THE THEOLOGY OF THE BODY

In this presentation we will be exploring the Theology of the Body. This new theology (study of God) was developed by Pope John Paul II.

God is infinite giving and infinte love. If we could think of love what do we think of?

The greatest act of love someone can do for another is to die for them. Here the person gives everything of their self for the sake of the other. In this self-giving is a clear expression of what love is. Love is self-gift.

God the Father is infinite giving and gives all of himself constantly. This giving is so powerful it generates another divine person, Jesus. Jesus infinitely and perfectly receives the love of God the Father and perfectly, infinitely returns that love. The giving and receiving of love between the Father and the Son is so powerful it generates the Holy Spirit who proceeds from the Father and the Son and perfectly and infinitely returns that love. The Holy Spirit perfects the love of the Father and the Son and so the Trintiy is complete in love and perfection. This infinite love is one single infinite act which is above time and space being eternal. God is perfect and infinite self-gift which is perfect and infinite love.

WE ARE CREATED IN THE IMAGE AND LIKENESS OF GOD

St Iranaeus suggests that all humans are in God’s image but our likeness to God is dependent upon the depth of our self-gift. These images on the right are all an image of Jesus, but some look more like Jesus than others. Humans are the same. We are all in God’s image and have human dignity, but we become more God like through our depth of love, through giving ourselves more, like each person of the Trinity does.

“This [Trinitarian] likeness reveals that man, … cannot fully find himself except through a sincere gift of himself.” (GS 24) This quote expresses the truth of our humanity and the goal of everyone one of us. It is to love. But it is not our love that is important but to receive God’s love.  “This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us” (1 Jn 4:10)

We are all in God’s image, but are more like God through our self-gift.

Q1) Explain how the Trinity is love itself.

Q2) Explain how humanity is made in the image and likeness of God.

Q3) How can humanity become more like God?

Q4) How can each of us ‘find ourselves’?

GOD REVEALS LOVE THROUGH THE BODY.

Here is one of the key points of John Paul II’s Theology of the Body:

The body, and it alone, is capable of making visible what is invisible: the spiritual and the divine. It was created to transfer into the visible reality of the world, the mystery hidden since time immemorial in God, and thus to be a sign of it.[1]

This echos the words of St Paul, “The Son is the image of the invisible God” (Col 1:15). Jesus is the message and the messanger. “Christ, who is both the mediator and the fullness of all revelation.” (DV 2) Jesus reveals all of this through his body. When we look at Jesus we see the Father. “Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father.” (Jn 14:9) Through the body of Jesus we see God.

The fullness of God’s love is expressed on the cross where the body of Christ is totally given to us. Catholics emphasis the body since we tend to wear a crucifix and not just a cross. We include the body and see it as important. Today Jesus continues to give us his body through the Eucharist. It is through this gift that we can receive the infinite love of God.

WHERE DO WE GET OUR LOVE FROM?

God offers us infinite love. Another name for infinite love is unconditional love. It is the same love since both are love without limit. How many of us want to be loved unconditionally (to be accepted as we are)?

We find that we all want to be loved unconditionally and desire that kind of love. The golden rule is to “do unto others as you would have them do unto you.” (Lk 6:31, cf Lev 19:18) But where are we to gain the love we need to be able to love others unconditionally? It is from the unconditional love of Christ manifest every Eucharist. It is from Christian prayer where we experience God accepting us as we are and transforming us through his love. “This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us” (1 Jn 4:10) So having received this love we can give this love. The more we give the more we get.

ADAM AND EVE IN THE GARDEN BEFORE THE FALL.

We are now ready to follow the path that Pope John Paul II does through the Theology of the Body. John Paul II starts with the question of marriage and uses Jesus’ answer:

“that at the beginning the Creator ‘made them male and female,’ and said, ‘For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh’? So they are no longer two, but one flesh. Therefore what God has joined together, let no one separate.” (Matt 19:4-6)

John Paul II goes back to the beginning to Adam and Eve before they sinned. They had perfect love and a perfect relationship. Their every thought and feeling was correctly ordered towards love of each other and God. They had no sin. In their relationship they shared everything and had no fear since there was nothing to fear. They had nothing to hide since their every thought and feeling was one of love and care. They were thus “naked without shame.” (Gen 2:25) Imagine how good that was. How pure and loving it was. How deep their friendship was. Take some time to ponder the richness and awesomness of their relationship at that point. God wants you to have the goodness they had and has a plan of how you can work towards that goodness.

Q5) How does God reveal his love to us?

Q6) Where can we receive God’s love?

Q7) What kind of relationship did Adam and Eve have before the fall?

Q8) What is the effect of marriage?

OUR BODIES SPEAK A LANGUAGE.

When Adam looked at himself he could see that his body was not meant for just himself. When he looked at Eve he realised what his body was meant for. It was meant as a gift to be given. Most of communication is through body language. His body speaks a language of love. That language is self-gift. Adam discovers his completeness is in the gift of self to Eve which his body already tells him. Through this self-gift a child is generated. This completes the Trinitarian image of marriage. In the mutual self-gift of husband and wife a child is generated just as the mutual self-gift between the Father and Son generates the Holy Spirit. The infinite Trinitarian love is mirrored by the unconditional love of husband and wife. That is why marriage is a sacrament. It points to the Trinitrian source of love and actually brings it about between the spouses.

This is a central point of the Theology of the Body. It is in giving that we discover the meaning of life and our true selves.

Q9) What are some examples of body language?

Q10) What does the language of the body teach us about the meaning of marriage?

Q11) What is the connection between marriage and the Trinity?

THE SIN OF ADAM AND EVE

To better understand our own experience of life, we need to understand what happened in the Garden of Eden. God allowed them great freedom in the garden and only prohibited them from one thing, to eat the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. What exactly is that tree? That tree is a symbol of the decision to decide that something evil is good and something good is evil, which is sheer fantasy. The reality is good is good and evil is evil which can never change. The goodness of creation comes from him alone. God can’t change an evil to a good. There are somethings which are impossible to even God, eg God can’t become evil. But God can bring a good from an evil.

God who is pure gift was going to give Adam and Eve all that is good. When Satan tempted Adam and Eve he suggested that God was holding back on Adam and Eve and they would “be like God knowing good and evil.” (Gen 3:5) Satan was selling them something they already had. They already knew what was good and evil and they were already like God. Satan was a very good salesman, but unfortunately they fell for it and so sin entered the world. The effects of this sin were devastating. They now lost their inner integrity, and so their passions were no longer at the service of love, but dominated them. Adam now looked at Eve in a whole different way. Before he looked at her with only love, appreciation and a desire to serve. Now he looked at her as an object, a challenge and wanted to be served by her. Eve too looked at Adam in that way. They struggled to adjust. Eve didn’t like the way Adam was looking at her and wanted him to get his mind off her body and so they tried to cover themselves up with fig leaves.

What do you think God’s reaction to this was?

God waited until the evening to respond to their situation and did not suddenly go “Sprung bad! You miserable humans” no he just walked nearby in the cool of the evening. Adam and Eve then played the first game of hide and seek. They hid from God. God knew where they were, but called out, “Where are you?” In that call is the call to each of us always, “Where are YOU in life, in your relationship with God?” This was the call to rebuild relationship with God and they responded and went back to God. This is the start of redemption. God listens to them and asks them questions. He sets an appropriate punishment which allows them to make up for what they have done and then he gives them a gift. He makes clothes for them out of animal skins. God is indeed a merciful and generous God.

To better understand this story let’s have a look at a modern day equivalent. You borrow your father’s car and go for a drive. You smash the car. Your father comes and you hide in the bushes. He calls out to you and he says, I forgive you, but you will need to pay for the car. Fair enough. But then he gives you a bike to get you around until the car is fixed. That is how generous and good God the father is. God allows us to make up for our sins, but even while we do it he is our friend and helps us along.

Q12) What was the fruit that Adam and Eve ‘ate’?

Q13) What did God do when Adam and Eve sinned?

Q14) What did Adam and Eve make clothes out of?

Q15) What did God make clothes for Adam and Eve out of?

Q16) Why did Adam and Eve make fig leaves?

THIS STATE OF SIN IS NOT GOD’S PERFECT PLAN FOR US.

God wants us to love each other and overcome sin in our lives. He wants us to be friends, to get to truly know each other. Through Christ this is possible. At this point we can highlight the problem with pornography. There is a quote which has been attributed to Pope John Paul II, “The problem with pornography is not that it shows too much, but that it shows too little.” It doesn’t show the person. It only shows the body. For those using pornography they are trying to develop a relationship with a bit of paper. It is only 2D. It does not truly reveal the person. We are made for true subject to subject relationships not for a relationship with a bit of paper. The effect of pornography is stunted relationships. It does not lead to happiness but sadness.

The Catholic Church offers a vision of true lasting friendships. We are building the opportunity to have many truly deep and happy friendships with the opposite sex. You can truly have that richness and joy that comes from this culture of life. Out of those good wholesome friendships may develop a special friendship that goes further.

Q17) What is wrong with pornography?

UNCONDITIONAL LOVE

We have established a vision for loving friendships as part of a community of a culture of life. We have already established the link between the Trinity as three divine persons giving and receiving unconditional love and the human family, father, mother and child as a family of unconditional love. We are now going to explore this further.

The love between husband and wife is meant to be unconditional love, that is, no conditions placed upon their love. I do not exist just for an instant, but I have a past present and future. A man can only give himself unconditionally once to a woman, since unconditionally means no condition on time. He can only give his past, present and future once unconditionally. That is what marriage is.

That means sex is only meant for marriage since it is when with our bodies we say I give all of myself to you. Even if I don’t mean that, the language of my body is saying that. The body is meant for unconditional love and so I can only use my body that way within marriage, otherwise I am saying a lie with my body. Sex before marriage is a lie because I am giving myself to the other person in a way which is meant to be unconditional by the very nature of using my body as a gift, but then don’t mean it unconditionally. Sex before marriage leads to union between the two people, but then this is broken and has an effect on the person within. The person can end up a user and they begin to feel used which affects their self-esteem. God wants us to experience freedom and unconditional love.

The Theology of the Body gives us a vision of life and love. It lays a foundation upon which we can build and establish a culture of life through which we can transform the world. God and the Church wants each person to have and experience unconditional love from conception to natural death. Marriage is part of that plan and lived rightly it is an experience of unconditional love. Through God’s grace and prayer, love is maintained and strengthened.

Q18) Why is the Church against sex before marriage?

FREEDOM

I would like to finish with a final point on freedom. Adam and Eve had total freedom. Their freedom included the possibility of choosing sin, but there was no need for them to choose it. They had many many many choices and all were good choices, only one was wrong. True freedom means being able to choose the good. Sin is a bad choice and shouldn’t be taken. There is no need whatsoever to sin. Due to sin in us we desire sin and struggle to do the right thing. God offers us through his love true freedom, which is the overcoming of our sinful selves. Through the Eucharist and prayer we gain the grace to desire and choose the good. We must live this life of grace if we are to live a life of love. We need Jesus.

Q19) Is there any reason to sin? Explain your answer.