a reply from the Doctor Angelicus, Saint Thomas Aquinas (1225?-1274), as well as from other theologians. These scholars have based their writings on this brief passage from Saint Paul: "What is sown in the earth is subject to decay, what rises is incorruptible. What is sown is ignoble, what rises is glorious. Weakness is sown, strength rises up. A natural body is put down and a spiritual body comes up" (I Corinthians 15:42b-44).

Saint Thomas and the others identify the four "properties" of the glorified body: impassibility, subtility, agility, clarity. Professor Ludwig Ott, in his reliable Fundamentals of Catholic Dogma, presents a helpful summary of these characteristics of the glorified body.

Impassibility means the incapability of suffering any kind of physical evils: death, sorrow, illness, etc. The glorified body will be free of these maladies, which cause so much anguish here in this life.

Subtility has been described as the "power to penetrate." No material objects will deter the glorified body from moving to and fro. Instead, the glorified body, after the example of Jesus' Risen Body, will have complete ability to move from one place to another unrestricted.

Agility is the power of the body to move easily and quickly at the soul's behest. No longer "weighed down," the human body in Heaven will move with great rapidity and amazing elegance.

Clarity means brilliance. The glorified body will shine with an unmistakable radiance, much as the Body of Jesus appeared at the Transfiguration. The glorified body will be full of splendor and radiance to the extent that the soul possesses clarity, which in turn depends on the soul's merits. Referring to Pope Saint Gregory the Great (538?-604), Saint Thomas asserts: "Thus in the glorified body the glory of the soul will he known, even as through a crystal is known the color of a body contained in a crystal ves

sel ..." (Summa Theologica, Suppl. 85, 1).

The glorified bodies of the Elect will differ greatly from the bodies of the damned. The bodies of the latter will suffer many indignities, bearing the brunt of the awful, unquenchable torments of Hell (poena sensus). True, the bodies of the damned will rise again in incorruption and immortality; yet, these bodies will not be transfigured in the likeness of Christ's Body.

To prayerfully consider the reality of the glorified body is to acknowledge God's goodness to His children. As if the celestial joys experienced by the soul in Paradise are not quite sufficient, the Almighty does something more: He bathes the glorified body in Heaven with incredible contentment of its own. The four properties of the glorified body attest to the Lord's desire to grant both soul and body unparalleled happiness.

Where Jesus Christ is visibly present now Body and Soul, we - His disciples - hope to follow. The utterly beautiful characteristics of His Body we will share, as will all those who, through the free gift of God, achieve the undying bliss of Heaven. Imagine the awesome grace of the Beatific Vision and the perpetual satisfaction which the bodies and souls of the Saints will enjoy in the next life.

The Easter Season provides ample opportunity for believers everywhere to ponder the mystery of Jesus' Resurrection. By living for and with Him here on earth, we will one day inherit the promise of everlasting life for both body and soul in the Kingdom of Heaven.

Father Charles M. Mangan is a priest of the Diocese of Sioux Falls, South Dakota.