TOB Tuesday: Three Thoughts

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Writing for the Theology of the Body Institute, Bill Donaghy, reflects on what he things are the “three most powerful thoughts from Pope John Paul II’s Theology of the Body.” Thought #1 – The Body Is Holy:

Many of us grow up being conditioned to think that are bodies are somehow dirty, our desires are always sinful and sex is a guilty pleasure (even among the married!). We seem to forget that it was God Himself Who gave us our bodies and declared them to be “very good” in the beginning (Gen. 2:31). God’s first commandment was not a “Thou Shalt Not” but a life-affirming, joyful and ecstatic exclamation to “Be fruitful and multiply!” (Gen. 2:38).

Our bodies are holy, unique, set apart, different and wholly one with our souls; they are not pieces of luggage our souls are wrapped in until death do us part. Our bodies are destined to share in the glory that is to come. The body is “a unique composite – a unity of spirit and matter, soul and body, fashioned in the image of God and destined to live forever” (Pope John Paul II’s message to Health Workers, Phoenix, Arizona, 1987).

It’s the sad consequence of sin that has caused a rift in the body/soul harmony. Everyone today, in a hundred different ways, is trying to figure out how to restore the balance. We must remember that our bodies are temples. I think we sometimes consider them to be more like parish youth centers or modestly carpeted church basements. Our bodies are so much more than this, for something beautifully theological is expressed in and through our bodies!

Read more on the other two thoughts: Marriage is an appetizer and God is a Lover.

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