“Easter should make rebels of us all,” wrote David Bentley Hart, an ornery theologian I happen to like. It’s one of my favorite things he’s ever said. And it is, in short, the moral of these readings from the 32nd Sunday in Ordinary Time, that our faith should give us courage, rebellious courage.
It’s the courage St. Paul implied when he taunted death: “O death, where is thy sting?” (1 Cor. 15:55) The idea is simple: that Christ rose from the dead—the same Christ who now lives in us by faith and the Holy Spirit and the sacraments—means that we too will rise from the dead, that in earthly death life is changed, not ended; the grave is nothing. Which means we ought, if we fully realize it, to be liberated from fear and from all that fear does. Not fearing death, we ought now to feel free to live the radical life Jesus taught us to live no matter the danger and no matter the hostility. Easter should make us rebels, you see. Fearless, we should cause trouble. Because we know that death has lost its sting, that heaven awaits.
This is the view of things sub specie aeternitatis, under the aspect of eternity, which is the view we Christians should have. When we think of our relationships, our marriages or our friendships, we should think of them considering heaven. That is, we should love our spouses like we’ll be with them in heaven for ever. Doing so will change our marriage. Also, we should treat our friends, strangers too, like we’ll be with them forever in heaven. That too will change our behavior. Because we will be in heaven with them, unless we refuse. That’s what Jesus was trying to get across to the Sadducees, that God is a God of the living and that since God is eternal, so will those who live in him live forever—and so we’d better start acting like it!
We Christians must see the bigger, infinite picture. When we make decisions about our lives, we must ask ourselves, “Will this help me get to heaven?” When we see another person, we should ask ourselves, “How should I treat them, so we can get to heaven together?” Those are the sorts of questions that’ll make you a saint, those around you too. So why not ask them, these questions of holiness? Because they will change you, your whole world, in fact.
