Why Catholic Saints are said to be in heaven but not yet given their resurrected bodies?
score:1
Souls separated from their bodies understand not from their bodily senses but spiritually.
See:
- ch. 12 "Knowledge in the Separated Soul" of Life Everlasting by Fr. Réginald Garrigou-Lagrange, O.P., which quotes:
- Of the Knowledge of the Separated Soul, Summa Theologica I q. 89 by St. Thomas Aquinas:
Do these souls know what is happening on earth? St. Thomas replies:
In the natural order they do not know, because they are separated from the society of those who are still on the road to eternity. Nevertheless, if we restrict the question to the souls of the blessed, it is more probable to say that they, like the angels, do know what happens on earth, particularly what happens to those who are dear to them. This is a part of their accidental beatitude.*Those in purgatory too can have love of us, even though they do not know our actual state, just as we pray for them, although we do not know their actual state, their nearness, for example, to deliverance.
[ibid. a. 8 "Whether separated souls know that takes place on earth?"]
*See Life Everlasting ch. 31 "Accidental Beatitude"
Upvote:1
Why Catholic Saints are said to be in heaven but not yet given their resurrected bodies?
The saints resurrected bodies will be reunited to their glorified souls only in the last day, with the exception of Blessed Virgin Mary and St.Joseph who are in Heaven with their glorified souls reunited with their resurrected sinless bodies.
994 But there is more. Jesus links faith in the resurrection to his own person: "I am the Resurrection and the life."544 It is Jesus himself who on the last day will raise up those who have believed in him, who have eaten his body and drunk his blood.545 Already now in this present life he gives a sign and pledge of this by restoring some of the dead to life,546 announcing thereby his own Resurrection, though it was to be of another order. He speaks of this unique event as the "sign of Jonah,"547 the sign of the temple: he announces that he will be put to death but rise thereafter on the third day.548
545 Cf. Jn 5:24-25; 6:40,54.
How do the dead rise?
997 What is "rising"? In death, the separation of the soul from the body, the human body decays and the soul goes to meet God, while awaiting its reunion with its glorified body. God, in his almighty power, will definitively grant incorruptible life to our bodies by reuniting them with our souls, through the power of Jesus' Resurrection.
Does it mean when the Catholic faithful pray to the Saints for their intercession, they are conscious but have not received their resurrected bodies? If so, why do the Church said (Catechism paragraph 956-957) that the Saints are in heaven?
The Saints in Heaven intercedes for us in "spirit and truth" just like all the glorified souls must worship God in "spirit & truth" and not by means of the senses of flesh.
But a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and in truth, for the Father is seeking such as these to worship Him. 24God is Spirit, and His worshipers must worship Him in spirit and in truth.”(John4:23-24)
If the Saints in Heaven can already worship God in spirit & truth and intercedes for us having a beatific vision, then why is the need for the Saints glorified souls to be reunited in their resurrected bodies at the last day?
The Saints who live up a pious life on this earth like Jesus, and had used their bodies to glorify God, are the only bodies worthy to be resurrected at the last day.
999 How? Christ is raised with his own body: "See my hands and my feet, that it is I myself";553 but he did not return to an earthly life. So, in him, "all of them will rise again with their own bodies which they now bear," but Christ "will change our lowly body to be like his glorious body," into a "spiritual body":554
The rest of the baptized believers will be given a "spiritual body" because how can God resurrect bodies that already decay into dust?
1016 By death the soul is separated from the body, but in the resurrection God will give incorruptible life to our body, transformed by reunion with our soul. Just as Christ is risen and lives for ever, so all of us will rise at the last day.
1017 "We believe in the true resurrection of this flesh that we now possess" (Council of Lyons II: DS 854). We sow a corruptible body in the tomb, but he raises up an incorruptible body, a "spiritual body" (cf. 1 Cor 15:42-44).
The degree of glory of all the Saints in Heaven who are reunited with their resurrected bodies esp. the incorruptible bodies of the Saints shines more brightly than the glorified souls whose mortal flesh are turn into dust and were only given a "spiritual body".
More post
- 📝 Does the Eastern Orthodox Church have guidelines on which language to recite the Jesus Prayer in?
- 📝 Are non-Catholics allowed to go to confession?
- 📝 Which denominations follow prosperity theology?
- 📝 Should Christians marry non-Christians?
- 📝 What does the Bible say about vegetarian diets?
- 📝 Is there a way to know for sure that a given practice is true Catholic Tradition?
- 📝 How did Peter recognize Elijah and Moses?
- 📝 In "take up your cross daily" what does "cross" refer to?
- 📝 Are the Ten Commandments a perfect summary of all the commandments found in the Bible?
- 📝 Does the Catholic Church consider Constantine's vision of "by this symbol conquer" to be from God?
- 📝 The Aseity or Lack Thereof of the Son and the Holy Spirit with the Assumption of Classical Trinitarianism
- 📝 What is the difference, if any, between elders and priests in the LDS church?
- 📝 What is the relationship between God the Father and the Holy Spirit?
- 📝 According to the Eastern Orthodox, in what sense did the Theotokos (Virgin Mary) give birth to Christ's divinity?
- 📝 omniscience of God the Son in Matthew 24:36
- 📝 Were priests just dressed in secular garb in the early church?
- 📝 How long did Jesus know Judas?
- 📝 Why is "Friends" capitalized in 1 Maccabees in the NRSV?
- 📝 Is there any Biblical Basis for 400 years of silence between Old and New Testament?
- 📝 Is there any basis in Catholic theology or in the writings of major Catholic theologians for the belief that snakes used to have legs?
- 📝 Atheism is the default position. Isn't the burden of proof on the Christian to assert that God exists?
- 📝 How do non-reformed theologists argue against "God alone matters"?
- 📝 In Aquinas's first proof of God's existence, what is the difference between accidentally and essentially ordered causal series?
- 📝 What does it mean to say the Bible is the "Word of God" and how is it justified?
- 📝 Female Sunday School teachers for 17, 18 year old male students?
- 📝 What is the justification for relying on faith healing and conventional medicine?
- 📝 Is it just Christian Ministers who are Watchmen, or are we all...Ezekiel 3
- 📝 Does the Bible refer to Christian gentiles or the Church as "New Israelites", "New Israel" or "Spiritual Israel"?
- 📝 Are there any Christian sects that believe in "curative intercourse"?
- 📝 Did women ever sing publicly with men present, other than their close family, in Bible history?
Source: stackoverflow.com
Search Posts
Related post
- 📝 Why Catholic Saints are said to be in heaven but not yet given their resurrected bodies?
- 📝 What is the Authoritative Catholic explanation of why the Magi get a pass, yet Catholics are to reject astrology?
- 📝 What does "the saints are not keepers of the law, but legislators" mean?
- 📝 Why does the Catholic Church consider protestant baptisms valid sacraments, but not protestant marriages?
- 📝 Are couples with secular marriages not allowed to serve in their Catholic parish?
- 📝 How do Latter-day Saints answer the question of why human beings are not created with a perfect character from the outset?
- 📝 In Catholic exorcisms why the Holy Angels (such as the possessed's guardian angel) are not actively participating as soldiers in battle?
- 📝 Why are a Catholic bishop's Coat of Arms green and not purple?
- 📝 Why are the civilly married not allowed confession in the Catholic Church?
- 📝 Why are the functions for man clear in the Catholic Church leading and decisive hierarchy, but there is no corresponding function for women?
- 📝 If Protestants won't ask dead saints to intercede because there is no mediator but Jesus then why do they ask living Christians to pray for them?
- 📝 Why is the word 'Lord' in all caps in the OT but not in the NT?
- 📝 Why does the Roman Catholic Church not hold to the perspicuity of Scripture?
- 📝 Why can the Catholic Church declare one person a saint but has never declared another damned?
- 📝 According to reformed theology, why are certain important doctrines not "obvious"? [i.e. why does the Westminister Confession even exist?]
- 📝 Why are we not seeing miracles in our lives?
- 📝 Jesus said no one had gone into heaven except the Son of Man, but what about Elijah?
- 📝 Why did God describe the light as being good, but not the darkness?
- 📝 What arguments are given that Ephesians was not written by Paul?
- 📝 Why is Origen considered a Church Father, but not a saint?
- 📝 Are there any biblical examples of Early Church disciples praying to deceased saints in order to request their intercessory prayer?
- 📝 Are there any examples of married, male, non-martyred (white crown), non-royal, canonized Catholic Saints excluding Saint Joseph?
- 📝 Why are Christian books not Public Domain?
- 📝 Why do Syrian Orthodox churches use only paintings and not sculptures, unlike Catholic churches?
- 📝 How comparable are the concepts of the Teaching Magisterium in the Catholic Church and the Jehovah's Witnesses view of their Watch Tower society?
- 📝 What scriptural arguments are there, if any, that there is hell but it is not eternal?
- 📝 Why does the Catholic church not sanction the KJV translation?
- 📝 If we will have free will and be sinless in Heaven at the same time, then why did God not create a world with sinless free creatures to begin with?
- 📝 Why are the wicked resurrected only to be destroyed and sent to the Lake of Fire?
- 📝 Why doesn't the Catholic Church give indulgences to everybody, regardless of their works?
