We had a really interesting conversation in the high school class last Sunday morning. It went like this. One of the teachers heard a Bart Simpson quote that went something like, “If you’re a really good person, but you have to have your leg amputated, will your leg be waiting for you in Heaven after you die?”
Most of the class hadn’t thought about the idea that the Creeds specify a “resurrection of the body” not just some ghostly existence with God after death. So we debated that one for a little while. Then we got into the idea of what a “perfected” body would look like. The group agreed that you, in Heaven, receive the body God has always wanted you to have. But we weren’t sure what that would look like. Would it mean a perfectly sculpted, fit, thin, American-beautiful body? Would it mean the body you have now, but free of whatever you don’t like about it? Or would it mean something totally different?
We didn’t follow our lesson plan at all, but the people there really sank their teeth into this discussion, and reminded us all of the value of having a day when we find out what’s on our minds.
Here (.doc file) is a paper on the possibility of resurrection from a materialist (the resurrection of the body rather than the resurrection of the soul or what have you) perspective. It’s pretty great, though perhaps dense at times. It’s by Notre Dame philosopher Peter Van Inwagen and called “I look for the Resurrection of the Dead and the Life of the World to Come.”