Reflection on January 13, 1982

https://www.ewtn.com/library/PAPALDOC/jp2tb68.htm

In Paragraph 3 SJPII points of 4 markers that we have looked at in mapping out this Theology of the Body. 1. God created them male and female. 2. The 2 become 1 flesh. 3. There is fruitfulness in procreation. 4. Have neither husbands or wives after Resurrection. The first three point to the importance in marriage, but the last shows that marriage is only for this world, a sign of what is to come in the next. While I was reading this, I was thinking about the priesthood and the understanding of celibacy. The sacrifice of not being married is one that Catholic priest accept and to many is seen as an unnecessary cost. But, as usual, this is the world looking at only the negative aspect, the thing you lose, the cost you have. In the debates about whether priest should be married or not, there is never usually the discussion of what the priest gains by not being married. Think about what the 4 markers above point to and what marriage is a sign is of. Marriage points to the relationship with God in the end. By sacrificing the sign of marriage here on earth, priest are trying to come closer to God and that relationship we will have after the resurrection, a fuller unity with God. The priest shares the gift of this unity through the graces given through ordination which allows him to bestow the sacraments through the church. Although they sacrifice the act of marriage here on Earth, it is to gain the experience of unity to God while on Earth. We can see it as a lose, and the world does, but think about what they gain, the unity they have, the graces they can bestow.

SJPII takes us back and looks at the importance of the created male and female as individuals. There is an importance there, that each is created in the image of God. The unity we have in marriage and procreation are gifts and experiences to help us further understand the reality that we are the image of God, but each of us as an individual is an image of God. The communion that we seek and are made for that is fulfilled earthly through marriage is fulfilled perfectly through communion with God after the Resurrection.

That inner innocence that has been mentioned several times, that small part of us that is linked back to our original innocence, that is a taste of Heaven as well. That inner innocence is no longer a small part of us but our whole self.

When you think of the indissolubility of marriage and what marriage is meant to be a sign of to the world, you have to ask what type of view of life after the Resurrection do people have when they believe in divorce?