Nathan March

5 December 2002

 

THEO 507 INTRO TO THE CATHOLIC FAITH

REFLECTION PAPER V

 

The history of man is defined by man’s realization of his own temporality and imminent death.  From time immemorial mankind has sought to understand the mystery of death: what happens to the soul when it is separated from the body?  Central to my own personal understanding of life is the existential question of the end of my own existence.  The discussions and readings from class have revealed my own limited understanding of death.

Christoph Schönborn in his chapter on Death asks the question: “Is death not something natural and thus something willed by God?” (LCCC 145)  I have a hard time reconciling the notion of death as “the wages of sin” (Rom 6:23), as punishment, the consequence of sin with the fact that  “God did not make death, and he does not delight in the death of the living.  For he created all things that they might exist.” (WIS 1:13-14)

The Catechism of the Catholic Church explains that death was “contrary to the plan of God.” (CCC 1008)  Further, man was created incorruptible. (Wis 2:23)  Thus, death was something “from which man would have been immune had he not sinned.” (CCC 1008)  It follows since, “God upholds and sustains creation.” (CCC 301) that if man had “upheld his original bond of friendship with God, then death would have had no power over him.” (LCCC 146)  This was presented in class in that by his sin, man separated himself from the relationship with God from which his material existence is sustained.  In this respect, death is the consequence of sin but not the creation of God.

I can’t quite see how this notion of death fits with Paul’s more legalistic presentation of death as “the wages of sin.”  Granted, Paul is moving away from the law and stressing that in Christ we are dead to the law of sin and death.  But at some point there appears to have been a notion of death as the retribution justly deserved as punishment for sin.  I do not see how this corresponds with the previous idea of man walking away from a sustaining relationship with God.

Regardless, what is important is not so much the origin of death as the final destination by which, “death is the gateway.” (LCCC 148)  Death is the end of man’s earthly pilgrimage.  This pilgrimage is a time of grace and mercy offered to him by God for the purpose of his divine plan and so that man may choose his final destiny. (CCC 264)  For the Christian, the final destiny that is chosen is God himself, offered in his Son.  Thus the Catechism states, “Christian death is this: through Baptism, the Christian has already, “died with Christ” sacramentally, in order to live a new life; and if we die in Christ’s grace, physical death completes this “dying with Christ.”  (CCC 1010) Death no longer is the end, but becomes a precondition for then “rising with Christ”.  Therefore, since he has risen again, we hope to be raised from the dead with him. (LCCC 142)