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John Paul II’s Theology of the Body

Daniel Francis Good, Seminarian for the Archdiocese of Mobile

• Introduction:
  • What is this Theology of the Body?
    • 129 Wednesday General Audiences
    • It also encompasses several encyclicals
    • It is accompanied by John Paul’s earlier book Love and Responsibility
    • Given from September 1979 – November 1984
    • “Boldest reconfiguration of the theology will make rethinking of everything in the creed.  Through the lens of marriage we look at the whole of Christian theology.” Christopher West
  • The Wednesday audiences are separated into different categories
    • Original unity of Man and Woman
    • Blessed are the Pure of Heart: Historical Man
    • Life according to the Spirit: Historical Man
    • Life according to the Spirit: Resurrection of the Body
    • Life according to the Spirit: Virginity/Continence for the sake of the Kingdom
    • Life according to the Spirit: The Sacramentality of Marriage
    • Life according to the Spirit: Reflections on Humanae Vitae
  • Why a Theology of the Body?
    • We are living in what John Paul II calls, “a culture of death.”
    • The thing to combat such a culture is a GOSPEL, a gospel of life
• In the beginning:
  • There was a primal command from God:
    • BE FRUITFUL AND MULTIPLY!!!!
    • From the beginning it was so.
    • Human beings are to have sex and have children
    • The Catholic Church does not teach that sex is something bad or dirty; in fact the Church teaches that it is a command from the most high God.
    • The Second Creation story says, “Therefore a man leaves his father and his mother and cleaves to his wife, and they become one flesh.”^[1]
    • From the beginning God made it clear.  He wanted us to, “Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth and subdue it; and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the air and over every living thing that moves upon the earth.”^[2]
  • God created them
    • “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness”[3]
    • Every human person is made in the image and likeness of God.
    • God’s love for us is so immense and intense he wants us to be like him, with our own freedom to choose him.
    • Every person who walks or has ever walked the earth reflects God in his very existence and essence. 
    • You are created in the image and likeness of God.  God loves each one of us intimately.
• What happened???
  • We have original sin.
  • “And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, “You may freely eat of every tree of the garden; ^ but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall die.”’^[4]
  • “he took of its fruit and ate; and she also gave some to her husband, and he ate. Then the eyes of both were opened, and they knew that they were naked; and they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves aprons.”^[5]
  • What happened?
  • What about God saying you shall die?
  • If we accept evolution, could we really believe that are original ancestors were not going to die a death?
  • Death for the Hebrew peoples was the loss of friendship with God.
  • Man and Woman were no longer able to “walk with God in the Garden.”
  • God did not abandon us however  
    • The best catechesis on salvation history that is short and to the point comes from the special anamnesis of the Fourth Eucharistic Prayer
    • Father, we acknowledge you greatness: all your actions show your wisdom and love. You formed man in your own likeness and set him over the whole world to serve you, his creator, and to rule over all creatures. Even when he disobeyed you and lost your friendship
      you did not abandon him to the power of death, but helped all men to seek and find you.  Again and again you offered a covenant to man, and through the prophets taught him to hope for salvation.
      Father, you so loved the world that in the fullness of time you sent your only Son to be our Savoir. He was conceived through the power of the Holy Spirit, and born of the Virgin Mary, a man like us in all things but sin. To the poor he proclaimed the good news of salvation, to prisoners, freedom, and to those in sorrow, joy.
      In fulfillment of your will he gave himself up to death; but by rising from the dead, he destroyed death and restored life. And that we might live no longer for ourselves but for him, he sent the Holy Spirit from you, Father, as his first gift to those who believe,
      to complete his work on earth and bring us the fullness of grace.

• Our liturgy is one that lives.  And we pray what we believe.  This prayer expresses our belief in the salvation that God brought us.
• God sent his son to redeem us.
• He didn’t just redeem us in a spiritual only way, but in a bodily way.
• The nails were driven into the HANDS and FEET of Jesus.  The crown of thorns was placed on the HEAD of Christ.
• God has given his son, for the life of the world.  We are not destined for death but for life.
• God redeems us.  He redeems our bodies
• John Paul II says in Evangelium Vitae
  • Truly great must be the value of human life if the Son of God has taken it up and made it the instrument of the salvation of all humanity! EV33
  • THE INSTRUMENT OF SALVATION IS A BODY!!!
  • The thing that we used to break our friendship with God ; GOD REDEEMS US WITH!!!
  • By God redeeming us it shows us the view of the Body in God’s eyes.
• God is truly awesome and full of Love.
• How are we to view the body now?
  • God gave us the body as a Gift.  God gave us the gift of salvation as well.
  • The next sentence is very important.
    • We are only self-fulfilled in the giving of the gift of ourselves to others.
  • In order to be fully actualized we need to completely give of ourselves.
  • There are two ways of giving of ourselves as gifts.
  • Both are very profound
    • Marriage
    • Celibacy
  • As someone who is moving toward a life of celibacy, I just want  to say that I think marriage is AWESOME!!!  Both Celibacy and Marriage are two ways of living out of the Gift that God has given us.
  • Marriage is a natural living out of the primal command of God.
  •  We’ll talk about marriage first
  •  
• The Sacrament of Marriage
  • The Catechism of the Catholic Church:
    • MARRIAGE: A covenant or partnership of life between a man and woman, which is ordered to the well-being of the spouses and to the procreation and upbringing of children. When validly contracted between two baptized people, marriage is a sacrament.
  • Marriage is a reflection on the inner life of God!
  • It is a reflection on the Trinity
  • We need to first discuss some relations of the Holy Trinity in order to relate it to marriage.
    • The Father is full of love.  His love is so good and over flowing that he begets another: the son.  The Son in return loves the Father.  Their love is so immense that it produces another: the Holy Spirit.
    • I want to note here, so we don’t become heretics:
      • The Son and the Holy Spirit are eternally with the Father.  There never was a time when they were not.
      • One more time: The Father is full of love.  His love is so good and over flowing that he begets another: the son.  The Son in return loves the Father.  Their love is so immense that it produces another: the Holy Spirit.
  • When a man and a woman come together in the Sacrament of Marriage they love each other. 
  • THEY ARE FULL OF LOVE FOR ONE ANOTHER
  • The come together in the MARITAL EMBRACE
  • Sex is an act of Love.
  • The husband fully loves the wife and the wife fully loves the husband, and because of this love A THIRD IS KNOWN
  • Through the Marital Embrace – LOVE PRODUCES ANOTHER PERSON
  • The gift of a child is a miracle
  • Why is their joy in every culture over the birth of one’s own child?
  • Marriage is a reflection on the inner life of God.
  • God wants us to be so in Love with him that our lives in the NORMAL way are a reflection of him.
  • How awesome is Marriage?
  • How awesome is God?
  • In Marriage we completely give the GIFT of ourselves to our partner.
• Celibacy
  • Celibacy is not a sacrament, like marriage
  • Marriage is a sign of the Kingdom to come, but sacraments pass away at Eschaton.   Jesus even says that In the kingdom to come they will not be given in marriage.
  • Christopher West gives the image of Street Signs.  When you are going to Chicago you need the signs to tell you how to get there. But when you get to Chicago you no longer need the signs.
  • Celibacy is a current living out of what is to come in the kingdom of Heaven.  You are directly invited into the mystery of the Trinity.
  • Celibacy is a call from the ordinary or the natural.  It is then extraordinary or supernatural
  • This is not ‘better’ than marriage, it is simply a different way of living out the one’s own vocation.
• Celibacy and Marriage
  • Neither celibacy nor marriage is a legitimate outlet for lust.  There is none.
  • One cannot lust after his or her spouse.
  • Because of our concupiscence living either lifestyle without lust is impossible. 
  • EVERY PERSON MUST BECOME A NEW PERSON IN CHRIST.
  • With the strength and joy of the Holy Spirit, both of these vocations are possible.  It is up to us to call upon the Holy Spirit in our own lives that we may do these things.  I strongly encourage everyone to do that now.
  • We will begin with our task of reading the Theology of the Body. The first section is Original Man.  Let us keep Von Balthasar in mind when he said, “Theology is best spent on one’s knees.”