Thirty-second Sunday C in Ordinary Time Lk 20,27-38

Introduction.

To live forever – a person not only longed, longs but will still desire.
The surrounding nature, our cemeteries during these days, the liturgical texts at the end of the church year, all this more often reminds us of an ever-present theme: to live, to live forever, as the people before us longed, we today, and those who do not yet know life natural or spiritual.

Sermon
Only a person can ask about what was, what is, what will be, about the meaning of life. Man lives from hope, many small hopes, and one great hope.

That hope is giving, can be given, and only Jesus, who says of God, “He is not the God of the dead, but of the living, for all live for him” (Lk 20:38).

Jesus points out hope to the Sadducees, who, in the time of Jesus, had an influence on the nation as teachers. Because, unlike the Pharisees, they do not recognize the resurrection. They adhered only to the Five Books of Moses and did not want to see a hint of future life in them. They come to Jesus with the question, referring to Moses (cf. Deuteronomy 25:5): “If a brother who had a wife but was childless dies to a man, his brother is to marry her and father offspring to his brother” (Lk 20:28). The seven brothers will gradually have the same woman as their wife. And they ask, “To which of them will a woman be a wife at the resurrection” (Lk 20:33)? Why do they ask? What are they doing with this? They disagree with Jesus’ teaching about hope. And Jesus’ belief in the resurrection leads to the absurd. With this question, the Sadducees reveal their impossible idea of the resurrection. Their view of life after death consists in continuing life on earth under the same circumstances. Jesus’ answer is clear. “Those recognized as worthy of that age and resurrection no longer marry or marry. They cannot die anymore because they are like angels and are sons of God because they are sons of the resurrection” (Lk 20:35).
Jesus reveals the unbelief of the Sadducees. It is impossible to believe in God, who created everything for man and planned a noble future for him, and would then determine for man the nothingness in the grave. In the end, God would reign over the vast cemetery; he would be the God of the dead and the dead himself. A person’s whole life would be a disgusting prank if God told us about eternal light, joy, and happiness and said that it was not for us. However, God Himself gives signs and teaches everyone to accept Him as the Alpha and Omega of all in which hope fore of eternal life. Jesus ends the attack of the Sadducees by pointing out what they believe, which they deny by their infidelity, and He also gives them hope and warning: “He is not the God of the dead, but of the living. You are sorely mistaken” (Mark.12:27). Jesus’ teachings go even further. He teaches about judgment on the last day. However, not all will be resurrected to eternal life. Jesus also teaches about eternal punishment (cf. Mt 25:46). In today’s gospel, Jesus emphasizes a positive view of the Resurrection.

The thought of death cannot be avoided by an ordinary person using reason. Experts confirm this fact. People believe, belief, and will believe in the afterlife; although they imagine it differently, they agree on one thing: a person’s life does not end with death. Horace put it: “I will not die altogether” (I. 4). Plato considers himself the founder of dualism, the teaching that man consists of two parts: the material body and the immortal spiritual soul. He talks about the special relationship between them. After death, supposedly, the body will crumble, but the soul, as a complete unit, will perfectly live on. He is living his eternity. Aristotle goes even further and teaches that, according to him, the soul receives a kind of subtle body at the resurrection but does not go into detail. The Bible differs in the truth about eternal life from ancient philosophers, or others, even today, who have difficulty accepting the teachings of Sacred Scripture.
In the Old Testament on the martyrdom of the Maccabees brothers, what is important is that faith in immortality and resurrection is already clearly pronounced. People can destroy life, but God has the power to awaken the dead to life (cf. 2 Mach 7:9). The writing of the Old Testament does not divide a person into two units, but only into an individual who, although it has two components, neither of them completely disappears by death. Here one can see the contradiction in the teachings between the Sadducees and the Pharisees. The Sadducees do not want to see a hint of future life. According to them, the souls of the righteous after death go to a kind of underworld, where, like shadows, they experience their further destiny. The evil ones disappear altogether with death. Jesus will not give them the truth.
After death, a person lives as a unit with a soul and a body. Both have done good or evil, and both will have to bear the consequence of their actions. Today we adhere to the teachings of St. Thomas Aquinas, who sees an incomplete unit spontaneously focused on the material body in the human soul. The soul lives even after disintegration, but it is an imperfect life waiting for its material side. The matter is complex; it interferes with the future because no one except Christ has returned from there.
The Church teaches two doctrinal truths:
The soul does not perish at death, nor does it immerse itself in a kind of sleep until the resurrection; it comes before a particular judgment of God and, after the decision, immediately experiences its result.
We will be resurrected in our flesh.
In First Corinthians, St. Paul writes, “How do the dead rise? In what body will they come?” Fool! What you sow will not come to life if it does not die first. And what you sow, you do not sow the future body, but the bare grain… But God gives him the body he wants, and each seed his own body. Not everybody is the same, but another is human…” (1 Corinthians 15:35-39). Would we like to know the details? Today it is still the mystery of God. It gives us hope. We believe in Christ. We must live the words of Christ.

We believe in the doctrine of a new life with God, which arose not from resistance to life but from a desire to live. “They cannot die anymore” (Lk 20:36).

“We want you to live… After all, life is so beautiful and the light so beautiful,” the executioners said to the third-century martyr, Pionio, who replied, “Yes, I know that life is beautiful, but a more beautiful life awaits me. The light is beautiful, but I long for a more true light. I also know that the earth is beautiful and the work of God. I renounce all this, not because I despise it, but because I expect something greater.”

Faith in the Resurrection does not distract believers from moral duties but prompts them to fulfill them. The hope of resurrection is the fountain of every good act because the expectation of a reward starts the soul to do good.

Every worker is willing to do hard work when he knows what reward awaits him… He who believes that his body will be resurrected from the dead takes care of the clothes of his soul and does not stain them. He who does not believe in the resurrection indulges immorality and harms his own body as if the body were not his.

Faith in the Resurrection is a matter of great doctrine and a warning to the Catholic Church; it is excellent and necessary, despite many negations, based on the truth. Cyril of Jerusalem wrote about it: “The Greeks are fighting against it, and the delusional, in turn, want to change it. There are many contradictions, but there is only one truth” (Catechesis 18:1).
The Eucharist comes into our contemplation when Jesus Himself assures us, “He who eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him at the last day” (Jn 6:54).
Who among us at least once has not longed to live forever, without pain, sadness, parting, fear…? Even today, at this time, it is right to accept the words of Jesus.