As we considered yesterday, the highest good that awaits us in Heaven is the vision of God, which will make us infinitely happy. Some Church Fathers have attempted to make this incomprehensible reality somehow accessible to us. Therefore, I would like to add one of these voices for our edification. Saint Augustine, a master of the word, writes in The City of God:[1]
How great shall be that felicity, which shall be tainted with no evil, which shall lack no good, and which shall afford leisure for the praises of God, who shall be all in all! For I know not what other employment there can be where no lassitude shall slacken activity, nor any want stimulate to labor. (…) All the members and organs of the incorruptible body, which now we see to be suited to various necessary uses, shall contribute to the praises of God; for in that life necessity shall have no place, but full, certain, secure, everlasting felicity. (…) And, along with the other great and marvellous discoveries which shall then kindle rational minds in praise of the great Artificer, there shall be the enjoyment of a beauty which appeals to the reason. (Book 22, chapter 30)
Let us consider two of the elements the Saint mentions here. On the one hand, there is an “other life” that will no longer be determined by earthly necessities. We do things because we do them gladly and with ease. This applies to all areas of our existence. Certainly, there are also things on earth that we enjoy doing, especially when they are done in view of God. Yet we surely sense the “paradisiacal” in these words of Augustine. The burden is lifted. The soil no longer needs to be tilled by the sweat of our brow so that we may survive. We no longer have to perceive the traces of death in our bodies, which lead to illness and all manner of ailments. Augustine praises the agility of the body, which we spoke of three days ago, as well as all the benefits we will then enjoy because of our spiritual body.
Even more sublime, however, is the second element that Augustine describes. It is the praise of the spirits with whom we will live in full communion—with the angels and saints who are our brothers. The great and perfect communion of those who carry out God’s will without any hindrance. It is a communion such as we can only wish for, yet one that far surpasses any wish. Is it not already the case on earth that we can enter into the deepest communion with those who love God with all their hearts, despite all limitations? How much more will this be the case in eternity, when each of us tells the other how deeply we are loved by God and praises the heavenly splendor that God has bestowed upon us!
There, in eternity, as Augustine writes: “True honor shall be there, for it shall be denied to none who is worthy, nor yielded to any unworthy; neither shall any unworthy person so much as sue for it, for none but the worthy shall be there. True peace shall be there, where no one shall suffer opposition either from himself or any other.”
Then the Saint reflects further on free will:
“In that city, then, there shall be free will, one in all the citizens, and indivisible in each, delivered from all ill, filled with all good, enjoying indefeasibly the delights of eternal joys, oblivious of sins, oblivious of sufferings, and yet not so oblivious of its deliverance as to be ungrateful to its Deliverer. (…) Certainly that city shall have no greater joy than the celebration of the grace of Christ, who redeemed us by His blood. (…) There shall be the great Sabbath which has no evening, which God celebrated among His first works, as it is written, And God rested on the seventh day from all His works which He had made. And God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it; because that in it He had rested from all His work which God began to make. (Gen 2:2–3)
For we shall ourselves be the seventh day, when we shall be filled and replenished with God’s blessing and sanctification. There shall we be still, and know that He is God; that He is that which we ourselves aspired to be when we fell away from Him, and listened to the voice of the seducer, You shall be as gods (Gen 3;5), and so abandoned God, who would have made us as gods, not by deserting Him, but by participating in Him.”
Reflection on the daily reading: https://en.elijamission.net/acts-of-the-apostles-acts-61-7-the-election-of-the-seven-deacons-and-the-persecution-of-stephen/
Reflection on the daily Gospel: https://en.elijamission.net/even-in-the-darkness-jesus-is-with-us-2/
