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Catholicism Week 20Death Judgement Heaven and Hell Part 2

What are, or more accurately, who are angels? The Book of Hebrews tells us this about angels, Hebrews 1:14 (RSV2CE) 14 Are they not all ministering spirits sent forth to serve, for the sake of those who are to obtain salvation? I love the fact that the Bible embraces all of creation, animals, plants, crawling creatures and creatures that swim in the sea, insects and life at the cellular level, mountains and deserts and jungle forests, clouds and hail stones and hurricanes, life at every level that we can see and hear. But the Bible also embraces all that is unseen in God’s creation, including angels and archangels that Bishop Barron believes exist at the very least at the same mind-numbing variation as the physical life that we can see. Think of all the variety of life on the spectrum from ameba to the largest dinosaurs that ever lived, and everything in between. That would include millions of species still living and all those that are now extinct. Thomas Aquinas believed that there must be at the very least that same level of diversity in the created beings we cannot see, as the ones we can see. He imagines countless varieties of angels and spirit beings. Now that I have given this some thought and allowed my imagination out of its box a little, I have to agree with him, why would God leave that kind of creative void in the invisible world. Bishop talks about all those beings that live and move and have their being at a higher pitch of existence. That is an interesting way to talk about angels, we know that humans have an electrical footprint, a charged profile that can be measured. Looking through an infra-red camera we give off heat that can be seen. Then think about God for a moment, who is pure light. The light that God is blinded St. Paul at his conversion, brighter than the noon day sun. We used to love catching fireflies when I was a kid, and put them into jars. I love watching film of all the creatures living down deep in the ocean that give off their own electrical light, creatures that we had never dreamed of, and that had never been seen before. Surely angels are those created beings that live at a higher electrical charge, a higher frequency.

Then Bishop takes us into the mind of Thomas Aquinas as he imagined the life of angels, calling them “separated intelligences”. Powerful beings that always brought fear to the humans that came in contact with them. Thomas saw each of them as a species in and of themselves. He explained it this way, think of all the humans belonging to the homo sapiens species, those that lived thousands of years before our generation, all those alive today, and all those will live in the future…that is one species. Aquinas imagined all of those human beings in that one species would be equal to just one angel…my mind goes

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numb. These are magnificent creatures with superior knowledge and strong wills, but they are not limited by physical matter. In our Catholic tradition these incredible beings praise and worship God continually day and night, seraphim, the highest order of angels are called “the burnt ones” in ancient Hebrew. These are the angels that burst into holy flames, the consuming fire that God is, because of their closeness to Him. Angels are able to interact with us as humans, in the much the same way an adult can interact with young children by lowing themselves to the level of a child and talk in baby talk. For many of us, all this discussion of angels and the “unseen” world is still a bit much to take in, but Bishop points out that it could be we are the ones that limiting the creativity of God, and the different dimensions

of this universe. Physicists today talk about worm holes in space that could possibly take us to another dimension or even another universe. If scientists can allow the science of physics that much imagination and creativity, why would we want to limit what God can do in an unseen world that most of us know deep down truly does exist?

In the same way we know of human beings that have fallen away from God, and become evil, wicked people, the Church has always taught about fallen angels that are evil, and wicked trying to take down the Kingdom of God on this earth. Isaiah 14:11–19 (RSV2CE) 11 Your pomp is brought down to Sheol, the sound of your harps; maggots are the bed beneath you, and worms are your covering. 12 “How you are fallen from heaven, O Day Star, son of Dawn! How you are cut down to the ground, you who laid the nations low! 13 You said in your heart, ‘I will ascend to heaven; above the stars of God I will set my throne on high; I will sit on the mount of assembly in the far north; 14 I will ascend above the heights of the clouds, I will make myself like the Most High.’ 15 But you are brought down to Sheol, to the depths of the Pit. 16 Those who see you will stare at you, and ponder over you: ‘Is this the man who made the earth tremble, who shook kingdoms, 17 who made the world like a desert and overthrew its cities, who did not let his prisoners go home?’ 18 All the kings of the nations lie in glory, each in his own tomb; 19 but you are cast out, away from your sepulchre, like a loathed untimely birth, clothed with the slain, those pierced by the sword, who go down to the stones of the Pit, like a dead body trodden under foot. Think about how evil Hitler was, now take that evil to a higher and more powerful plane, and now we begin to see the devil that controlled Hitler. But we do pause for a moment right here and remind ourselves that the devil and all his demons combined are no rival to God. Satan is a created being that allowed his pride to destroy him, and he has been thrown and totally defeated by the Blood of Jesus on the cross. His main weapon of destroying lives is deception, he takes over people with his lies. And any power he has is very limited and controlled by God, he can only go so far…and no more. Our choices in this life either give him access into our lives our drive him away, shutting him out completely from any influence over us. We cannot underestimate the spiritual warfare going on all around us at this very moment. Ephesians 6:12 (RSV2CE) 12 For we are not contending against flesh and blood, but against the principalities, against the powers, against the world rulers of this present darkness, against the spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places.

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Much discussion has happened over the anti-Christ over the last 30 years, all the evil candidates that you can imagine have been that title, from Hitler to the Pope. Bishop takes us to the painting in Orvieto of the anti-Christ, depicted in a very interesting way. Notice the arm of the devil extending through the vestment of the anti-Christ as he speaks into his ear. In reality satan comes at us on many different levels and in many different ways. You can spend time with any of the priests that are part of the ministry of exorcism, and they will give you hair raising accounts of how sometimes the devil comes at us with all his evil exposed, raw and violent. There are many accounts in the Bible of this approach…but most of the time he takes a much more subtle approach through inuendo, questioning God’s wisdom and compassion, as it relates to each of our lives. Sin rips at the fabric of our society through our own personal sin, and through institutional sin like abortion clinics, and the segregation laws in past decades, and homeless on the

streets of LA and Seattle…but satan also comes at us with an armed frontal assault through depression, oppression, and even possession. Secular society acknowledges our personal failings, and the injustice of institutional wrongs, but they have no clue what to do with direct demonic attack. You can explain away much of it through mental illness, but not all of that is just mental illness. Here is the good news, Jesus confronted all three forms of sin, personal, institutional, and full on frontal assault…and He defeated all of it…the power of all sin has been destroyed, end of story. We can stand up in the name of Jesus and take the devil down. How many angels are there…well we know from the Bible 1/3 of the angels rebelled against God and were cast down, leaving 2/3 as the warriors of heaven. I really like those odds. I agree with Thomas Aquinas and with Bishop, I think there are a whole lot of them, myriads and myriads of them the Bible tells us. And why not, Bishop points out how many insects God created, why not that many and more angels? We know each of us has a guardian angels, there is a few bus loads right there.

Finally we come to heaven…Bishop sums it up this way, we have come to the final goal of our Catholic faith. The liturgy, the sacraments, our study of the Word, and living this Christian life is all pointing toward and striving for our final place of rest, eternity in heaven. Bishop makes some amazing statements that we don’t what to just rush through to get to the end. Like this, God wants to share with us His God life, His trinitarian God life. Let that simmer for a minute. He wants to sweep each and everyone of us up in His arms of love, He became one of us so we could share in the divine life of God Himself. That ought to fire you up in some way this morning. Heaven is where God’s love has come to full completion. St. Paul compared faith, hope, and love and his declaration was love was the greatest and it would remain. That makes total sense, faith and hope fade a way in heaven, they are no needed any longer…only love remains. Bishop concentrates on three visions of heaven, the beatific vision, the City of God, and the New Heavens and the New Earth.

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First he takes us to Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris, thank God the north rose glass window was saved in the fire. St. Thomas Aquinas would have been very familiar with that beautiful window as he studied theology in Paris. Aquinas believed that man always reaches beyond himself for the true, the good, and the beautiful. The mind seeks the truth, and finds a limited amount of truth in this world we are born into, but not enough truth to satisfy…we want all the truth, God wired us that way. Our wills seek the good, and the world produces some good, but not nearly

enough. We want all the good that is out there. The soul searches high and low for the beautiful, and once again the would has much beauty, our souls ache for that vision of beauty that satisfies our longing, and so we keep on searching. We were created to unite ourselves with ultimate truth, and good, and beauty…and we know we must search beyond this world for truth, goodness, and beauty that transcends this earth, and finally is only found in God. The world only leaves us with an ache for more, somehow we have a desire beyond our desire. Heaven is the fulfillment of the desire beyond our desire. Bishop first saw the Rose Window in Notre Dame in June of 1989, and he stood stunned for over twenty minutes. After that day, he came back to that same spot everyday until Christmas of that year. The complexity, and yet the overwhelming beauty and harmony was more than he could take in, in one moment of time, he had to come back again and again and again.

The window is based on the number 8, Christ and His Mother are surround by eight holy images, and those by sixteen, and finally two rows of thirty two. That all ands up to 88 images…it is all about the number 8. And 8 is the number of eternity, our whole lives we live 7 day weeks, but when we die we enter the 8th

day…the day of eternity. St. Thomas once again, tells us the saints in heaven discover for their delight just how incomprehensible God is. The more we come to know about God, only feeds our hunger to know more. Many of us might wonder if staring at that window might become a little boring after a couple million years, and that is why Bishop now takes us to the City of God. Now we have and entire city of visons to gaze upon. I have been to New York a few times, and it truly is the “city that never sleeps”. Grand Central Station was more than I could handle, and then you step onto the streets of New York, or ride the subway with all those people. Street musicians, people going in every direction, millions of them. I’m from Buhler for heaven’s sake. Times Square is lights and noise and people everywhere you look. That’s New York now imagine…imagine the City of God. I know Jackie pretty well, since we have been married for 26 years. But what if we lived in a city

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where we knew everyone that completely. That kind of knowledge and harmony is beyond imagination. All our lives, that lives of all that have gone before us shared together in love and perfect harmony. What is keeping us from that now, our sin and selfishness. But that won’t be a problem in heaven, sin and selfishness will be things of the past.

The third and final discussion Bishop opens up, the New Heavens and the New Earth. Here we have to concentrate on resurrection and restoration. The body of Jesus was resurrected from the corruption of death, Jesus loved His earthly body so well, He took it with Him to heaven. Many Christians, including lots of Catholics think that the afterlife is all about getting rid of

this body, and living in a completely immaterial world. That is not good Bible teaching. Jesus was resurrected with flesh and bones. Doubting Thomas put his hand in the wounded side of Jesus. The two on the road to Emmaus broke bread with Jesus. Jesus fixed breakfast for heaven’s sake on the shore of Galilee. Jesus is not a ghost, He is the second person of the Godhead, the son of the living God. He is the embodied Son of God. During Mass we hear the words, “This is my body”… not this is my spirit, or this is my soul. The Nicene Creed ends with, “We look for the resurrection of the dead and the life of the world to come.” Our bodies will not be left behind, but instead the transfiguration of the body will take place, and we will be reunited with our bodies. God made all things in this creation, and He found them all very good. What will the resurrected body look like, we have some clues from sacred scripture, Jesus was resurrected in his early thirties, but I can’t guarantee that will be the age of your or my resurrected bodies. Somehow in heaven I don’t think we will really care that age we look. I do think we will shine with the light of God in our resurrected bodies. No more disease or illness, or afib…thank you Jesus. I don’t believe our imaginations can conceive of all of this, not yet. I agree with Bishop, if you want to anticipate what heaven will be like, get ready for an eternity of surprises. I like comparing a two dimensional square or triangle to what happens when those same forms enter into the third dimensional world, A square is transformed into a cube, still in the shape of a square but now seen for all three dimension with height and width and depth. A triangle becomes a pyramid in the third dimension. Quantum Physics now tells us that there may be five or six dimensions in this universe, or even more. Our imagination is not developed enough to grasp all of this.

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Catholicism is a way of seeing…it is a manner of life. It has distinct texture, feel, and resonance. And ultimately it all revolves around and leads to, and is centered in Jesus Christ…the Word made flesh…the Son of the Living God. Amen.