Mystery of the Body's
Redemption Basis of Teaching on Marriage and Voluntary Continence
General Audience, July 21, 1982
1."We ourselves, who have the first
fruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we await...the redemption of
our body" (Rom 8:23). In his Letter to the Romans, St. Paul sees
this redemption of the body in both an anthropological and a cosmic
dimension. Creation "in fact was subjected to futility" (Rom 8:20).
All visible creation, all the universe, bears the effects of man's
sin. "The whole creation has been groaning in travail together until
now" (Rom 8:22). At the same time, the whole "creation awaits with
eager longing the revelation of the sons of God" and "nourishes the
hope of also being freed from the slavery of corruption, to obtain
the glorious liberty of the children of God" (Rom 8:19, 20-21).
Object of hope
2. According to Paul, the redemption of the body is the object of
hope. This hope was implanted in the heart of man in a certain sense
immediately after the first sin. Suffice it to recall the words of
the Book of Genesis, which are traditionally called the proto-evangelium
(cf. Gn 3:15). We could therefore also call them the beginning of
the Good News, the first announcement of salvation. The redemption
of the body, according to the words of the Letter to the Romans, is
connected precisely with this hope in which, as we read, "we have
been saved" (Rom 8:24). Through the hope that arises at man's very
origin, the redemption of the body has its anthropological
dimension. It is the redemption of man. At the same time it
radiates, in a certain sense, on all creation, which from the
beginning has been bound in a particular way to man and subordinated
to him (cf. Gn 1:28-30). The redemption of the body is therefore the
redemption of the world. It has a cosmic dimension.
Awaiting redemption
3. Presenting in his Letter to the Romans the cosmic image of
redemption, Paul of Tarsus places man at its very center, just as
"in the beginning" he had been placed at the very center of the
image of creation. It is precisely man who has "the first fruits of
the Spirit," who groans inwardly, awaiting the redemption of his
body (cf. Rom 8:23). Christ came to reveal man to man fully by
making him aware of his sublime vocation (cf. Gaudium et Spes 22).
Christ speaks in the Gospel from the divine depths of the mystery of
redemption, which finds its specific historical subject precisely in
Christ himself. Christ therefore speaks in the name of that hope
that had already been implanted in the heart of man in the proto-evangelium.
Christ gives fulfillment to this hope, not only with the words of
his teaching, but above all with the testimony of his death and
resurrection. So the redemption of the body has already been
accomplished in Christ. That hope in which "we have been saved" has
been confirmed in him. At the same time, that hope has been opened
anew to its definitive eschatological fulfillment. "The revelation
of the sons of God" in Christ has been definitively directed toward
that glorious liberty that is to be definitively shared by the
children of God.
Authentic theology
4. To understand all that the redemption of the body implies
according to Paul's Letter to the Romans, an authentic theology of
the body is necessary. We have tried to construct this theology by
referring first of all to the words of Christ. The constitutive
elements of the theology of the body are contained in what Christ
says: in recalling "the beginning," concerning the question about
the indissolubility of marriage (cf. Mt 19:8); in what he says about
concupiscence, referring to the human heart in his Sermon on the
Mount (cf. Mt 5:28); and also in what he says in reference to the
resurrection (cf. Mt 22:30). Each one of these statements contains a
rich content of an anthropological and ethical nature. Christ is
speaking to man, and he is speaking about man: about man who is
"body" and who has been created male and female in the image and
likeness of God. He is speaking about man whose heart is subject to
concupiscence, and finally, about man before whom the eschatological
prospect of the resurrection of the body is opened.
"Body", according to the Book of Genesis, means the visible aspect
of man and his belonging to the visible world. For St. Paul it means
not only this belonging, but sometimes also the alienation of man by
the influence of the Spirit of God. Both the one meaning and the
other are in relation to the resurrection of the body.
Sermon on the Mount
5. Since in the previously analyzed texts Christ is speaking from
the divine depths of the mystery of redemption, his words serve that
hope which is spoken of in the Letter to the Romans. According to
the Apostle, ultimately we await the redemption of the body. So we
await precisely the eschatological victory over death, to which
Christ gave testimony above all by his resurrection. In the light of
the paschal mystery, his words about the resurrection of the body
and about the reality of the other world, recorded by the synoptic
Gospels, have acquired their full eloquence. Christ, and then Paul
of Tarsus, proclaimed the call for abstention from marriage for the
sake of the kingdom of heaven, precisely in the name of this
eschatological reality.
6. However, the redemption of the body is expressed not only in the
resurrection as victory over death. It is present also in Christ's
words addressed to historical man, when they confirm the principle
of the indissolubility of marriage as a principle coming from the
Creator himself, and also when, in the Sermon on the Mount, Christ
called man to overcome concupiscence, even in the uniquely interior
movements of the human heart. The key to both the one and the other
of these statements must be to say that they refer to human
morality, that they have an ethical meaning. Here it is a question
not of the eschatological hope of the resurrection, but of the hope
of victory over sin, which can be called the hope of every day.
Strength to overcome evil
7. In his daily life man must draw from the mystery of the
redemption of the body the inspiration and the strength to overcome
the evil that is dormant in him under the form of the threefold
concupiscence. Man and woman, bound in marriage, must daily
undertake the task of the indissoluble union of that covenant which
they have made between them. But also a man or a woman who has
voluntarily chosen continence for the sake of the kingdom of heaven
must daily give a living witness of fidelity to that choice, heeding
the directives of Christ in the Gospel and those of Paul the Apostle
in First Corinthians. In each case it is a question of the hope of
every day, which in proportion to the normal duties and difficulties
of human life helps to overcome "evil with good" (Rom 12:21). In
fact, "in hope we have been saved." The hope of every day manifests
its power in human works and even in the very movements of the human
heart, clearing a path, in a certain sense, for the great
eschatological hope bound with the redemption of the body.
Victory over sin
8. Penetrating daily life with the dimension of human morality, the
redemption of the body helps first of all to discover all this good
in which man achieves the victory over sin and concupiscence.
Christ's words spring from the divine depths of the mystery of
redemption. They permit us to discover and strengthen that bond that
exists between the dignity of the human being (man or woman) and the
nuptial meaning of the body. They permit us to understand and put
into practice, on the basis of that meaning, the mature freedom of
the gift. It is expressed in one way in indissoluble marriage and in
another way through abstention from marriage for the sake of the
kingdom of God. In these different ways Christ fully reveals man to
man, making him aware of his sublime vocation. This vocation is
inscribed in man according to all his psycho-physical makeup,
precisely through the mystery of the redemption of the body.
Everything we have tried to do in the course of our meditations in
order to understand Christ's words has its ultimate foundation in
the mystery of the redemption of the body.
Taken from: L'Osservatore Romano Weekly Edition in English 26 July
1982, page 1
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