Alive in God

HOMILY: Thirty-Second Sunday in Ordinary Time 

Luke 20:27-38

6 November 2022

Fr. Ricky Cañet Montañez, AA

A friend who lost her husband to Covid once asked me this question — “In the afterlife, are we going to recognise one another?”  What an interesting question indeed but one that I really could not answer with accuracy as I have not yet experienced the afterlife! What I do know is that those of us who yearn for a lost loved one do wonder: “If we find each other in heaven, will our relationship be the same, as though time had not passed?” Only God really knows and we can only hope in His promises.

As we inch closer to the end of the liturgical year, we are asked to think about end-of-life issues. This Sunday’s readings nudge us more particularly in the direction of the resurrection. The passage from the Book of Maccabees relates to us how a mother and her children’s firm belief in the resurrection  made them endure a painful martyrdom. In contrast, the Sadducees ask Jesus in the gospel passage about consecutive marriages to debunk the belief in the resurrection of the dead. 

First of all, it is important to note why the Sadducees do not believe in the afterlife. They had restricted their beliefs to the Pentateuch, the first five books of the Bible, namely (Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy) supposedly written by Moses and containing the essence of the Jewish Law. They did not believe in the immortality of a soul. They believed the dead went to a permanent place called Sheol which was neither a place of punishment nor reward. For them, death was the end of everything.  The Pharisees on the other hand, accepted some beliefs in the later writings of the Old Testament — i.e. the existence of spirits and angels, and the resurrection of the dead. Death for them was a transition to another beginning. 

To test Jesus and to assert their own faith convictions, the Sadducees proposed an imagined situation of seven brothers who died one after another. Eventually, all seven brothers married one and the same woman as mandated in the Mosaic Law. The unanswerable question: “Which of the seven would be the woman’s husband in the next life?” (Luke 20:33) For the non-believers in the resurrection, there was no problem since with death everything ends. However, for those who believed, this question posed a serious problem. Who becomes the rightful spouse of the woman? Would she be considered polygamous and sinful? 

In His response to the Sadducees, Jesus manages to avoid the trap they have set for Him by giving them an insight into the truth of the afterlife. He declares with authority that in the next life there are no marriage relationships. “The children of this age [i.e. those who belong to this world] marry and remarry but those who are deemed worthy to attain to the coming age and to the resurrection of the dead neither marry nor are given in marriage”.  (Luke 20:35) Marriage after all is meant to create families and to rear children and continue to populate the earth. Heaven does not need that. In other words, we are not supposed to assume that heaven is like earth. The things of heaven are not the things of earth.  Jesus’ response says that our earthly relationships take on a different form when we are all reunited in heaven. Since we have become adopted children of God in Christ, brothers and sisters to each other, there will be a different essence and focus to our relationship with God and one another in God’s Kingdom. Everything we know, we know because it is revealed by Jesus who is Lord of this life and the next. The details of the afterlife remain a mystery to us who are living and perhaps will only be made clear as we find ourselves at death’s door. 

To further prove His point, Jesus challenges the Sadducees’ unbelief about life after death by quoting from a part of the Bible which they recognise as true. He reminds them of the episode at the burning bush with the voice identifying Himself to Moses. “I AM the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob” (Exodus 3:6). God, says Jesus, is the God of the living and not of the dead [i.e., of those who have gone ahead and do not exist physically anymore]. Since Abraham, Isaac and Jacob’s God is a god of the living, then by consequence, are also living.  This is how Jesus makes apparent where the Sadducees’ argument fails.

Recently we lost a very dear Sister in the Religious of the Assumption (Sr. Mary Fidelis Estrada, RA). I remember her as one person who was never afraid to die… to pass on to fuller life. She once told me that she would always  pray to God to take her as soon as her mission on earth is done. Her life was a testament of love and gratitude. She was convinced that we have a loving God who will not allow those who believe in Him to suffer eternal damnation. She was of the conviction that in God’s love no one is ever lost. 

Lastly, I urge you to focus on what is essential. Let us not waste time speculating over things which will not yield a precise knowledge or we do not have an experience of.  It is enough that we place our trust in Jesus and in the declarations He has made in Scriptures. There is no reason for us to doubt Him or to challenge His teachings. He has not failed us and He never will. As a people of faith, although we may not fully understand God’s plans for us we should be rest assured that our future lies securely in God’s hands. Jesus’ promises are more than enough to keep us going! Saint Paul says that “God is always faithful and that He directs our lives toward His love and the endurance of Christ.”  (2 Thessalonians  3:5) Let us allow the Lord to lead us to Himself and trust that He has prepared a place for us in His heavenly home.