Hope all’s well.
Now and again you might hear it said, particularly in times of bereavement and loss, ‘it must be awful not to believe, not to have faith in the afterlife’ or ‘I couldn’t get through this without my faith, without my faith in God, without believing in life after death’
The Sadducees (see today’s gospel) didn’t believe in life after death. For them, there’s no life beyond this earthly life.
They want to trap Jesus and ridicule him about believing that death doesn’t have the last word.
They paint this picture trying to make the afterlife look like it is a complete extension of this life and they want to make it sound absurd.
Jesus says that it will be different. ‘For when they rise from the dead, men and women do not marry; no they are like angels in heaven’
Really Christ is saying to us that life after death will not just be a continuation of this earthly life, but it will be different beyond our understanding and imagining.
St Paul when writing to the people in Corinth about the afterlife said, ‘We shall all be changed’.
Thank God for our faith, our faith in eternal life.
Without it, it is unthinkable how life would be coping and living with the loss of our loved ones.
Remember, if you have a few photos of any parish pilgrimages from over the years, email them in for our video collage to [email protected]
Take care
Have a safe and happy Wednesday
Fr Mackle