Reflection on February 4, 1981

https://www.ewtn.com/library/PAPALDOC/jp2tb54.htm

I thought it was interesting how SJPII says you can describe humans as you would animals, describe them in a purely physical sense, but that this would be an incomplete description. SJPII might say you would be lacking the most important part, an indispensable part, what “is” the body, what makes us human. He puts this longing to describe this non-physical part of the human as the inspiration for all of our culture’s art, paintings, novels, poetry, etc. If you think about a scientist that wants to study humans as animals, in an atheistic type setting, that scientist must throw out all art. There is no purpose to such things in a world where humans are merely the sum of all their cells. But how many actually believe that. And you can see that those that want so much to prove we are just like animals don’t want to give up the arts, but they want to bring the animal world up. http://melissaasmith.hubpages.com/hub/buy-art-painted-by-animals. Why else would you buy art made by an elephant, buy a CD of dogs barking. The world does not want to give up what makes us human but tries to bring animals up to a human level.

When you think about the body, before the fall, in its original innocence, had a neutrality in all its parts, that would be very close to the way SJPII described the scientific view of the body. In original innocence, there were no parts” we think less honorable” or “unpresentable”. When a scientist looks at a body, all parts are neutral, there is no shame, they are all just cells. Although the neutrality is very similar, SJPII is not saying that we were animalistic before the fall. He spent many reflections on the creation narratives showing that we were made above animals from the beginning. But this doesn’t take away the idea of our body’s neutrality, in its parts, in original innocence. SJPII actually finds that St. Paul’s description of the Body after the fall, in historical man, confirms the findings that were developed in the close reading of the creation narratives.

The fall brings about disunity in the body. This causes some parts to be “unpresentable”, causes Adam and Eve to cover them. SJPII does not only focus on the negative, covering ourselves in shame, but also on the positive aspect. He finds that there is original innocence still in us. This is a longing to be pure. We do not just cover out of shame, but to preserve our holiness.

I was thinking about that neutrality of original innocence. In original innocence, physical man was closer to animals, in the sense that there was no need to cover themselves, but their body was in completer unity. Inner man was completely separated from animals and fully understood that disunity and had no desire to be united with them. (Thus Adam’s joy at the creation of Eve, one like him) After the fall, we become less like animals, in the physical sense, because we cover ourselves because of this new disunity and parts that are “unpresentable”. But we grow closer to animals in an inner sense, following our desires and feelings, letting them control us, seeking pleasure and not the unity we were created for.