The Redemption of the Heart

            God created man, male and female. In their original beatitude they were innately conscious of the nuptial meaning of the body. It consist in that attribute of the body to express love in the sexual differentiation of man as male and female,[1] who in the whole reality and truth of their body and sex experience one another without shame (original nakedness); therefore, without any constraint on account of the body and sex,[2] man and woman exist in the freedom of self-possession and are able to mutually give themselves as a gift in love (reciprocity) and in so doing create a communion of persons.[3] Original innocence allows man, male and female, to see each other as being created for their own sake. In the freedom of their interior subjectivity, they have a vision of the other that is beatifying. They do not see the other as an object to be made use of or appropriated for selfish ends. Rather the vision is of the other as a good, a gift to be received and to be reciprocated with the gift of my love. This is nothing less than betrothed love.[4]

            However, original innocence is lost through the original sin of Adam and Eve[5] and left behind as a state that will echo within his heart as a constant reminder of the nuptial meaning of the body. “After original sin, man and woman will lose the grace of original innocence. The discovery of the nuptial meaning of the body will cease to be for them a simple reality of revelation and grace.”[6]  Now it will be a constant struggle against fallen human nature infected by concupiscence that manifest itself in the three forms of lusts—lust of the flesh, lust of the eyes, and pride of life.[7] It is in this context that the Holy Father picks up anew his presentation on the theology of the body taking as his new point of departure “The Sermon on the Mount” and specifically Matthew 5:27-28 quoted below.

            You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall not commit adultery.” But I say to       you that everyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed     adultery with her in his heart.

It is within the context of this text and the text of the fall of man in Genesis 3:1ff, that John Paul II develops the schematic of fallen man and his tendency to objectify the other and appropriate him as a means to satisfy lustful urges in complete opposition to the nuptial meaning of the body which seeks to create a communion of reciprocal love between man and woman precisely through the manifestation of the body.

            For the New Testament, man is understood as a whole person consisting of mind, will and emotions. He is an intentional being whose center is the heart. The heart is the center of man’s will, emotions, thoughts and affections. “The heart is this dimension of humanity with which the sense of the meaning of the human body and the order of this sense is directly linked.”[8] Therefore, in a particular way, the heart is the place where man meets God and God meets man. It is the center of man, from which comes forth all that is good and all that is evil.[9] For this reason, it is critical to the understanding of the importance for the “theology of the body” in as much as the heart affects our acting out in our body which will either reflect or distort the nuptial meaning of the body. Therefore, concurrent with the redemption of the body is the redemption of the heart.

            The Holy Father locates the rupture of the covenant with God in the human heart.[10]  “Lust is not of the Father but of the world.”[11] Lust has its inception, its entrance into the heart of man precisely in the fall. In Genesis 3:1-5 we witness Adam and Eve’s temptation by the serpent. In Genesis 3:6 we read of the act of the fall, in Genesis 3:7 the original experience of shame. In a real and poignant manner, man turns his back on God and casts him out of his heart.[12] In effect, man’s original sin invites into the human heart what is of the world and not of the Father.

Article by Fr. Alejandro Valladres, Archdiocese of Mobile