Homily

Thomas placed his hands into the wound of Jesus, touching His body to make sure he was not seeing a ghost. Jesus was able to enter a room even though the doors were locked, and yet, at the same time, His body could be touched, and His wounds were clearly visible. It’s always fun for me to ask people, “Does Jesus have a body in heaven?” Most people immediately want to say “No,” but the suspicious ones wait a few seconds to think about it because they smell a trap. Of course Jesus has His body in heaven, and any other place He may be—and it’s a mystery beyond the laws of physics and biology. But it’s a mystery we shall all share in at the end of time. Christ came to become a man and take on flesh, sharing our humanity; and our flesh, though long decomposed or carbonized will be given back to us, transformed as we share in the glory of Christ’s resurrection. Jesus didn’t shuck off His flesh after His resurrection. He kept it as a sign of His eternal union with mankind, and we shall keep our own flesh also by the gift of His loving kindness.

When I was young and the topic of the resurrection of the dead came up in class, I sometimes imagined how great that would be. You could eat all you wanted, you would never get hurt no matter what you did and probably you could fly. How cool that would be. But some time ago, an amazingly accomplished teacher in one of local Catholic grade schools was talking about this same topic in religion class and a number of his 8th grade students couldn’t accept the idea of the resurrection of the dead. They thought it was disgusting and “gross.” It made me think once again about how our attitudes about death and the dignity of our bodies has changed during my lifetime. Modesty in dress used to be considered an important value. Why would you show so much of yourself to the whole world and why would you want to do that? How many people treat their bodies not as a real part of who they are but as billboards and commercial ads for what they want people to think they are. Sexy, and/or, powerful, and/or “one-of-a-kind,” and/or “look at me world.”

Smoking tobacco is bad, but smoking pot is good. We must eat natural foods with no additives, even as we take a pill with artificial hormones to keep us from getting pregnant. We can pass a law to ban plastic bags in order to save life in the oceans, but we can’t pass a law forbidding street corner begging when much of that begging is for cash to buy drugs or booze that is harmful to the lives of human beings. And what about the parents today who are injecting their children with hormones to stop puberty or to mimic the hormones of another sex because they are certain their children are physically the wrong gender? And it’s not only legal in certain quarters it is considered enlightened parenting.

It’s easy to go on with other examples of how we see our bodies today and how we value or rather dis-value and discount their worth to us in a culture that moves further and further away from a Christian worldview. But I will give you just one more example. The state of Washington is ready to pass a bill that will allow for the composting of dead bodies. Yes—the composting of corpses. They don’t call it that. They call it “natural organic reduction,” and it does sound all that natural, in a way. Don’t bodies decompose in graves after burial? Of course they do. But in this process the body is placed in a metal tube with wood chips, straw and alfalfa, and rotated on a regular basis. It gives new meaning to the term “rolling over in his grave.” Instead of the months and years that actual natural decomposition takes, composting gets rid of you in 4-7 weeks, and then you can take it with you to use in your garden. “Grandma, what’s that in that wheelbarrow?” “Oh, Johnny, that’s Grandpa. He’s going to help us grow some big juicy tomatoes.” Actually the process ends up giving you two wheelbarrows worth of compost so Grandpa can help with the zucchini as well. They make it sound so natural and simple. Do you really think bones decompose in four weeks? Then what do they do with them?

The sponsor of the Washington bill says, “We’re all going to die—and here’s an area where technology has done nothing for us.... It just seems like an area that is ripe for having technology help give us some better options than we used to have.” The woman who formed a company to perform this composting calls it a “death care option” that is also “environmentally friendly and a meaningful option.” Meaningful to whom? The director of the Washington State Funeral Association says, “To provide more options for people’s choices is a very exciting thing.” Ah, yes. It’s all about choices, and the more the better! So we are told, again and again. And now they will have to open a new section at Jerry’s Garden Department. Compost will have to be labeled and let’s hope that once again we are offered more choices. “I heard that Polynesian works best for roses, and Canadians are good for potatoes.”

Each thing, each choice, each option, each right that we have never seen before but comes along our way has an effect on our culture, on the way we see human beings living in this world, and on our faith. We can’t just turn a blind eye and say “that doesn’t affect me”—because, while we ourselves may not agree with or make use of all these new choices we have, we can be sure that many of our neighbors WILL agree, accept or use them also. This has consequences for us all.

But dear friends, we must stand with Christ our Lord. We must learn from Him what it is to be a true and authentic human person, instead of relying on public opinion and surrendering truth to sentimental appeals and newly discovered human rights that no one could have imagined fifty years ago. And with each new technological marvel and each new human right we open ourselves up to the potential degradation and cheapening of human life. How we treat our dead shows us what we think about life. How crazy is it to say, “Grandma will live forever in my heart,” knowing that your kids will turn your heart into compost? A short eternity.

St. Thomas touched the body of Christ and so will we also do this morning, not with our hands but with our mouths, not with our fingers but with our souls. We cherish His Body and Blood, and we will carry His Body and Blood with us today. May we listen to Him and understand what is true respect for our bodies and our souls, as one person, one follower, one disciple of Christ our Lord.