By Jenny Koch
Connecting Creed and Life
Editor’s note: For 2025, the weekly Connecting Faith and Life column will be renamed Connecting Creed and Life. To celebrate the 2025 Jubilee Year and the 1,700th anniversary of the Council of Nicaea, the columns will consist of reflections on the Nicene Creed, corresponding with related paragraphs in the Catechism of the Catholic Church (CCC).
“I Want My Body Back!” (CCC 988-1004)
It’s mid-life crisis time in my world. The “Oregon Trail” generation is starting to have knee problems, our grey hairs are now showing and every room has their own pair of reading glasses. Can you relate? Do you often wonder how your body is going to make it another 5, 10 or 50 years? If so, you’re probably in the majority. We age with time and our frail bodies do not live up to the expectations we have as teens. Our beautiful Catholic faith, however, offers insight into the mind-body-soul connection that brings hope and promise to our failing bodies. Our creed reminds us that we “believe in the Resurrection of the Body.” So, whether you are satisfied or not with your earthly body, the Catholic Church is pretty clear that your mortal body is yours to keep. With what arms will we hug him? What eyes will see his face? It seems that the creator of the universe made the mind, body and soul together. So, in God’s time, when we dwell in his presence, we will meet him face to face. It will be our face, the face reading this page.
When I visited the Catacombs in Italy, I remember being very surprised to see so many boats and whales. I don’t know what I expected to see — maybe crosses or Latin words — but the early Christians relied on the “sign of Jonah” as a constant reminder of the basics of their faith. Jonah was not only a prophet who preached repentance, but he was also a living, breathing person who came back to life. He was spit out of the whale, his entire body resurrected in a sense. He was gone for three days and came back. Just like Jesus! And the early Christians understood that this is what will happen to them. Despite the torture, despite the terror, they would rise to eternal life. That same promise awaits us. It is indeed the culmination of what we believe, and it’s important that we reflect on it, for it has many implications for how we live our lives today.
Tertullian, an Early Christian Father sums it up well: “The resurrection of the dead is Christian men’s confidence. By believing it we are what we claim to be.” Meditating upon and praying about the Resurrection of the Body will not make us proud or righteous. Unfortunately, it won’t make our metabolism better or improve our skin tone. However, a proper understanding of our bodies and subsequent Resurrection of the Body gives us hope. Hope in the frailty, hope in the loss of eyesight and hope during the sore muscles. The Catechism spells out the basics for us. Rising means “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” (997). While the “how” definitely “exceeds our imagination and understanding … our participation in the Eucharist gives us a foretaste of Christ’s transfiguration of our bodies.” Every Sunday, “nourished with his body in the Eucharist, we already belong to the Body of Christ” (1003). We are “tiny tabernacles” taking Jesus into the world while at the same time being transformed by this sacrament.
Our bodies are very important, and the Resurrection of the Body is a critical part of our faith. St. Paul reminds us that, “The body is meant for the Lord, and the Lord for the body. And God raised the Lord and will also raise us up by his power. Do you now know that your bodies are members of Christ? You are not your own. So glorify God in your body” (1 Corinthians 6:13-15, 19-20). The Catechism also teaches us to focus on human dignity as we await our eternal fate — “In expectation of that day, the believer’s body and soul already participate in the dignity of belonging to Christ. This dignity entails the demand that he should treat with respect his own body, but also the body of every other person, especially the suffering” (1004). We will get our bodies back. Fully transformed. Fully resurrected. Fully Redeemed. Until that day, let us focus our efforts in building up others around us to realize the same, whether that be the poor and needy or sick and suffering.
Jenny Koch is a local publisher at Decided Excellence Catholic Media. Her family attends Corpus Christi Parish in Evansville.