God of the Living

Saturday, November 23rd Readings Reflection: Saturday of the Thirty-third Week in Ordinary Time

Today is the eve of the Last Sunday After Pentecost, the eve of the Feast of Christ the King in the new liturgical calendar. Today’s Gospel is appropriately triumphant, as Jesus makes a profound declaration about God’s nature: “[H]e is not the God of the dead, but of the living: for all live to [H]im” (Lk 20:38 DRB). Christ cited, as evidence for His declaration, God’s words to Moses from the Burning Bush: “I am the God of thy father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob” (Exod 3:6).

Christ’s statement in today’s Gospel reveals the truth about life after death. As human beings, we are comprised of both a body and a soul; the two exist in a necessary connection in order to together comprise a human being. All visible beings are comprised of matter and form, and in the case of human beings, the body is the matter and the soul is the form. When one is missing—either matter or form—the human person is incomplete. For this reason, when a person dies and his soul leaves his body, his corpse can no longer philosophically be called a human body, for it is mere matter that is missing its life-giving form, the soul.

After we die, our bodies and souls are separated until Christ’s Second Coming. However, since body and soul are so closely connected to comprise a human person, God will raise our bodies again at the end of time. After that, for all eternity, our bodies will be glorified and united with our souls to share either our eternal reward or our eternal punishment. In Heaven, we shall worship God out of perfect charity; in Hell, we shall do so out of sheer necessity, for all existence must worship God. However, since there is no love in Hell, the damned do so most unwillingly.

Nonetheless, Christ is King over both the righteous and the unrighteous, and all shall recognize His kingship when He comes again to judge the living and the dead. To Him, all are alive, for our eternal souls never die. Although they are hidden from earthly site, the souls of the departed are very much alive, awaiting the day when their souls will be reunited with their bodies. For this reason, God can rightfully be called the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, because their souls are still alive, even though their matters have disintegrated into dust.

God is God of the living, not of the dead, because no man ever dies (that is, ceases to exist) under His omnipotent gaze. In this Month of All souls, may we remember to pray for the souls of those who have gone before us into eternity, that the souls suffering in Purgatory might be permitted to enter their heavenly home quickly by our prayers.